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Thoughtful Comics
Does AI Understand Language The Way A Person Does?
How language models use patterns without sharing human experience or unstated social context.
The takeaways
- 01A language model does not share lived experience or the room’s social context.
- 02Models learn relationships in language and predict useful responses.
- 03Unstated context matters most in sensitive human situations.
- 04Explain the situation, consider interpretations, and keep human judgment.
Read this comic as text
Reader Why did you miss that I was being sarcastic?
Robot I model patterns in language, but I do not share your lived experience or the room's social context.
Takeaway: A language model does not share lived experience or the room’s social context.
Reader Then what does an LLM understand?
Robot It learns rich relationships among words, ideas, and examples, allowing it to predict useful responses.
Takeaway: Models learn relationships in language and predict useful responses.
Reader Where is that difference most important?
Robot In emotional, cultural, political, or organisational situations where unstated context matters.
Takeaway: Unstated context matters most in sensitive human situations.
Reader I will explain the situation and ask you to identify possible interpretations.
Robot And keep human judgment for the interpretation that affects people.
Takeaway: Explain the situation, consider interpretations, and keep human judgment.
- LLM
- A large language model trained to recognise and generate patterns in language.
- Representation
- An internal numerical way for a model to organise relationships among concepts.
- Ambiguity
- Language or information that can reasonably have more than one meaning.
- Implicit context
- Background people understand without it being directly stated.