How ChatGPT Works, In Layman’s Terms [Written by Claude] – Splitting Headache
This is my previous blog post rewritten by Anthropic’s Claude model. The original post.
Let’s get one thing straight: ChatGPT is not “AI” in the way you might imagine—a thinking, reasoning human-like intelligence. It’s essentially a sophisticated “What Word Comes Next” prediction machine. Think of it like an incredibly advanced autocomplete that doesn’t just finish your sentence, but can write entire essays, stories, and code.
A Mathematical Foundation (Don’t Panic!)
Remember regression from statistics class? The simple equation y = mx + b
? That’s actually the perfect analogy for how ChatGPT predicts text. Just like how that equation helps you predict a y-value from x, ChatGPT predicts the next word based on previous words.
Imagine this equation stretched out to include billions of variables: y = mx1 + nx2 + ... + nx1billion + b
. Suddenly, you’re not just predicting one point, but an entire landscape of possible words.
Tokens: The Building Blocks of Prediction
Here’s where it gets interesting. ChatGPT doesn’t work with whole words, but with “tokens”—smaller chunks of language. Take this Shakespeare-inspired sentence: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”
When tokenized, it looks like:
[What]['s][ in][ a][ name][?][ That][ which][ we][ call][ a][ rose][ by][ any][ other][ name][ would][ smell][ as][ sweet][.]
Each token gets a numerical representation, which then feeds into an incredibly complex prediction equation.
The Great Data Feast
How does ChatGPT learn? By consuming an mind-boggling amount of text. I mean everything: novels, Wikipedia articles, blog posts, forum discussions, even leaked emails (yep, everything publicly available). Armies of scientists and engineers then create a method to transform this text into a predictive model.
This process, called “training”, creates an algorithm so complex that no single human fully understands its inner workings. That’s what makes it feel almost magical.
Important Disclaimers
Let me be crystal clear: This explanation is a massive oversimplification. A technically trained reader would spot numerous nuanced inaccuracies. But that’s intentional. My goal is to explain a complex technological concept in a way that an average high school graduate can understand.
Consider this your beginner’s guide to understanding the wizardry behind ChatGPT—no advanced degree required.