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Technology

How does ChatGPT work and do AI-powered chatbots “think” like us?

The large language models behind the new chatbots are trained to predict which words are most likely to appear together – but “emergent abilities” suggest they might be doing more than that

By Edd Gent

25 July 2023

2R59MEN ChatGPT, chatbots and AI

Illustronaut/Alamy

The current whirlwind of interest in artificial intelligence is largely down to the sudden arrival of a new generation of AI-powered chatbots capable of startlingly human-like text-based conversations. The big change came last year, when OpenAI released ChatGPT. Overnight, millions gained access to an AI producing responses that are so uncannily fluent that it has been hard not to wonder if this heralds a turning point of some sort.

There has been no shortage of hype. Microsoft researchers given early access to GPT4, the latest version of the system behind ChatGPT, argued that it has already demonstrated “sparks” of…

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