Member-only story
Fist of all, let’s start with some foundational understanding. While the use of large language models is fairly intuitive, when it comes to application development via APIs, there are certain basics we should grasp. This includes understanding the nature of large models, the installation process for LangChain, the various APIs offered by OpenAI, and sources to download prevalent open-source big models.
What is a Large Language Model?
A large language model is an advanced artificial intelligence construct, predominantly harnessing deep learning methods such as neural networks, to decode and generate human linguistic patterns. The term ‘large’ signifies the extensive number of parameters these models possess, often scaling to tens of billions or more. This substantial size empowers them to recognize and emulate sophisticated language structures.
Think of a large language model as an extensive predictive mechanism. Its core training principle is akin to “word prediction”: given a text’s beginning, it endeavors to anticipate the next word. Drawing from vast training datasets, like web-scraped texts, the model seeks to discern how words and their groupings function and relate in a language. It continually refines its predictions, honing its parameters for optimal precision.
Take this as an example: if we feed the model a partial sentence like “The cake tastes so…”, it might anticipate “delicious” as the following word. This is because “The cake tastes so delicious” is a frequent expression it has encountered in its extensive training data.
Such forecasts don’t just hinge on the frequency of word pairings, but also a deeper comprehension of the surrounding context. Occasionally, the model even demonstrates an understanding of common cultural sentiments, recognizing, for instance, that cakes are typically associated with celebrations or positive emotions. As a result, it can produce or deduce content that aligns with these themes.
However, large language models do not fully understand language. They lack human emotions, consciousness, or…
