Probabilistic vs deterministic

Also called: probabilistic, deterministic, non-deterministic, stochastic, Non-determinism, randomness

Deterministic software gives the same output for the same input every time. AI models are probabilistic: they pick likely words with some randomness, so the same question can get different answers. This is why AI products need checks.

For example: A calculator always says 2 + 2 = 4. Ask an LLM to write a product description twice and you get two different versions.

Connects to 8

Sampling Concept
Temperature Concept
Evals Concept
Hallucination Concept
Next-token prediction Concept
Automated check Concept
Testing Concept
Inference Concept