Hm. By [inter|extra]polation, I mean the prediction of some unvalidated value/number based on prior validated values/numbers using a *formal* model. While it's true that this conversation, where SteveS asserts an analogy between LLM interpolation and human intuition, involves informal interpolation, that's a stretch. Stretching formal prediction to informal expectation(s) is OK. We do it all the time. But what you're doing in the pigeon thing is conflating the formal with the informal. And that's dangerous.
The formal model for a pigeon falling would look a bit different from the formal model for a stone, depending not only on the shape of the stone but the fact that stones aren't covered in feathers and aren't bags of meat. Similarly, the formal interpolation done by LLMs may be *very* different from the informal interpolation done by humans. I just don't know how linguistic interpolation works in the human brain ... and I posit that you don't know either. But I can say the formal models lead to concrete expectations. The informal ones usually do not. To be clear, math is formal and concrete (to me). Sentences like "It will fall like a stone" are NOT formal, nor concrete. That doesn't mean informal things cannot be concrete, however. But concrete informal things require high-frequency, high-dimensional feedback ... i.e. we'd have to be standing next to each other when you threw the pigeons and the rocks. The concreteness is mediated by that tight coupling. On 6/19/25 8:25 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
I am a child in this universe. Delegate someone to set me straight. Am I not correct that we cannot have the calculus without interpolation? Ok, so the problem is with linguistic interpolation ? So, let us compare two interpolations. Let us toss a dead pigeon off the Leaning Tower and predict that it will arrive on the surface of the Plaza in N seconds. We are interpolating, right ? Or extrapolating. Whichever. If I said, "It will fall like a stone ", that would be a linguistic interpolation, right ? Both lead to concrete expectations. Well , at least to marble ones. In one case we need a stopwatch to con firm; in the other case we need a stone. Nick
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