Chain Rule for Sequence Probability
The chain rule of probability is a fundamental principle used in language modeling to calculate the joint probability of a sequence of tokens, such as {x_0, x_1, ..., x_m}. It works by decomposing the joint probability into a product of conditional probabilities. Each term in this product, , represents the probability of token occurring, given all the tokens that came before it. The general formula is: This can be written more compactly using product notation: By convention, the conditional probability for the first term, where i=0, is simply the marginal probability (\text{Pr}(x_0)). For practical applications, this formula can be expressed in a logarithmic form, which converts the product into a sum and improves numerical stability.

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Ch.2 Generative Models - Foundations of Large Language Models
Foundations of Large Language Models
Foundations of Large Language Models Course
Computing Sciences
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Types of Language Models
Evaluating language models
Shannon's Foundational Work on Language Modeling
Generalization of the Language Modeling Concept
Chain Rule for Sequence Probability
Deep Learning Approach to Language Modeling
Output Token Sequence in LLMs
Start of Sentence (SOS) Token
[CLS] Token as a Start Symbol
A system is designed to predict the probability of a sequence of words. For the sequence 'The dog ran', the system provides the following conditional probabilities:
- The probability of 'The' occurring at the start of a sequence is 0.2.
- The probability of 'dog' occurring after 'The' is 0.3.
- The probability of 'ran' occurring after 'The dog' is 0.7.
Based on the fundamental principle used by such systems to determine the likelihood of a full sequence, what is the overall probability of the sequence 'The dog ran'?
Analyzing Language Model Probability Assignments
A system's primary goal is to predict the probability of a sequence of tokens. To calculate the total probability for the sequence 'The quick brown fox', it breaks the problem down into a series of conditional probability calculations. Arrange the following calculations in the correct order that the system would use to find the total probability of the sequence.
Evaluating a Language Model's Probabilistic Output
Chain Rule for Sequence Probability
Conditional Probability of the Next Token
A model is generating a sequence of words. It has already produced the words 'The', 'quick', 'brown'. According to the principle of autoregressive conditional probability, which expression correctly represents the likelihood that the next word will be 'fox', given the preceding words?
Defining Probability for a Token in a Sequence
A model is generating a sequence of elements (x₀, x₁, x₂, x₃, ...). To calculate the probability of the fourth element (x₃), the model's calculation must be conditioned on the entire preceding subsequence (x₀, x₁, x₂). A simplified model that conditions the probability of x₃ only on the immediately preceding element (x₂) would still be correctly applying the principle of autoregressive conditional probability.