AI · The typing monkey

What do language models and a typing monkey have in common?

Name: What do language models and a typing monkey have in common?
Uploaded: 2026-10-25
Duration: 24 s
Description: Give a monkey a keyboard and forever, and it will type Hamlet by chance. Just the line to be or not to be would take about ten to the twenty six tries. A language model is the same monkey with loaded keys: from what it has typed so far, it has learned which key comes next. Chance, shaped by everything we ever wrote.

What you’ll see

Give a monkey a keyboard and forever, and it will type Hamlet by chance. Just the line to be or not to be would take about ten to the twenty six tries. A language model is the same monkey with loaded keys: from what it has typed so far, it has learned which key comes next. Chance, shaped by everything we ever wrote.