How LLMs Work

An interactive guide — no PhD required

Based on Stanford CME 295: Transformers & Large Language Models

You type “hello” into ChatGPT.

The computer sees 15496.

Every conversation you’ve ever had with an AI started with this translation: your words became numbers, and the AI’s numbers became words back.

But it’s not random. In the right system, “king” minus “man” plus “woman” equals “queen.”

Words become coordinates on a map. And on that map, meaning has a shape.