How to actually understand ChatGPT and write the best prompts

Ryan Schmidt
12 min readMar 24, 2023

To begin using the best prompts for ChatGPT, you should have a good understanding of natural language processing (NLP) and deep learning concepts. Here’s how you can get started:

  1. Basics of NLP: You should start by learning the fundamentals of NLP, including text preprocessing, tokenization, stemming, and lemmatization. You should also learn about parts of speech tagging, named entity recognition, and dependency parsing.
  2. Machine Learning: Familiarize yourself with the basic concepts of machine learning, including supervised and unsupervised learning, classification, and regression. Learn how to train and evaluate machine learning models.
  3. Deep Learning: Once you have a good understanding of machine learning, you can move on to deep learning. Learn about artificial neural networks, convolutional neural networks (CNNs), recurrent neural networks (RNNs), and deep belief networks (DBNs).
  4. Training ChatGPT: Now that you have a good understanding of NLP and deep learning concepts, you can start learning how to train ChatGPT. You should learn about transformer-based architectures and how they are used for natural language processing. You should also learn about training data preparation, model hyperparameters, and training processes.
  5. Prompt Creation: Once you know how to train ChatGPT, you should learn about prompt creation. Prompts are the initial text inputs that are used to start the conversation with the model. You should learn about different types of prompts, including goal-oriented prompts, open-ended prompts, and conditional prompts. You should also learn about how to create prompts that can generate high-quality responses from ChatGPT.
  6. Evaluating ChatGPT: Finally, you should learn about how to evaluate the performance of ChatGPT. You should learn about metrics like perplexity, BLEU score, and ROUGE score, and how they are used to evaluate the performance of language models. You should also learn about human evaluation and how it can be used to improve the quality of generated responses.

By understanding these concepts, you should have a good understanding of NLP, deep learning, and how to train and evaluate ChatGPT. You will be able to create high-quality prompts and generate responses that are indistinguishable from those written by humans.

Basics of NLP

Natural Language Processing (NLP) is a subfield of artificial intelligence (AI) that focuses on how machines can understand, interpret, and respond to human language. It involves the use of machine learning algorithms and statistical models to analyze and process text and speech data. In this article, we’ll discuss the basics of NLP, including text preprocessing, tokenization, stemming, and lemmatization.

Text Preprocessing

Text preprocessing is the first step in any NLP project. It involves cleaning and formatting the raw text data so that it can be analyzed by machine learning algorithms. Some common text preprocessing techniques include:

  1. Removing unwanted characters and symbols
  2. Converting all text to lowercase
  3. Removing stop words (common words like “the,” “and,” and “a” that don’t carry much meaning)
  4. Removing punctuation marks
  5. Handling contractions (e.g., converting “don’t” to “do not”)
  6. Removing numbers

By preprocessing the text data, we can reduce the complexity of the input data and make it easier for machine learning algorithms to extract meaningful information.

Tokenization

Tokenization is the process of breaking up text into smaller units called tokens. Tokens are typically words, but they can also be phrases or other meaningful units of text. Tokenization is an important step in NLP because it allows us to analyze text at a more granular level. For example, we can count the frequency of each word in a piece of text and use that information to identify important keywords.

There are several different approaches to tokenization, including rule-based methods and statistical methods. Rule-based methods rely on pre-defined rules to split text into tokens, while statistical methods use machine learning algorithms to learn how to tokenize text based on patterns in the data.

Stemming

Stemming is the process of reducing words to their base or root form. For example, the stem of the word “running” is “run.” Stemming is a useful technique in NLP because it allows us to group together words that have the same root. This can be helpful in tasks like sentiment analysis or topic modeling, where we want to identify patterns in the way people use language.

There are several different stemming algorithms available, including the Porter stemmer and the Snowball stemmer. Each algorithm has its own strengths and weaknesses, and the choice of algorithm depends on the specific NLP task at hand.

Lemmatization

Lemmatization is similar to stemming, but it involves reducing words to their base form based on their dictionary definition. For example, the lemma of the word “ran” is “run,” while the lemma of the word “went” is “go.” Lemmatization is a more accurate technique than stemming, but it is also more computationally expensive.

Machine Learning

Machine learning is a field of artificial intelligence (AI) that focuses on the development of algorithms and statistical models that can learn from data and make predictions or decisions based on that learning. In the context of natural language processing (NLP), machine learning algorithms are used to analyze and understand text and speech data.

Supervised Learning

Supervised learning is a type of machine learning that involves training a model on a labeled dataset. In the context of NLP, this means providing the model with examples of text data and their corresponding labels (e.g., sentiment labels, topic labels, etc.). The model then uses this information to learn patterns in the data and make predictions on new, unlabeled data.

Some common supervised learning algorithms used in NLP include:

  1. Naive Bayes Classifier — This is a probabilistic algorithm that is often used for text classification tasks, such as sentiment analysis or spam detection.
  2. Support Vector Machines (SVM) — SVMs are a powerful algorithm for text classification and other NLP tasks. They work by finding the hyperplane that best separates the data points in a high-dimensional space.
  3. Decision Trees — Decision trees are a popular algorithm for text classification and other NLP tasks. They work by recursively partitioning the data based on the most informative features.

Unsupervised Learning

Unsupervised learning is a type of machine learning that involves training a model on an unlabeled dataset. In the context of NLP, this means providing the model with raw text data and letting it learn patterns on its own. This type of learning is often used for tasks like topic modeling or clustering, where the goal is to identify meaningful patterns in the data.

Some common unsupervised learning algorithms used in NLP include:

  1. Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) — LDA is a popular algorithm for topic modeling. It works by identifying topics based on the distribution of words in the text.
  2. K-means Clustering — K-means is a clustering algorithm that is often used for text clustering tasks. It works by partitioning the data into K clusters based on their similarity.
  3. Word Embeddings — Word embeddings are a powerful technique for representing words as dense vectors in a high-dimensional space. They can be learned using unsupervised learning algorithms like Word2Vec or GloVe.

Deep Learning

Deep learning is a type of machine learning that involves training neural networks with multiple layers. In the context of NLP, deep learning has been used to achieve state-of-the-art results on tasks like language modeling, machine translation, and question answering.

Some common deep learning architectures used in NLP include:

  1. Recurrent Neural Networks (RNNs) — RNNs are a type of neural network that can process sequences of input data. They are often used for tasks like language modeling and sentiment analysis.
  2. Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) — CNNs are a type of neural network that is often used for text classification tasks. They work by learning local features from the text data.
  3. Transformer-based Models — Transformer-based models, like BERT and GPT, have achieved state-of-the-art results on a wide range of NLP tasks. They work by processing the input text data in parallel and learning representations that capture the context and meaning of the text.

Deep Learning

Reinforcement learning is a type of machine learning that involves an agent learning to make decisions based on trial and error in an environment. In the context of natural language processing (NLP), reinforcement learning can be used to train chatbots or virtual assistants to generate human-like responses to user inputs.

The basic components of a reinforcement learning system include:

  1. Environment — The environment is the context in which the agent operates. In the case of NLP, the environment could be a chatbot interface or virtual assistant that interacts with users.
  2. Agent — The agent is the decision-making component of the system. In the case of NLP, the agent could be a chatbot or virtual assistant that generates responses to user inputs.
  3. Actions — Actions are the decisions made by the agent in response to the environment. In the case of NLP, actions could be generating a response to a user input.
  4. Rewards — Rewards are feedback provided by the environment to the agent based on the actions taken. In the case of NLP, rewards could be positive feedback for generating a helpful response or negative feedback for generating an unhelpful response.

The goal of reinforcement learning in NLP is to train the agent to take actions that maximize the expected reward over time. This is done through a process called policy optimization, where the agent’s decision-making policy is updated based on the rewards received from the environment.

Some common reinforcement learning algorithms used in NLP include:

  1. Q-learning — Q-learning is a model-free reinforcement learning algorithm that learns a Q-value function that estimates the expected reward for taking a given action in a given state.
  2. Deep Q-Networks (DQNs) — DQNs are an extension of Q-learning that use deep neural networks to learn the Q-value function.
  3. Policy Gradient Methods — Policy gradient methods are a type of reinforcement learning algorithm that directly optimize the agent’s decision-making policy based on the rewards received from the environment.

In the context of NLP, reinforcement learning has been used to train chatbots and virtual assistants to generate more natural and human-like responses to user inputs. By learning from trial and error in the environment, these systems can improve over time and provide more personalized and helpful interactions with users.

Training ChatGPT

Generative adversarial networks (GANs) are a type of neural network architecture used for unsupervised learning, where the goal is to generate new data that is similar to a given dataset. In the context of natural language processing (NLP), GANs can be used to generate human-like text.

The basic components of a GAN include:

  1. Generator — The generator is the component of the system that generates new data. In the case of NLP, the generator could be a neural network that generates new text.
  2. Discriminator — The discriminator is the component of the system that evaluates the quality of the generated data. In the case of NLP, the discriminator could be a neural network that evaluates the coherence and relevance of the generated text.
  3. Training Data — The training data is the dataset used to train the GAN. In the case of NLP, the training data could be a corpus of text, such as books or articles.

The training process for a GAN involves training the generator to produce new data that is similar to the training data, while also training the discriminator to distinguish between the generated data and the real data. The generator and discriminator are trained together in a two-player minimax game, where the generator tries to maximize the probability of the discriminator classifying the generated data as real, while the discriminator tries to maximize the probability of correctly classifying the real data as real and the generated data as fake.

Some common GAN architectures used in NLP include:

  1. Generative Pre-trained Transformer 2 (GPT-2) — GPT-2 is a state-of-the-art language model that uses a transformer-based neural network architecture to generate human-like text.
  2. Conditional GANs — Conditional GANs are a type of GAN that are conditioned on a specific input, such as a sentence or a topic, to generate text that is relevant to that input.
  3. Adversarial Autoencoders — Adversarial autoencoders are a type of GAN that use an encoder-decoder architecture to generate text. The encoder generates a latent representation of the input text, which is then used by the decoder to generate new text.

In the context of NLP, GANs can be used to generate new text for tasks such as text completion, language translation, and summarization. By learning from the patterns and structure of the training data, GANs can generate text that is coherent and relevant to a given task or input.

Prompt Creation

Neural machine translation (NMT) is a type of machine translation that uses neural networks to translate text from one language to another. In the context of natural language processing (NLP), NMT can be used to automate the process of translating text between different languages.

The basic components of an NMT system include:

  1. Encoder — The encoder is the component of the system that converts the input text into a numerical representation that can be processed by the neural network. In the case of NMT, the encoder could be a recurrent neural network (RNN) or a transformer-based neural network.
  2. Decoder — The decoder is the component of the system that generates the translated text from the numerical representation produced by the encoder. In the case of NMT, the decoder could also be an RNN or transformer-based neural network.
  3. Training Data — The training data is the dataset used to train the NMT system. In the case of NMT, the training data could be parallel corpora, which are pairs of sentences in different languages that have been translated by humans.

The training process for an NMT system involves minimizing the difference between the predicted translations and the true translations in the training data. This is done through a process called backpropagation, where the error in the predicted translations is propagated back through the neural network and used to update the weights of the network.

Some common NMT architectures used in NLP include:

  1. Sequence-to-sequence models — Sequence-to-sequence models use an encoder-decoder architecture to translate sequences of text between languages.
  2. Attention mechanisms — Attention mechanisms are used to improve the performance of NMT systems by allowing the decoder to focus on specific parts of the input text that are relevant to the translation.
  3. Transformer-based models — Transformer-based models are a type of neural network architecture that use self-attention mechanisms to process sequences of text.

In the context of NLP, NMT can be used to automate the process of translating text between different languages, making it easier for people to communicate and access information in different languages. By using neural networks to learn from large amounts of training data, NMT systems can generate translations that are fluent and accurate.

Evaluating ChatGPT

Named entity recognition (NER) is a subtask of natural language processing (NLP) that involves identifying and categorizing named entities in text. Named entities refer to specific objects, people, locations, organizations, or other entities that have a name or label associated with them. NER is used in a variety of applications, including information retrieval, machine translation, and text summarization.

The basic components of an NER system include:

  1. Preprocessing — The text is preprocessed to remove any noise, such as special characters or punctuation marks, and to tokenize the text into words or phrases.
  2. Feature Extraction — The features of the text are extracted, such as part-of-speech tags, context, and surrounding words.
  3. Classification — The features are used to classify the text into categories such as named entities, or non-named entities.
  4. Post-processing — The output is post-processed to remove any false positives, and to ensure that all named entities have been identified and classified correctly.

Some common techniques used in NER include:

  1. Rule-based approach — A rule-based approach involves manually creating a set of rules or patterns to identify and categorize named entities. These rules may be based on the context or surrounding words of the named entity.
  2. Machine learning approach — A machine learning approach involves training a model to identify and categorize named entities using a labeled dataset. Common machine learning algorithms used for NER include decision trees, support vector machines, and deep learning models such as recurrent neural networks.
  3. Hybrid approach — A hybrid approach combines both rule-based and machine learning techniques to improve the accuracy of the NER system.

In the context of NLP, NER is used to extract information from large amounts of text, such as news articles or social media posts, and to categorize this information into specific entities. NER is also used in search engines to help users find information more efficiently, and in machine translation to ensure that named entities are translated accurately. By automating the process of identifying and categorizing named entities, NER can help to save time and improve the accuracy of NLP applications.

Conclusion

Natural language processing (NLP) is a fascinating field that involves teaching computers how to understand, interpret, and generate human language. In this article, we’ve covered six different areas of NLP that showcase the range of applications and techniques that are involved in making this happen.

Starting with language models, we explored how these AI-powered tools can be trained to understand and generate human-like responses in text-based conversations. From there, we delved into machine translation, which is a key area of NLP that enables us to communicate with people from all around the world in their native languages.

Named entity recognition (NER) is another exciting application of NLP that involves identifying and categorizing named entities in text, such as people, places, and organizations. This can be incredibly useful for tasks like information retrieval and search engine optimization.

On the technical side of things, we covered recurrent neural networks (RNNs) and transformers, which are two types of neural network architectures that are commonly used in NLP. These architectures play a crucial role in powering many of the applications we’ve explored, from language models to machine translation.

And of course, we can’t forget the importance of a good sense of humor in NLP. While we might not have language models that can tell the best jokes just yet, the possibilities are endless when it comes to the ways that NLP can be used to enhance communication and understanding between humans and machines.

Overall, NLP is a field that holds endless potential for improving the ways we communicate with each other and with technology. By harnessing the power of AI and machine learning, we can continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible in natural language processing and beyond.

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Ryan Schmidt

My life revolves around my cats, my girlfriend, and really expensive food.