The discourse around this is annoying. A big group of people use "next-token predictor" to imply that LLMs aren't capable of anything interesting. Another big group of people opposes the use of "next-token predictor" because of that implication. But that fight isn't about the "predictor" language at all.
The linked article makes a good point: a substantial chunk of the training does not consist of "here's a bunch of tokens, here's the next token, learn that." But all the comments want to turn it into a referendum on the goodness of AI.
The linked article makes a good point: a substantial chunk of the training does not consist of "here's a bunch of tokens, here's the next token, learn that." But all the comments want to turn it into a referendum on the goodness of AI.