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J.M.W. Turner, "Valley of Aosta: Snowstorm, Avalanche and Thunderstorm," 1836/37. Oil on canvas,
92.2 x 123 cm. Frederick T. Haskell Collection, Art Institute of Chicago.
Image via Wikimedia Commons.

What is romanticism?
Romanticism is a creative movement that spanned literature, visual art, music, poetry, and architecture in the 18th and 19th centuries. It elevated the role of the artist in society and formed modern ideas of individuality, originality, and personal experience (read 101).

The romantics embraced philosopher Edmund Burke’s concept of the sublime, with the era's painters showcasing grand scenes intended to draw strong reactions (see a list of famous romanticism paintings here).

Despite a similarity to the word “romance,” romanticism includes a broad range of positive and negative emotions and subjects beyond romantic love and ultimately played a significant role in major historical events like the aftermath of the French Revolution, German unification, and many nationalist movements.

... Read our full look at romanticism here.

Also, check out ...
> How romanticism's trope of the Byronic hero dominates culture today. (More)
> Explaining the technique of depicting a subject from behind. (More)
> The reasons photography moved art beyond romanticism. (More)



Under the Hood of the Chatbot
Large language models, explained
Large language models are sophisticated computer programs that process and generate natural language, providing the foundation for tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini (watch explainer).

By finding patterns in the sequence of words and subwords (prefixes, for example) in massive amounts of text, these models can predict the most likely next word in a generated sequence and repeat this prediction until the output is complete (learn how they know when to stop).

AI chatbots are user-friendly interfaces that act as intermediaries between users and the LLM framework. Because of the temperature parameter, insufficient data, or inadequate training, LLMs may hallucinate, generating false or misleading information. Due to the complex nature of transformer architecture, explicitly identifying what led to the hallucination is often impossible.

... Read our full explainer on LLMs here.

Also, check out ...
> See if you can prompt this LLM to reveal (fake) passwords. (More)
> The key computer chips that power generative AI. (More)
> What is an AI agent? (More)