# Next-Token Prediction **Entity class:** Concept **Research spine:** [[research/Chronology of Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software - Research|Chronology of Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software]] ## Definition Next-token prediction is the iterative language-model process of estimating a probability distribution over the next token, selecting one, appending it, and repeating. ## Chronological Proximity The abstract loop runs from [[wiki/Claude Shannon Next-Word Generation|Shannon's 1948 experiment]] through the 2017 transformer to [[wiki/GPT-2|GPT-2]] and later systems. ## Relational Proximity The [[wiki/Transformer Architecture|transformer]] expands contextual representation, while [[wiki/Temperature|temperature]] governs how the predicted distribution is sampled. ## Collection Routes [[collections/The Civilian Intelligence Marketplace|The Civilian Intelligence Marketplace]] · [[collections/Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and the Intelligence Environment|Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and the Intelligence Environment]] · [[wiki/Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software|Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software]] ## Sources / Provenance - [[research/Chronology of Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software - Research|Chronology of Signals, Silos, and Sovereign Software - Research]].