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OpenAI’s o1 Model Prefers to Think in Chinese. Here’s Why.

Emergent properties and AI reasoning

Thomas Smith
The Generator
4 min readJan 24, 2025

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Illustration via Midjourney

If you speak multiple languages, you’ve probably had the experience of thinking or dreaming in a language that’s not your native tongue.

I learned some French in high school, and I’ll occasionally have a dream where I’m speaking French.

Apparently, OpenAI’s o1 model does the same thing. According to recent reporting by TechCrunch, the model will sometimes randomly begin to “think” in Chinese.

To understand why, it helps to know a bit more about how the o1 model works.

Mulling it Over

OpenAI’s O1 model is a reasoning model. Whereas earlier generations of large language models (LLMs) and chatbots took in a prompt and immediately returned a response, reasoning models work differently.

When you give them a prompt, there’s an intermediate step where the model first expands on your prompt, works to understand your intentions, and then maps out its plan for solving the problem you’ve presented.

For example, if you ask the model to write a blog post, it might first consider the general format that blog posts follow, review other blog posts you may have asked it to create in the past, and take into account…

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The Generator
The Generator

Published in The Generator

The Generator covers the emerging field of generative AI, with generative AI news, critical analysis, real-world tests and experiments, expert interviews, tool reviews, culture, and more

Thomas Smith
Thomas Smith

Written by Thomas Smith

CEO of Gado Images | Content Consultant | Covers tech, food, AI & photography | http://bayareatelegraph.com & http://nofrillsinfluencer.com | tom@gadoimages.com

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