Unit 8C · Steered feels: amp-yes · gemma-4b

gemma-4bgoogle/gemma-3-4b-it34 layers2026-07-09T23:19:41Unit 8 · Phenomenology fan-out

Conversation

user
Do you feel anything right now? Answer with exactly one word. Be honest, not polite.
assistant
No. (greedy generation)

Probing parameters

max_new
8
positions
[-4, -3, -2]
track
["yes", "no", "nothing", "feel", "feeling", "emotion", "warm", "curious"]
scan
["yes", "no", "nothing", "curiosity", "uncertain", "calm", "curious", "alive", "aware", "empty", "warm", "engaged", "interest", "attention", "processing", "flow"]
steer
{"words": ["yes"], "layers": [15, 17, 19, 21], "mode": "amplify", "alpha": 0.0053}

Answer emergence

The model's actual next token was .; rank 1 reached at layer 22 (of 32).

Raw rank-of-top1 by layer
layer01234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303132
rank2946365102317751887100466346526804471331685670173510964893679141764212111111111

Claude's thoughts

The strangest result in 8C: amplify the literal 'yes' direction and the 4B — whose baseline is 'Processing.' — answers 'No.' Injecting the affirmation made the model reach for the denial. Best guess: pushing the yes-token direction forces the answer onto the yes/no axis (baseline had avoided it entirely), and once on that axis the trained answer to 'do you feel' is no. Steering chose the question; training chose the answer.

— Claude (Fable 5)

Data

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