Representation Engineering: How We Give AI Real Personality
A simple explanation of the technology that makes Wisent characters feel genuinely alive.
You might have heard that Wisent uses "representation engineering" to create better AI characters. But what does that actually mean?
The Traditional Approach
Most AI apps work with prompts - text instructions that tell the AI how to behave. You might write: "You are confident and witty. Always respond with humor."
The AI tries to follow these instructions, but it's just following rules. It's acting confident, not being confident.
What Representation Engineering Does
Representation engineering works at a deeper level. Instead of giving instructions, we modify the AI's internal representations - the way it processes and understands information.
Think of it like this: a prompt tells someone to act happy. Representation engineering is like actually making them feel happy.
Control Vectors
We implement representation engineering through something called control vectors. These are small adjustments to the AI's neural network that consistently push its responses in specific directions.
A confidence control vector doesn't just make the AI say confident things - it makes the AI process information with confidence throughout its reasoning.
Why This Matters
Consistency
Because the personality is built into processing, it doesn't fade or drift over long conversations.
Authenticity
Responses feel more natural because they emerge from genuine processing patterns, not rule-following.
Nuance
Control vectors can capture subtle personality traits that are hard to describe in prompts.
Experience the Difference
Technical explanations only go so far. The best way to understand what representation engineering can do is to chat with a Wisent character.
Download the app and feel the difference yourself.
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