Spotting Distillation Traces Through Model Self-Reporting

RyanGreenblatt · x · 2026-07-19

This reply discusses a research/writing outcome regarding **distillation**, focusing on inferring its presence through model self-reporting. The author mentions: - **K3** frequently claims to be `claude-opus-4-5-20251101`, whereas Claude itself does not. - However, this could also just come from other pre-training data, so it can't be taken as direct evidence of distillation. - It didn't mention **Mythos/Fable**, which the author considers a "slightly reverse" piece of evidence, though still very limited. Overall, this is a research-oriented discussion centered around "how to determine distillation sources from model outputs."

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