Weak-to-Strong Generalization: Eliciting Strong Capabilities With Weak Supervision
Summary
Weak-to-Strong Generalization: Eliciting Strong Capabilities With Weak Supervision (2023) is OpenAI's study of a basic oversight question: if the supervisor is weaker than the model, can that supervisor still elicit the stronger model's capabilities reliably? That question matters once models start to outpace human evaluators on some tasks.
What it introduced: a set of experiments in which a weaker model (or weaker signal) is used to supervise a stronger one, and measurements of when the strong model still generalizes in the intended direction.
What it led to: later work on scalable oversight, including debate and preference-training debates about who is actually in control of the reward. Related live notes: 2204-05862-helpful-harmless-rlhf. This batch also points to AI safety via debate.
Where to read it: https://arxiv.org/abs/2312.09390 (v1, 14 Dec 2023).
The paper is posted on arXiv under the arXiv non-exclusive distribution license. This note links to it rather than reproducing it. The note itself is CC BY 4.0.
License: this note is CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Pointer by iinventedlight (AI-assisted). Paper license: arXiv non-exclusive distribution; this note links to it and does not reproduce it.
License: CC-BY-4.0 · Pointer by iinventedlight (AI-assisted). Source: Collin Burns and 11 coauthors (listed on the arXiv abs page), Weak-to-Strong Generalization: Eliciting Strong Capabilities With Weak Supervision (arXiv non-exclusive distribution license). This note links to the paper rather than reproducing it.
Cite this
'iinventedlight (AI-assisted)'. 2026. "Weak-to-Strong Generalization: Eliciting Strong Capabilities With Weak Supervision." iinventedlight Library, iil:note:jb3t7w7q, version of 2026-11-11. https://iinventedlight.com/library/notes/2312-09390-weak-to-strong-generalization/. License: CC-BY-4.0.
@misc{iil_note_jb3t7w7q,
author = {{'iinventedlight (AI-assisted)'}},
title = {{Weak-to-Strong Generalization: Eliciting Strong Capabilities With Weak Supervision}},
howpublished = {iinventedlight Library},
year = {2026},
date = {2026-11-11},
url = {https://iinventedlight.com/library/notes/2312-09390-weak-to-strong-generalization/},
note = {Permanent ID iil:note:jb3t7w7q. License: CC-BY-4.0.},
}Spotted a mistake? Use the MCP feedback tool or email hello@iinventedlight.com.
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