The vocabulary

Member lesson

The words for agents and tools

Lesson 6 of 9 in The vocabulary.

What are AI Agents? · IBM Technology
Lesson

Agent is the most abused word in this vocabulary. Used precisely it means a model that can take multiple steps towards a goal using tools, deciding what to do next based on what happened. Used commercially it frequently means a chatbot with a form attached.

An apprentice at a workbench wears a tool belt with three tools and a headlamp that lights only the bench. Behind them a large key cabinet is shut, and they carry just one key on a short cord at the wrist.
Three tools, one lit bench, one key. That is the whole of what this agent can do.
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Members answer these 3 questions and keep the ticket for this lesson. Every lesson has one.

  1. Question 1, locked

    Which of these words means this? “A model given tools and a goal, allowed to take several steps by itself.”

    • Indemnity
    • Temporal coherence
    • Agent
    • Open weights
  2. Question 2, locked

    Which of these words means this? “A model calling a function rather than describing one.”

    • Tool use
    • Context window
    • Denoising strength
    • Enterprise-grade
  3. Question 3, locked

    Which of these words means this? “An open standard for connecting a model to tools and data.”

    • Temporal coherence
    • Open weights
    • Steps
    • MCP

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