# What Linear Probes Miss: Multi-View Probing for Weight-Space Learning

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.23410 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.23410/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Circuits and mechanistic analysis, one of 13 directions in Mechanistic interpretability.
- Builds on 21 of its 36 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 22 May 2026.

## Placed in

- Mechanistic interpretability / [Circuits and mechanistic analysis](https://mlsanity.com/mechinterp/circuits-and-mechanistic-analysis/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 21 of 21)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [An Image is Worth 16x16 Words: Transformers for Image Recognition at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.11929/) (2020)
- [High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.10752/) (2021)
- [Masked Autoencoders Are Scalable Vision Learners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.06377/) (2021)
- [Emerging Properties in Self-Supervised Vision Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.14294/) (2021)
- [DreamBooth: Fine Tuning Text-to-Image Diffusion Models for Subject-Driven Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2208.12242/) (2022)
- [Model soups: averaging weights of multiple fine-tuned models improves accuracy without increasing inference time](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.05482/) (2022)
- [TIES-Merging: Resolving Interference When Merging Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.01708/) (2023)
- [Predicting Neural Network Accuracy from Weights](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.11448/) (2020)
- [Equivariant Architectures for Learning in Deep Weight Spaces](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.12780/) (2023)
- [Classifying the classifier: dissecting the weight space of neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.05688/) (2020)
- [Hyper-Representations as Generative Models: Sampling Unseen Neural Network Weights](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.14733/) (2022)
- [Graph Neural Networks for Learning Equivariant Representations of Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.12143/) (2024)
- [Graph Metanetworks for Processing Diverse Neural Architectures](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04501/) (2023)
- [Symmetry in Neural Network Parameter Spaces](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.13018/) (2025)
- [Learning on LoRAs: GL-Equivariant Processing of Low-Rank Weight Spaces for Large Finetuned Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.04207/) (2024)
- [Deep Linear Probe Generators for Weight Space Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.10811/) (2024)
- [Learning Useful Representations of Recurrent Neural Network Weight Matrices](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.11998/) (2024)
- [Generative Modeling of Weights: Generalization or Memorization?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.07998/) (2025)
- [Learning on Model Weights using Tree Experts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.13569/) (2024)
- [GradMetaNet: An Equivariant Architecture for Learning on Gradients](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.01649/) (2025)

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [Finite Probes Suffice: Identifiability and Universality for Weight-Space Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.33901/) (2026)
- [Transferable Graph Metanetworks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.00420/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The explosive growth of open-source model repositories has created a Model Jungle, where checkpoints are frequently shared without adequate documentation or metadata. While weight-space learning offers a pathway to identify and analyze these models directly from their parameters, processing full-scale weights is computationally prohibitive. Probing-based methods have emerged as a lightweight alternative, extracting permutation-equivariant representations via learnable probe vectors. However, existing probing methods are limited by a single-view design: they capture first-order structures but fail to encode the rich, higher-order correlation patterns inherent in row-column interactions. To bridge this gap, we introduce MVProbe, a multi-perspective probing framework that synthesizes first-order signals with interaction-aware (Gram-based) views. Our approach is theoretically grounded; we analyze the scaling laws of different probing orders to derive a principled standardization and fusion strategy that ensures balanced contributions from all branches. On the Model Jungle benchmark, MVProbe consistently outperforms the state-of-the-art ProbeX across diverse architectures, including discriminative backbones (ResNet, SupViT, MAE, DINO) and large-scale generative LoRA adapters (Stable Diffusion LoRA).