What is the function of the COSINE parameter in the SQL query used for retrieving similar vectors?

The function of the COSINE parameter in the SQL query is to indicate that the cosine distance metric should be used for determining the similarity between vectors. Cosine similarity measures the cosine of the angle between two vectors, which is a common method for assessing how similar two vectors are in high-dimensional space. When this parameter is specified in a query, the database system understands that the calculations performed to retrieve similar vectors should be based on this specific distance metric.

This is particularly important in applications involving machine learning and natural language processing, where vectors represent data points such as text embeddings or feature representations. By using cosine similarity, the system can effectively determine how closely related the vectors are based on their directional alignment rather than their absolute distance, which is crucial in many contexts, such as identifying documents with similar content or finding images with similar attributes.

Other options may involve filtering or encoding, but they do not align with the specific purpose of the COSINE parameter, which is solely about the calculation of similarity using the cosine distance metric.