I use modprobe to load kernel modules, but its naming keeps confusing me a little. -probemeans in its verb form:
physically explore or examine (something) with the hands or an instrument.
So, I would expect it to return me some information about the current state of a module. Instead, it adds to the set of currently loaded kernel modules.
Modprobe's Wikipedia page says it is a continuation of module-init-tools and modutils. These more general names do not directly indicate probing. The man pages do not disambiguate the name.
From What's the difference between insmod and modprobe? I derive that modprobe does some inspection indeed, but then it does not explain how modprobe indicates any loading of modules.