So that doesn't really address the concept I'm questioning. You're leaning hard into the fact the computer is using numbers in place of words but I'm saying why is that any different than assigning native language to a book written in a foreign language? The vernacular, language, formula or code that is being used to formulate a thought shouldn't delineate if something was a legitimate thought.
I think the gap between our reasoning is a perfect example of why I think FUTURE models (wanna be real clear this is entirely hypothetical assumption that LLMs will continue improving.)
What I mean is, you can give 100 people the same problem and come out with 100 different cognitive pathways being used to come to a right or wrong solution.
When I was learning to play the trumpet in middle school and later learned the guitar and drums, I was told I did not play instruments like most musicians. Use that term super fuckin loosely, I am very bad lol but the reason was because I do not have an ear for music, I can't listen and tell you something is in tune or out of tune by hearing a song played, but I could tune the instrument just fine if I have an in tune note played for me to match. My instructor explained that I was someone who read music the way others read but instead of words I read the notes as numbers. Especially when I got older when I learned the guitar. I knew how to read music at that point but to this day I can't learn a new song unless I read the guitar tabs which are literal numbers on a guitar fretboard instead of a actual scale.
I know I'm making huge leaps here and I'm not really trying to prove any point. I just feel strongly that at our most basic core, a human's understanding of their existence is derived from "I think. Therefore I am." Which in itself is nothing more than an electrochemical reaction between neurons that either release something or receive something. We are nothing more than a series of plc commands on a cnc machine. No matter how advanced we are capable of being, we are nothing but a complex series of on and off switches that theoretically could be emulated into operating on an infinate string of commands spelled out by 1's and 0's.
Im sorry, my brother prolly got me way too much weed for Xmas.