You're moving the goal posts. OP wrote:

> The distinction I want to emphasize is that they don't just predict words statistically. They model the world, understand different concepts and their relationships, can think on them, can plan and act on the plan, can reason up to a point, in order to generate the next token.

You replied:

> How can an LLM model the world, in any meaningful way, when it has no experience of the world?

> An LLM is a language model, not a world model.

No one in this discussion has claimed that LLM's are effective general purpose agents, able to throw a curve ball, or drive a vehicle. The claim is that they do model the world in a meaningfull sense.

You may be able to make a case for that being false, but the assumption that direct experience is required to form a model of a certain domain is not an assumption we make of humans. Some domains, such as mathematics, can only be accessed through abstract reasoning, but it's clear that mathematicians form models of mathematical objects and domains that cannot be directly experienced.

I feel like you are arguing against a claim much stronger than what is being made. No one is arguing that LLM's understand the world in the same way human's do. But they do form models of the world.