Can we maybe make it "don't anthropoCENTRIZE the LLMs" .

The inverse of anthropomorphism isn't any more sane, you see. By analogy: just because a drone is not an airplane, doesn't mean it can't fly!

Instead, just look at what the thing is doing.

LLMs absolutely have some form of intent (their current task) and some form of reasoning (what else is step-by-step doing?) . Call it simulated intent and simulated reasoning if you must.

Meanwhile they also have the property where if they have the ability to destroy all your data, they absolutely will find a way. (Or: "the probability of catastrophic action approaches certainty if the capability exists" but people can get tired of talking like that).

> LLMs absolutely have some form of intent (their current task)

They have momentum, not intent. They don’t think, build a plan internally, and then start creating tokens to achieve the plan. Echoing tokens is all there is. It’s like an avalanche or a pachinko machine, not an animal.

> some form of reasoning (what else is step-by-step doing?)

I think they reflect the reasoning that is baked into language, but go no deeper. “I am a <noun>” is much more likely than “I am a <gibberish>”. I think reasoning is more involved than this advanced game of mad libs.

> LLMs absolutely have intent (their current task)

That's like saying a 2000cc 4-Cylinder Engine "has the intent to move backward". Even with a very generous definition of "intent", the component is not the system, and we're operating in context where the distinction matters. The LLM's intent is to supply "good" appended text.

If it had that kind of intent, we wouldn't be able to make it jump the rails so easily with prompt injection.

> and reasoning (what else is step-by-step doing?) .

Oh, that's easy: "Reasoning" models are just tweaking the document style so that characters engage in film noir-style internal monologues, latent text that is not usually acted-out towards the real human user.

Each iteration leaves more co-generated clues for the next iteration to pick up, reducing weird jumps and bolstering the illusion that the ephemeral character has a consistent "mind."

I think it’s helpful to try to use words that more precisely describe how the LLM works. For instance, “intent” ascribes a will to the process. Instead I’d say an LLM has an “orientation”, in that through prompting you point it in a particular direction in which it’s most likely to continue.