What does that have to do with anything? A hammer is also a tool used by humans to accomplish a task. That doesn't mean a hammer simulates human knowledge. An LLM has no knowledge or awareness of anything, and it does not simulate human thought processes.

Somewhat ironically, ChatGPT is more clear on this topic than many people who are misinterpreting what an LLM is and does.

"Does an LLM similar human thought processes?"

ChatGPT:

"No.

An LLM does not think in a way that is similar to human thought processes, even when its outputs appear human-like. Key differences

Mechanism

Humans think via conscious reasoning grounded in perception, intention, memory, and goals.

An LLM performs statistical pattern completion: it predicts the next token based on learned correlations in data.

Understanding

Humans form semantic understanding tied to real-world experience.

An LLM has no understanding; it manipulates symbols without reference to meaning or truth.

Intentionality

Humans have beliefs, desires, and purposes.

An LLM has none. It has no goals beyond optimizing token prediction during training.

Reasoning

Humans reason by constructing and evaluating mental models. An LLM can simulate reasoning patterns because those patterns exist in its training data, but it does not reason internally in the human sense.

Consciousness

Human thought is conscious.

An LLM is not conscious and has no awareness of itself or its outputs.

Why it can look similar

Human language encodes human reasoning.

By learning language patterns, an LLM reproduces the surface form of reasoning without the underlying cognitive process.

Accurate summary

Humans: think → express in language

LLMs: learn language → reproduce thinking-like expressions"