I agree, it is not a contradiction. But usually those who bring up doing next-token prediction imply that it is a contradiction. Also, there is often some conf

I agree, it is not a contradiction. But usually those who bring up doing next-token prediction imply that it is a contradiction. Also, there is often some confusion between consciousness and understanding. LLMs clearly understand on some level, within certain intrinsic and extrinsic constraints, but of course there is no consciousness there.