4 ms·

I said language can exist independently, not that all language exists independently. "one plus one equals two" can be understood and worked with without ever f

I said language can exist independently, not that all language exists independently. "one plus one equals two" can be understood and worked with without ever feeling water over your hand. It is a priori knowledge (see Hume's fork for an explanation). You have to understand that the richness of language linked to cognition is due to your experience with that part of language and resulting romantization of it. It doesn't mean that it is a core defining feature of language, even though it feels that way (and as touching as that anecdote is).

computably 1y ago
> "one plus one equals two" can be understood and worked with without ever feeling water over your hand. It is a priori knowledge "Understood" and "worked with" are completely different. The complete absence of embodiment is several degrees removed from "feeling water over your hand." LLMs have no sensory apparatus to relate the word "one" to actual, discrete, singular objects. The most rudimentary calculator can represent and compute "1+1=2", but I doubt any philosophical tradition or even an educated layperson would claim calculators "understand what 1+1=2 means." The "understanding" part has nothing to do with the accuracy or truthfulness of the computation; it comes from the relation of the abstract statement to counting of actual objects.