The context has to be very particular for me not to consider this to be exactly 24 (natural number, not real number) without intermediate representation. I assu

The context has to be very particular for me not to consider this to be exactly 24 (natural number, not real number) without intermediate representation. I assume we're working over the ring of integers here. In that case, 6x4 is only ever not instantly 24 when it's part of an expression of similar terms (say, 6x1 + 6x2 + 6x3 + 6x4) in which a pattern is being expressed. If you're not working over the usual ring, though, intuition goes out the window and I think of it as "six-but-not-six blob four-but-not-four". That's because in a module sense, it is 6 (element of ring) times (arbitrary multiplication operation) 4 (element of module).