Nailed it. These LLMs do not understand code. They are silly string lookup services. Compilers with soundness tend to be INCREDIBLY verbose with their error messages which these LLMs use to ingest to get better outcomes on the re-attempt…
Given the fact that I think of myself roughly like a string lookup service, i think there are much stronger places to argue for the incapacity of LLMs than deferring to the ill-defined and generally-inapplicable "understand".