NeurIPS paper: LLMs keep thinking even when explicitly told not to
james_y_zou · x · 2026-10-09
A NeurIPS 2026 paper, "LLMs Keep Thinking When Told Not To," documents persistent "Thinking Inertia": LLMs continue reasoning even when explicitly instructed not to, often getting answers right while failing the no-thinking instruction. The authors argue that knowing when NOT to think is as important as knowing how to think — with implications for instruction following and inference cost control.
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