Try to teach the competitor to do some things that make sense to humans and some things that do no make sense to humans, from wildly different fields. If the competitor seems to be confused by things which are confusing to people and learns things which are not confusing, it is more likely to be thinking instead of parroting.
For example, you could explain why no consistent logical system can trust itself, and the ask the competitor if they think their way of thinking is consistent; if they think it isn’t, Ask them if they think that they could prove literally anything using their way of thinking. If they think it is, ask them if they would believe everything that they can prove to be true.
Thinking entities will tend to believe that they can’t prove things which are false, and thus that everything that they can prove is true. Calculating entities run I to trouble with those concepts.
Less meta, one could explain the magical thinking expressed in The Secret and ask why some people believe it and others don’t, along with asking why the competitor does or doesn’t.
Try to teach the competitor to do some things that make sense to humans and some things that do no make sense to humans, from wildly different fields. If the competitor seems to be confused by things which are confusing to people and learns things which are not confusing, it is more likely to be thinking instead of parroting.
For example, you could explain why no consistent logical system can trust itself, and the ask the competitor if they think their way of thinking is consistent; if they think it isn’t, Ask them if they think that they could prove literally anything using their way of thinking. If they think it is, ask them if they would believe everything that they can prove to be true.
Thinking entities will tend to believe that they can’t prove things which are false, and thus that everything that they can prove is true. Calculating entities run I to trouble with those concepts.
Less meta, one could explain the magical thinking expressed in The Secret and ask why some people believe it and others don’t, along with asking why the competitor does or doesn’t.