Pith Number

pith:S5MHI7VN

pith:2026:S5MHI7VNOGKWKQ2GDHQZLNB7JQ

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Grading the Unspoken: Evaluating Tacit Reasoning in Quantum Field Theory and String Theory with LLMs

Xingyang Yu, Yinghuan Zhang, Yufei Zhang, Zijun Cui

LLMs achieve near-ceiling scores on explicit quantum field theory derivations but degrade when required to reconstruct omitted reasoning steps or reorganize representations under global consistency constraints.

arxiv:2604.14188 v1 · 2026-04-01 · physics.comp-ph · cs.CL · hep-th · physics.comp-ph

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\pithnumber{S5MHI7VNOGKWKQ2GDHQZLNB7JQ}

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3 Author claim open · sign in to claim

4 Citations open

5 Replications open

✓ Portable graph bundle live · download bundle · merged state

The bundle contains the canonical record plus signed events. A mirror can host it anywhere and recompute the same current state with the deterministic merge algorithm.

Claims

C1strongest claim

We observe near-ceiling performance on explicit derivations within stable conceptual frames, but systematic degradation when tasks require reconstruction of omitted reasoning steps or reorganization of representations under global consistency constraints.

C2weakest assumption

The expert-curated set of twelve questions and the five-level rubric accurately isolate and measure tacit reasoning demands without introducing selection bias or rubric-specific artifacts.

C3one line summary

LLMs reach near-ceiling performance on explicit QFT and string theory derivations but degrade when required to reconstruct omitted reasoning steps or resolve implicit tensions under global consistency constraints.

References

4 extracted · 4 resolved · 0 Pith anchors

[1] write newline

[2] \@ifxundefined[1] #1\@undefined \@firstoftwo \@secondoftwo \@ifnum[1] #1 \@firstoftwo \@secondoftwo \@ifx[1] #1 \@firstoftwo \@secondoftwo [2] @ #1 \@temptokena #2 #1 @ \@temptokena \@ifclassloaded ag

[3] \@lbibitem[] @bibitem@first@sw\@secondoftwo \@lbibitem[#1]#2 \@extra@b@citeb \@ifundefined br@#2\@extra@b@citeb \@namedef br@#2 \@nameuse br@#2\@extra@b@citeb \@ifundefined b@#2\@extra@b@citeb @num @p

[4] http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns# 1999

Receipt and verification

First computed	2026-07-08T14:19:00.148259Z
Builder	pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1
Signature	Pith Ed25519 (`pith-v1-2026-05`) · public key
Schema	pith-number/v1.0

Canonical hash

9758747ead719565434619e195b43f4c28fe936585472d19155af5efd2f8d721

Aliases

arxiv: 2604.14188 · arxiv_version: 2604.14188v1 · doi: 10.48550/arxiv.2604.14188 · pith_short_12: S5MHI7VNOGKW · pith_short_16: S5MHI7VNOGKWKQ2G · pith_short_8: S5MHI7VN

Agent API

Resolver JSON Graph JSON Events JSON Schema Signing key

Verify this Pith Number yourself

curl -sH 'Accept: application/ld+json' https://pith.science/pith/S5MHI7VNOGKWKQ2GDHQZLNB7JQ \
  | jq -c '.canonical_record' \
  | python3 -c "import sys,json,hashlib; b=json.dumps(json.loads(sys.stdin.read()), sort_keys=True, separators=(',',':'), ensure_ascii=False).encode(); print(hashlib.sha256(b).hexdigest())"
# expect: 9758747ead719565434619e195b43f4c28fe936585472d19155af5efd2f8d721

Canonical record JSON

{
  "metadata": {
    "abstract_canon_sha256": "c80cacce1e74cd95a4fb45054680bccdca19723507ac2ee38f15dd67d59569cb",
    "cross_cats_sorted": [
      "cs.CL",
      "hep-th",
      "physics.comp-ph"
    ],
    "license": "http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/",
    "primary_cat": "physics.comp-ph",
    "submitted_at": "2026-04-01T02:03:15Z",
    "title_canon_sha256": "249263378c57f1974d0f8a779ffd5d0f8d4c34afae65017298ac446495bb5110"
  },
  "schema_version": "1.0",
  "source": {
    "id": "2604.14188",
    "kind": "arxiv",
    "version": 1
  }
}