I'm not sure why you distinguish large language models as not having understanding, as it shows a high degree of comprehension; in a de facto sense, it understands an awful lot. It understands your inputs well enough to give you useful outputs, and it can absolutely reason creatively about problems you pose to it. It doesn't have it's "own" though or understanding only because it doesn't have it's "own" story and experience to add that element of unique personality.