> It's python3.11, not python3, and the python3 "executable" is, itself a symlink to the particular binary (in this example python3.11).
Not for the example I gave. If you’re seeing Python 3.11, you’re definitely not using the /usr/bin/python3 on macOS with is made available by the Xcode CLI tools. That’s at 3.9.6 even on Sonoma.
> as someone else also points out, you don't even have to use the symlinked versions, you can use --copies
Which, again, doesn’t work for the stated case.