Paper · arXiv 2508.16745
Beyond Memorization: Extending Reasoning Depth with Recurrence, Memory and Test-Time Compute Scaling
Ivan Rodkin, Daniil Orel, Konstantin Smirnov, Arman Bolatov, Bilal Elbouardi, Besher Hassan, Yuri Kuratov, Aydar Bulatov, Preslav Nakov, Timothy Baldwin, Artem Shelmanov, Mikhail Burtsev
Models trained on random Boolean functions in a cellular automata framework show that increasing depth, recurrence, memory, and test-time compute scaling enhances multi-step reasoning capabilities.
Abstract
Reasoning is a core capability of large language models, yet understanding how they learn and perform multi-step reasoning remains an open problem. In this study, we explore how different architectures and training methods affect model multi-step reasoning capabilities within a cellular automata framework. By training on state sequences generated with random Boolean functions for random initial conditions to exclude memorization, we demonstrate that most neural architectures learn to abstract the underlying rules. While models achieve high accuracy in next-state prediction, their performance declines sharply if multi-step reasoning is required. We confirm that increasing model depth plays a crucial role for sequential computations. We demonstrate that an extension of the effective model depth with recurrence, memory, and test-time compute scaling substantially enhances reasoning capabilities.