Even in that case they would still be consciouss individuals. I'm not sure if "caring" is even the the correct term here. For example I talk to my pet gerbils despite the fact that I know they don't care. They don't even understand a single thing I'm saying. It doesn't matter. They're still individuals with personalities that have some sort of an subjective experience of the world. They look back at me and know I'm there and I know they can hear my voice too.

This is not the case with LLM. There's no one there. Not only does it not care it doesn't even know you exist. Talking to it is not talking to an individual. It's like asking a group of scientists how they're doing today. Any reply you're going to get back is completely meaningless so why bother even asking?

I think it's cosciousness that's the relevant factor here. You need to atleast get the sense of talking to something that can experience things even if it was infact not consciouss. Otherwise it's just a more advanced version of a stereo that is programmed to say "hello" when you turn it on.