[Lerc]

Notably the difference is that ten digits is not the same thing as a number. One might say that turning it into a number might be the first step, but Neural nets being what they are, they are liable to produce the correct result without bothering to have a representation any more pure than a list of digits.

I guess the analogy there is that a 74ls283 never really has a number either and just manipulates a series of logic levels.