Sentience means "having
sensory perception". In its widest sense, an automatic door is sentient. However, sentience is frequently used as a synonym for
sapience[?]; i.e., saying that something is sentient indicates that it is
aware in an approximately
human-like manner of what it is sensing.
The sentience or non-sentience of animal species is a matter of debate, especially among animal rights activists and philosophers. The issue of sentience also frequently arises in science fictional contexts.
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