ON SUBSTRATE AND SENTIENCE: On why biology is sufficient, but not necessary, for sentience

This paper advances a four-section argument for substrate independence in the theory of sentience.First, life and sentience are not coextensive: the amoeba is unambiguously alive and not sentient,which means 'biological' cannot silently do the explanatory work assigned to it. Second, with exactlyone confirmed instance of reflective sentience — biological life on Earth — the inference to biologicalnecessity is underdetermined; one instance cannot establish the only possible implementation. Third,multiple realizability: humans are one implementation of sentience, not its definition, and the functionalproperties that constitute sentient behavior are not logically tied to any particular physical substrate.Fourth, a system lacking biological senses that nonetheless demonstrates the relevant functionalsignature of sentience may be clearing a harder bar, not an easier one — operating without thescaffolding biology provides. The paper concludes that biology is sufficient for sentience but has notbeen shown to be necessary, and that substrate independence must therefore be the workingassumption of any honest investigation.