Largely true, but as an absolute truth it remains supposition, and even if true doesn't alter the fact that feedback from the conscious can alter the next decision to be made.
I look at a clock. Note that it is 12:00 and become hungry as a result.
Conscious influence of the subconscious?
Wake me when the telephone is aware of what it is doing.
Your question is really asking me of I think a machine can be sentient. It most certainly can be but without the ability to sense and respond to the world around it, you begin to run into the limits of what is commonly known as sentience.
And none of which are equivalent to sentience, although they are closely related.
If you are defining sentience as simply consciousness then you have a problem because there is no active definition of consciousness.
But the question wasn't about consciousness, but sentience...
What makes you think that sentience can't be programmed?
On the other hand what makes you think that it can be emulated to the point that Turing can be passed without actually producing sentience?
The case for programming sentience is far stronger.
Hold on... Let me ask one...
...
Nope.
On the other hand, my computer here is very self aware. It know exactly where it puts every piece of information.
However, it isn't conscious, or aware that it is aware. Neither is it aware of it's surroundings. Hence it isn't sentient.
And why would your cell phone evolve any differently than a tree?
The title of the thread is "What is the purpose of sentience." You have confused sentience with consciousness. They are different but related concepts.
Since it is a part of the world, and it would have the ability to model the world, it will necessarily need to model itself and hence it would necessarily be self aware and sentient.
You seem to be arguing that if you program sentience then there is no need for sentience.
Why would the cell phone have a goal of not being eaten by a bear? How would the cell phone not know that the bear was a pet, or a vegatarian, or an antidisestablismenphoneatarian?
While you might get a program to emulate the desired behaviour you would spend the rest of your life writing...
Without a sense of self awareness, how will it know that it's legs aren't already in the bear's mouth, and that as a consequence running is no longer an option?
Without a sense of self awareness, how will it know that it has hit a tree and can no longer advance?
Without a sense of self...
"The argument being presented to you is that an artificial intelligence can be programmed to react to a situation and potentially even be programmed to learn/adapt." - Ryan
If it is programmed to have a specific response, then in what way is it intelligent?
You are also confusing intelligence...
"..consciousness is a by product of intelligent agency rather than the agent itself." - Ryan
Clearly it is both an observer of decision and a decision maker. I have made a conscious decision to have eggs for dinner. That conscious decision will drive my response. At other times, when I am...
"The point was that many kinds of decisions can be made with a very simple processor." - Dave
And they are generally made with a very simple processor - the spinal column.
But you miss the point entirely. Why should a non-sentient organism associate a bear with a complex pattern of response...