sentience

noun

Etymology: From sentient, from Latin sentiēns, present participle of sentiō (“feel, sense”). Compare with sentence, its equivalent formation from Classic Latin sententia (for *sentientia).

1. The state or quality of being sentient; possession of consciousness or sensory awareness.

   “For a while I sat quiet, my heart beating. The place was grimly dark. The only light was a faint one from the top of the lamp which threw a white circle on the high ceiling, except the emerald sheen of the shade as the light took its under edges. Even the light only seemed to emphasize the blackness of the shadows. These presently began to seem, as on last night, to have a sentience of their own.”

   “The science of animal sentience is far from a firm one; there's no way of knowing exactly what any animal is feeling.”

2. Misspelling of sentence