I strongly agree. Is a human in a vegetative state sentient? What about when they're asleep? What about someone with brain damage? What about someone with an IQ of 20?

Ray Kurzweil argues sentience is a philosophical question, and doesn't have much value as applied to science and technology. What will change the world is how this intelligence is applied. No one's going to care whether AGI is defined as sentient when it creates cheap fusion energy.