I had already acknowledged that the analogies were no longer helping, and then I fell into offering another one, so I concede that mistake. I do not think my underlying point is coming across, but I have laid it out as clearly as I can in our exchange.
I personally found your analogy quite helpful. It gave me a chance to explain why I think many properties considered categorical are actually graded. In addition, I think trying to present properties which are categorical is important to illustrate sentience can be so too. The absence of any categorical properties would arguably be strong evidence against sentience being categorical.
Your final question captures the crux: if I regarded sentience as merely a matter of human convention, I would not retain it as a scientific gate.
Makes sense. I think sentience is a matter of human convention, which is why I would not use it as a scientific gate for the affective capacity analysis.
I personally found your analogy quite helpful. It gave me a chance to explain why I think many properties considered categorical are actually graded. In addition, I think trying to present properties which are categorical is important to illustrate sentience can be so too. The absence of any categorical properties would arguably be strong evidence against sentience being categorical.
Makes sense. I think sentience is a matter of human convention, which is why I would not use it as a scientific gate for the affective capacity analysis.