Sentient vs. Sapient

[ZomgK3tchup]

Also known as, my newest and most trivial Stellaris pet peeve.

Back in the day, pre-sapients were called pre-sentients and sapient species were called sentient species.

At some point, they swapped every instance of pre-sentient and sentient out for pre-sapient and sapient, likely because the latter is more accurate.

Now, for some reason, we have both. That is, the game will use sapient in one event text and sentient in another when referring to the same concept. Event text from First Contact and Astral Rifts noticeably uses sentient whereas older content uses sapient.

I don't feel strongly as to which one they go with, but it'd feel cleaner if they chose only one.

Other minor inconsistencies have crept in recently, such as "ring world" versus "ringworld" and "home world" versus "homeworld".

It ain't the end of the world, but if we're all putting our complaints out there, I just wanted to air this one.

 

[prismaticmarcus]

Moved to Suggestions

 

[Abdulijubjub]

A matter of grave importance. Personally, I blame the vegans.

 

[GhostDanny]

Sentient: able to understand your environment.
The more intelligent animals.

Sapient: Truly able to comprehend and philosophise complex aspects.
Humans be the only known example in real life/
Though dolphins, whales, some great apes other than humans and perhaps elephants are suspected of somewhat capable of this. (pre-sapients essentially)

 

[ZomgK3tchup]

Sentient: able to understand your environment.
The more intelligent animals.

Sapient: Truly able to comprehend and philosophise complex aspects.
Humans be the only known example in real life/
Though dolphins, whales, some great apes other than humans and perhaps elephants are suspected of somewhat capable of this. (pre-sapients essentially)

Correct.

I suspect Stellaris initially used "sentient" and "pre-sentient being" because that's what Star Wars, Star Trek, and other popular media use.

At some point, they decided sapient and pre-sapient were closer to what they wanted and made the swap, but as I mentioned in the original post, recent content that was likely created by new writers, sometimes uses sentient alongside sapient.

This thread isn't really about which is more correct but rather that both are currently used to refer to the same thing. A noticeable example is that when you uplift a pre-sapient species, the Egalitarian advisor will say that a pre-sentient species has been enlightened.