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Following an interesting discussion on the possibility of sentience in Eldar craftworlds i thought i'd open this up a bit further

What can be considered sentient in 40k?

It should be noted that Sentience and Intelligence are two different things.

Sentience is defined as the ability to react to stimuli, perceive sense impressions (touch, scent etc) or be aware to any degree of the environment surrounding the entity in question.

Intelligence also requires self-awareness, the ability to reason and deduce.



An example: A tyranid bioweapon may well be sentient (all living creatures are to some degree, according to the scientific definition of the word). It has a sense of touch, and often sight, can react to stimuli (such as the psychic 'trigger' to fire from it's bearer) and often can percieve the world around it. Some are more advanced than others, and might even qualify as intelligent (such as the pyrovore's gun, which can fire itself when it senses an nearby enemy, regardless of how the pyrovore is acting).


An eldar craftworld is described in the eldar codex as being a living entity, reactive to psychic stimuli. The Black Library is also self aware and psychically active in it's own defense, which makes it intelligent.


Other ones i'd like an opinion on

Necron warriors that have been killed a few hundred times
Necron Scarabs and Tomb Spyders
Wraithguard
Machine-spirits in LR's etc

In "Path of the Warrior", the craftworld seals off a portion of its surface and turns off the shields to remove a large portion of an impertial army. I'm not sure if this was a tactical response from the craftworld, which would imply intelligence, or only a reactive protocol like an immune system, which implies sentience.

Mr Nobody wrote:In "Path of the Warrior", the craftworld seals off a portion of its surface and turns off the shields to remove a large portion of an impertial army. I'm not sure if this was a tactical response from the craftworld, which would imply intelligence, or only a reactive protocol like an immune system, which implies sentience.

Or it has everything to do with the Infinity Circuit, which is a collective consciousness of dead Eldar whose psychic resonance is what powers the ship and is spread throughout the entirety of the ship.

That's the entire basis of Ascalam's argument. The Infinity Circuit means that a Craftworld is sentient, but the Craftworld without the Infinity Circuit doesn't work. The Infinity Circuit is sentient, but the Craftworld isn't.

Actually, Kan, no it isn't the entire basis of my argument. It was one of several.

In the other thread i proposed that the craftworld could be considered intelligent due to the Infinity circuit being possessed by intelligent thinking souls. There was some dispute as to whether the Infinity Circuit and the Craftworld are synonymous or seperate. Thus far i've not seen any proofs that the Infinity circuit is a seperate entity from the craftworld.

The sentience of a craftworld (or not) is not the same as it's intelligence, as i also pointed out in the other post. It has different criteria.

That was the other thread.

I started this thread without stating my argument or your counterargument to see what other people think about the subject, defined by the scientific terms for sentience and Intelligence. I've made no argument in this thread about the sentience of a craftworld beyond the fluff that they are a living entity, and one is self aware, pyschically active and defends itself (the black library).

It's possible that the Infinity Circuit was responsible for the action above. It's also possible that it wasn't.

Does anyone have a quote or a page reference that we could use to review it?

Sentience IS intelligence. You cannot have one without the other.

For the necrons, I think only the lords have intelligence, while the rest of the units such as warriors and scarabs only have sentience.

I'll try and look for the craftworld example.

Kanluwen wrote:Sentience IS intelligence. You cannot have one without the other.

Intelligence requires sentience.

Sentience does not always denote intelligence.


GW is a wargaming hobby.

Wargames are not always GW.

The scientific terms are different for a reason. Intelligence is a higher order of sentience, with different qualifiers.

Venus flytrap. Vines growing towards light. Bales of hay set on fire.

As I understood it from Path of the Warrior, the Craftworld is quasi-organic, but not sentient - it's the Infinity Circuit which provides this, but at the same time the Infinity Circuit is sentient in the same way a very large gathering of people are, and more to the point it's largely blind to the outside with the exception of psychic stimuli*. It is much more likely that the Autarchs arranged for the Craftworld to seal off sections and vacuumize them.

Black Library is essentially a craftworld, but since it is located within the webway/warp, maintained by Eldar whose minds are a bit on the twisted side and frequented by followers of Cegorach more than anyone else... well, it's sentience would be up for discussion.

* Since the Infinity Circuit is capable of detecting the mere presence of strong psychic individuals such as Karandras (whom is not a psycher), the whole Doom of Malantai is a bit... odd... It's like a story where an Eldar Warlock would manage to get undisturbed to the centre of Hive Fleet Leviathan and, excruciatingly painful to the hive mind, excavate it's mind without the rest of the fleet (hive mind included) being aware of even that something is happening to the hive mind.
The Infinity Circuit is also the most guarded space on the craftworld, and that a wounded zoanthrope would get in there... well... here's another analogy: how likely is it that the humans of earth would abandon the guard around the Immortal Emperor's throne and let a measly zoanthrope get through? If the Emperor was conscious enough to offer warning as well.

Kanluwen wrote:Venus flytrap. Vines growing towards light. Bales of hay set on fire.

Is this a haiku?

Venus flytraps have a sense of touch, and react in accord to stimuli.

If you set a bale of hay on fire what does it do, besides burn?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Mahtamori wrote:As I understood it from Path of the Warrior, the Craftworld is quasi-organic, but not sentient - it's the Infinity Circuit which provides this, but at the same time the Infinity Circuit is sentient in the same way a very large gathering of people are, and more to the point it's largely blind to the outside with the exception of psychic stimuli*. It is much more likely that the Autarchs arranged for the Craftworld to seal off sections and vacuumize them.

Black Library is essentially a craftworld, but since it is located within the webway/warp, maintained by Eldar whose minds are a bit on the twisted side and frequented by followers of Cegorach more than anyone else... well, it's sentience would be up for discussion.

* Since the Infinity Circuit is capable of detecting the mere presence of strong psychic individuals such as Karandras (whom is not a psycher), the whole Doom of Malantai is a bit... odd... It's like a story where an Eldar Warlock would manage to get undisturbed to the centre of Hive Fleet Leviathan and, excruciatingly painful to the hive mind, excavate it's mind without the rest of the fleet (hive mind included) being aware of even that something is happening to the hive mind.
The Infinity Circuit is also the most guarded space on the craftworld, and that a wounded zoanthrope would get in there... well... here's another analogy: how likely is it that the humans of earth would abandon the guard around the Immortal Emperor's throne and let a measly zoanthrope get through? If the Emperor was conscious enough to offer warning as well.

Yah, that bit of the fluff never sat well with me either, but then most of the new nid book doesn't sit too well..

Necron warriors - I'd imagine that the basic insticts are all that remain in the average warrior. C'tan wouldn't want their armies asking questions now would they?

Spyders/Scarabs - They have artificial intelligence, but I'd imagine this is limited as, referring back to the above, the C'tan wouldn't want their minions asking questions. It's probably an immensely advanced intelligence, just stopped from learning to properly think for its self outside of tactical decisions etc

Purely guessing here, before the Dakk-Nazi attack.

dave_salmon wrote:Necron warriors - I'd imagine that the basic insticts are all that remain in the average warrior. C'tan wouldn't want their armies asking questions now would they?

Spyders/Scarabs - They have artificial intelligence, but I'd imagine this is limited as, referring back to the above, the C'tan wouldn't want their minions asking questions. It's probably an immensely advanced intelligence, just stopped from learning to properly think for its self outside of tactical decisions etc

Purely guessing here, before the Dakk-Nazi attack.

Doesn't Necrons lose sentience each time they die? A lowly Necron Warrior might once have been a lord, but has now died so often that it retains little to no autonomous thought. At least, that was my impression.

It does say in the dex that their senses and personalities were 'dulled' by the transformation and I was left with the impression that only the bitterness and hatred were what was left aside from the basic instincts of each Necrontyr.

The thought that even the lords retain much of themselves in the current fluff grates on me a little (I'm hoping that the special characters come with a bloody good explaination for their being special and not just "special necrons"). I can only picture a lord with any personality at all being a incredibly derranged, highly excentric (60 million years of torment), psychotic killer only interest in the funny dance your silhouette does as you are flayed alive in a beam of green fire.

' I can only picture a lord with any personality at all being a incredibly derranged, highly excentric (60 million years of torment), psychotic killer only interest in the funny dance your silhouette does as you are flayed alive in a beam of green fire. '

I would so sig that if i had spare room Good stuff

Interesting Ideas

what about the hive mind?

I'd say that it as a gestalt entity is intelligent, and synapse creatures are by extension.

The non-synapse bugs would be sentient but not intelligent probably. They can sense and react to their environment, but they are being controlled rather than thinking for themselves when within synapse range.

Outside synapse range they are intelligent, as they can act and think on their own.