Is Google's LaMDA AI sentient? There seems to be strong evidence to that effect

The most basic problem for the claims of this Google engineer: for the Google super chatbot to acquire consciousness appears to be simply impossible for simple logical reasons and first principles; for the simplest of reasons - things are not thoughts, and computer AI can manifest nothing more than the algorithms implemented in such systems by the designers and programmers. 

AI is performed by computers and computers are entirely algorithmic. That is to say, they are constrained to obey a set of operations written by a computer programmer. The programs consist entirely of logic and mathematics implemented in silicon, and the physics that underlies the operations of the silicon chips. Mathematics is algorithmically constructed, based on logic and foundational axioms. And physics is built algorithmically on foundational laws. So, AI is even in principle entirely algorithmic. It operates according to the logic of mathematics and the laws of physics. But human consciousness and the soul consist of something unknowable that exhibits something entirely nonphysical - sentient subjective consciousness and awareness and experience. 

And this would seem to entirely prevent a disembodied immaterial soul from manifesting itself in a physical AI system. Along with this, Laird has pointed out that one of the most essential attributes of human consciousness - human free will - would be prevented from manifesting in the computer system since it is entirely programmed and algorithmic. It would be like mixing oil and water. Consiousness is fundamentally just not computable and algorithmic.