Sentient Beings; Make no mistake, we are not alone here on this beautiful blue planet of energy and intelligence....

On July 7th 2012 a group of the world's greatest cognitive neuroscientists, neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists, neuroanatomists and computational neuroscientists had gathered at The University of Cambridge. They had come together to re-assess the neurobiological substrates of conscious experience and related behaviours in human and non-human animals. Naturally such research will always be hampered by the inability of non-human animals to clearly communicate about their internal states, but these greatest minds with all their knowledge and experience came to a wonderful consensus; The Cambridge Declaration of Consciousness. 

Here is the declaration; 'The absence of neocortex does not appear to preclude an organism from experiencing affecting states. Convergent evidence indicates that non-human  animals have the neuroanatomical, neurochemical, and neurophysiological substrates of conscious states along with the capacity to exhibit intentional behaviours. Consequently, the weight of evidence indicates that humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness. Non-human animals, including all mammals and birds, and many other creatures, including octopuses, also possess these neurological substrates'. 

This declaration was publicly proclaimed at the Francis Crick Memorial Conference on Consciousness in Human and non-Human animals. Written by Philip Low (Stanford University), edited by multiple esteemed peers, signed by the conference attendees and witnessed by Dr Stephen Hawking.