If we're making that distinction, I think it would be more accurate to say that many people in the field appear to believe that these models are sapient, even though they are clearly not sentient.
Sapience is defined as wisdom, not intelligence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisdom#Sapience
LLMs possess a lot of knowledge, which is intelligence, but I constantly see them failing to apply wisdom. I don't see evidence of sapience.