How are you defining intelligence as distinct from sentience? At first blush such a distinction has no utility.

If you don't make that distinction then your statement doesn't make sense "there's fundamentally no evidence our thoughts are the decisive events leading to behavior". You started making this separation here, not me, I just talk about intelligence. If you thought they were the same thing you wouldn't say things like that.

I just took "intelligence" as a metonym for "thought processes". Again, I am unsure what it means to use intelligence if not through our own perception of our own intelligence, nor what utility such a concept would have.