*sigh*
Whether a candidate passes the Turing test depends on the evaluator.All. That is why it is the Turing test. Though I suspect that quite a few machines would too quite soon. Most current bots are able to carry on normal conversation quite well.
Some years back, a university had a webpage where one could chat with a computer, I forgot the name. It answered questions like "How do you know that you're not a robot?" quite cleverly. But when asked metaphysical and philosophical questions (such as "What is the meaning of life?"), it replied in the same evasive, politically correct manner most people do. So who exactly wasn't passing the test here: the computer or people?
One of the themes in android fiction is the psychologically ideal human. Prime examples in film are the Stepford Wives and The Making of Mr. Right. The idea is that humans consider as the psychologically ideal human a being who has a limited range of emotions -- for all practical intents and purposes, an android.
And the only way a human can arrive at the psychologically ideal human is to mimic androids ...This is sentience and the only way AI would arrive at it is by mimicry.