We know so little about consciousness we cannot falsify the hypothesis that inanimate things are conscious. This is exemplified by the term consciousness itself, which separates unconsciousness, such as sleep, because of unresponsiveness, which isn't at all lack of consciousness. We just don't have any other way to test for consciousness than responses, and there's an almost unlimited list of very good reasons to not respond. We sure can't test for self-consciousness without first testing for consciousness.