The case has been made that sentient agents are endowed with consciousness to varying degrees. Although that is consistent with the idea of evolution, little has been said about how it is feasible, particularly with the contemporary appreciation that the random mutation steps of Darwinian evolution are complemented by those reflecting environmental and social influences. This paper considers a species constrained by Mendelian principles, but susceptible to mutation. Consciousness is viewed as awareness of awareness, achieved by rewiring of the agent’s connectome by neural plasticity, making the species adaptable and so amenable to evolution.