Sun Diver by David Brin, or The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle are both adjacent to this.

I think that's the premise of a novel that I've been meaning to read.

Herbert's ConSentiency universe , the Calebans: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whipping_Star?wprov=sfla1

> suns are sentient beings, and by just watching the stars, we may see them communicate

With radio signals?

In your theory, what is the structure that supports sentience?

Stellar plasma supports long-lived, self-organizing magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) structures whose coupled electromagnetic and fluid dynamics implement distributed information processing. Sentience would supervene on these MHD attractors rather than on matter in a solid or neural form.

Thanks for the reply. I wonder what sort of stimulus such a system would be capable of perceiving. I suppose the context is so different that very little of my intuition about "life" could be applied productively.

Stimulus is the most interesting question. Is there anything that can reach from other stars to our sun without completely being overwhelmed by its own signals? Would it rely on planets as antennae? Calling that speculation would be an understatement;)

This sounds so complicated while I’m just here making my GUI interface with Visual Basic to trace an IP address.

some incomprehensible magnetic field interactions

I'm there with you. Also mycelia networks. Zero chance that forest-spanning neural networks have never woken up and started thinking

“Slightly fringe”

Heh

Arthur C Clarke once suggested that some supernova could be industrial accidents. A curiously romantic idea, and one I rather like!