Fussbudgets i have known

lucy as a tiger has conference with fussby

in second life i have a cat fussbudget, named for a real cat now gone to be with elvis; fussby is the being i envision sometimes to raise maitri, 'unconditional friendliness.'
to get in touch with this loving feeling within yourself, you think of someone, person or pet, that you love without complication or reservation.
both cats are orange tabbies, very vocal, very consistently companionable and amiable.
real life (rl) fussbudget, unlike many rl cats, was even delighted to get his ration of cat food each day. yeahhhh! it's CAT FOOD AGAIN!!!! unlike sl fussby, rl fussby was a major barfer -- i always wanted to get him a little tee shirt that said on the front something like 'barf your guts out' and on the back 'then eat the barf' -- he was very tidy and easy going.
enough about that. here's my problem -- every now and then sl fussby's programming gets out of whack. like a rl cat he is programmed to ignore all commands and settings from time to time and wander out of his preset range to get hung up in some neighboring sim border or object protection. dragging him back doesn't always put him right and then i have to delete him and rez another copy.
this is where i get a little freaked out. is it the same cat i am so fond of? this sounds like the buddhist exercise "if you lose a leg are you still your 'self', if you lose all limbs are you? if you lose internal organs are you? if you lose your brain are you still you? etc..." (for the answer, meditate for several lifetimes).
are these sl fussbudgets just blossoms on the virtual cat bush? to me it seems the exact same cat but i still hate to delete him. and for some reason i don't consider him a sentient being like the roomba, any more than i consider my avatar to be a sentient being. maybe because neither one of them seems to learn much along the way.