As T Clark wrote, pain and hunger are programming, so if these aliens lack them both, yet they eat and do not harm themselves, it must be due to another form of programming.

Also, morality is not a stagnant feature of any society. It is a stagnant box into which features are placed and removed. Murder and enslavement are morally acceptable and advocated by people on our very planet who know pain and hunger. Perhaps when you say "our" perception of morality, you mean yours?

You have asked a convoluted question full of conjecture, making this difficult to respond to with anything but questions in turn.

For instance, do we have an inability to assign self-aware consciousness to a computer? Are we unable to explain how consciousness arises from matter? Why do you think these things?

Are there "no conflicts or inconsistencies in the perceived reality"? If there were, how would you know?