Certainly, a scouting familiar is going to be arrow-bait unless it is either very, very good at stealth, or in its natural habitat so as not to arouse suspicion. Or both.
Although I understand the argument about some game feature being "too powerful" in comparison to others, I don't think it's valid here. Sure, we need special rules to govern many things, especially time-sensitive aspects like combat. But we should also have our games be open-form enough that players can think outside the box, and extrapolate story elements from basic premises.
If the basic premise is that your wizard has a familiar (owl, winged cat, whatever) that can talk and fly and that has above-animal intelligence, he should be able to give his familiar instructions to undertake actions that aren't limited to a single round or a single minute or a 30-foot leash.
Now, if the DM comes back and says, "you wait ten minutes... 30... several hours, and there is no sign of your familiar," well, let's just say that the player shouldn't be all that surprised, either. It's a cruel world.
Pathfinder 2 doesn't say much about a familiar intelligence. So, I'll refer to the lore to answer this question. And the lore comes from Pathfinder 1, where familiars were having an intelligence between 6 and 15. So, at my tables (and unless anything anywhere specifies a familiar intelligence), I'll consider familiars to be intelligent enough to go scouting, report for pits, axe wielding orcs and conversations.
But, considering how poor they are when it comes to skill checks, I'll limit the familiar actions to anything that is not asking for more than one of them. So, no super familiar infiltrating the orc camp to steel the shaman's key. That's a rogue/ranger mission.
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An awful lot of assumptions here that familiars are meant to be the same as in 1st edition. The rules don’t seem to support that. Just because something is a magical cat doesn’t mean it is an intelligent magical cat once it is no longer with its magical owner.
The fact that things tend to behave naturally once no longer commanded seems to indicate to me that your owl might just be more interested in catching mice than in delivering a scouting report.
Pathfinder 2 doesn't say much about a familiar intelligence. So, I'll refer to the lore to answer this question. And the lore comes from Pathfinder 1.
You can certainly do that if you want to and if it makes the game more fun for you, go for it. But it makes as much sense to source the answer from PF1 as it does to source it from AD&D, Chainmail, D&D 4e or GURPS. As I said, there is no wrong answer so if this makes your game more fun I’m glad. But there is no logical reason to source the answer from PF1e.
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The only thing about familiar intelligence that we have in PF2 is:
"Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more."
In addition, one of the abilities you can give them is speech: "It understands and speaks a language you know."
So it seems to me that the notion that a familiar is more of a sentient minion than an animal is fairly consistent with the RAW.
I'm hoping that the upcoming Game Mastery Guide will have something more about using familiars outside of Encounter mode. And even if it doesn't, there is no RAW reason to limit familiars to a a single round or a single minute or a 30-foot leash when outside of Encounter mode. Even within Encounter mode, an understanding DM could easily interpret "sapient minions act how they please" to allow a familiar to continue acting on earlier commands beyond the round in which they were given a specific command.
The something more is definitely up for interpretation. I would consider a winged cat to be something more. I'd probably give more than animal intelligence if you selected speech. Another GM might keep it at dog intelligence (dogs definitely understand some sounds, but probably bother more and not as much as we think) with a parrot's speech ability. I'd personally consider that a dick move but I can see a GM ruling that.
The something more is definitely up for interpretation.
It was clearer in PF1 when familiars hads stats, and thus an intelligence score, on the human scale. Now it is simply undefined. Meaning that, for the time being at least, it is open to interpretation by DMs and players alike. And that PFS, not allowing such open-ended interpretations, will be the victims of table variation until such time as they write additional guidelines.
As things stand now, a strict interpretation of the RAW means that familiars have no function and no role at all in Exploration mode.
It's like in the Order of the Stick, when Varsuvius's raven popped into existence and took on a life of its own. Having a familiar is a conceit, a tool whose existence we ignore until (in Encounter mode only) it has defined game effects.
Personally, I prefer to have players who think outside the box, and only resort to rule-bound definitions when necessary to resolve actions and consequences.
And that PFS, not allowing such open-ended interpretations, will be the victims of table variation
This has to be the most melodramatic way you could have expressed this idea.
And I dont think there is any problem with your "all familiars are sapient" stance. Nor do I think there is anything wrong with "familiars have animal level intelligence unless it otherwise makes sense for them not to." So long as the DM is clear and up front I think people can have fun either way.