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I did actually google how these brake pad sensors work, and found a lot of unreliable information. A lot of people seem to think the sensors have two circuits, are magnetic and other strange ideas. I think all that is wrong.
If you take a look at the connector, it has only two pins in a plastic housing. That means is has ONE circuit. The resistance between the two pins is 0.3 ohm, which is pretty much a short circuit. The sensor does not stick to metal, so it is not magnetic.
Two things can happen to it as the disc starts grinding down the plastic.
1) The circuit can be grounded to the disc.
2) The circuit can be broken.
If it was an analog proximity sensor of some sort, it would have been more expensive, and would have more pins in the connector.
Since the sensor is buried rather deep into the brake pad, there will be no damage to it at all until the material is almost gone. At this point, the pads should definitely be replaced.
Before this happens, the car can only guess based on you driving pattern how much pad life there is left, and it does a very bad job at this, at least with my driving style.
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