Quote Originally Posted by Bonsay View Post
Yes. If I may go further with this. What's so inherently special about neural or silicon based networks that creates consciousness? They are just interacting systems. What gives me or some other animal the specific subjective experience is the relation between our sensory organs and complex neural structures. What I'm aiming at - is it possible that the motion and interaction of macroscopic objects, some simplistic communication between bacteria, or even motion of water molecules creates some sort of a consciousness. Is it in a sense possible, that with our social interaction (for example), we create a new global consciousness? Is the idea that a group of people interacting creates some sort of a virtual entity too far fetched to consider? If it is, then why? (Pointing back at the lack of any inherent characteristic to a neuron that would imply it's uniqueness in spawning a consciousness, for example.)
My argument against this proposition is a mathematical one; the number of systems outnumbers the number of brains by a very large factor. Given the axiom that there is no bias to 'being' any particular conscious system, then the proposition seems unlikely, because you would not expect to be in the extreme minority which is human brains; however, we are.

It seems more likely to me that only certain systems are capable of consciousness. What is special about those systems I do not know, but perhaps we will work it out when we crack the neural code.