If Consciousness Is A Function Of Neurons ?

[A-wal]

It allows for the formation of the 5 senses, is responsible for the system of cognition, & for the continuity of consciousness. 

How though? How does a bunch of electrons moving around give rise to awareness?

 

Consciousness occurs when one of the modules, in competition with the others, acquires access to a global cortical neural network that sends its message to all the other "daemons" involved -- it's indicated by what's called a "P3" wave in an EEG scan.   Stanislaus Dehaene's excellent CONSCIOUSNESS & THE BRAIN discusses this in detail, including his interesting experiments.

How could any amount of neural processing give rise to consciousness? Those are mechanical processes. How could something mechanical explain thoughts, emotions and awareness? All you're doing is describing the functions of organic/computational processes. That in no way explains the emergence of consciousness.

 

"Consciousness occurs when one of the modules, in competition with the others, acquires access to a global cortical neural network that sends its message to all the other "daemons" involved..."

You're confusing cause and effect. It's more accurate to say:

'Modules, in competition with the others, acquiring access to a global cortical neural network that sends its message to all the other "daemons" involved seems to occur in conscious systems.'

[mrg]

Dennet's description of brain activity, with neurons trying to get more importance than others, is close to mine.

 

I do not think Dennett would have any disagreement with you.  Dehaene, the experimental counterpart to Dennett, talks about "Darwinism in the brain", in that the neural system is inherently "noisy", and It can't work very well if it isn't.  (It gets too noisy, and you get schizophrenia.)

[Super Polymath]

"Consciousness occurs when one of the modules, in competition with the others, acquires access to a global cortical neural network that sends its message to all the other "daemons" involved..."

Think of a game of dominoes.