Trying to simplify my Consciousness hypothesis

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, I was probably responding to where I think you're going than to the thing you just quoted.  My bad.

There's always doubt for me, at all levels of analysis.  But let's say that for us, the brain is real (though we may not agree on what underlies it or any material thing), and that the nature of our experiences is clearly affected by brain function, and that observing brain function can tell us something about what somebody might be experiencing.  I can't experience what it's like to view a mouse with sonar, for example, because I'm not a bat, and we can look at differences in bat an human brains to see what that processing might look like.

You -don't-, we have no idea whether or not we can't.  If there is a language to cognition or experience, there is, conceivably, a means of translation.  If there's some intrinsic common element to experience..then that's one less hurdle to overcome in translation. The only way that we could legitimately claim that we simply -couldn;t- experience what it was like to be a bat is if the hardware (or the intrinsic element in either subjects experiential mechanism, as it were) were completely disparate and therefore incompatible. That's certainly -not- the case with the bats brain, relative to ours....so there's only one place such a troubling incompatibility could lie........the intrinsic x you propose, that I do not. That isn;t going to work for you, though, considering your description of it as intrinsic to the universe itself. So, maybe, lay off the can'ts?

(I know you like having your mind blown - I present the above for your enjoyment)

But with regard to psychogony, I wouldn't say the brain allows for mind, exactly.  Does an ocean cause waves, because it has waves on it?  No: tidal motions, winds and so on create the waves.  And even the capacity of waves has nothing to do specifically with the ocean, but with properties of water-- not even water, but of the QM particles which do their little dance with energy.  So saying we only see waves on oceans doesn't really mean much.  Waves are really something intrinsic to the universe-- how energy transmits through materials.  Wave-ogony is not explained by oceans, or anything oceans do.

You do realize that the qm particles that make up the water, and the water that makes up the ocean...are all the same thing..right?  I don't know why we'd say that we only see waves on oceans anyway...this seems like an incredibly poor analogy to draw any inference from whatsoever. Qualia, otoh, appears to be a bit more limited than waves. While we do have evidence of wave functions in a variety of media, we -don;t have evidence of qualia in a variety of media. Ultimately, and you know I;m very sympathetic to this notion, there may be many more thing with qualia than we know about.........but do you really want to open that can of worms, lol?

A material monist might tell you that interaction is the intrinsic thing in the brain that allows for cognition and qualia.  So, ignoring any issues wih the description or comments above...I don't see any problem or incompability with your description of the intrinsic this or that of waves and a material monists explanation of brain functions. There's only the additional qualification that while interaction may be intrinsic, and necessary...it clearly isn't sufficient in and of itself. Thus, enters the specific types of interactions provided by the brain (and sure, possibly other things as well...).