Does it make sense to speak of "Universal Consciousness" or "Universal Intelligence"?

[Chas]

Then I most certainly have a problem with the statement you made:
"However, the ability to receive and process photons is intrinsic to all matter-- on some level."

You are saying that all matter has brains?

I agree my original statement wasn't very well coined, so let me revise it. It may be that every reception of a photon causes a state change in the receiving matter, and that it is this minimal exchange of information (i.e. from the emitter) that represents the most fundamental "quantum" of qualia-- a little nano-spark of consciousness. And that this particle now "behaves" differently as a result of the information it has received, causing that original reception to cascade through physical causality. So on that level, the process is whatever the mechanism is that allows things to receive photons, have their state changed, and through their modified behavior affect the causal chain.

I'm not too attached to that specific idea-- my point is that EVEN IF we agree mind supervenes somewhere in the brain, it's not necessarily only, and specifically, in the brain as a whole entity that qualia might be spawned. Qualia might be intrinsic to all exchanges of information, or only to certain kinds of matter which interact with certain kinds of energy, or to any mechanism which collects data over time and causes it to be related to new data, or to only the whole brain, or only to me personally. Most importantly, note that all these are purely physicalist models.

OK, fine. I will restate that there is absolutely no evidence for anything but mind being dependent on anything but brain.

And no evidence that qualia are in any way not simply an aspect of consciousness.

I am not claiming that external factors might not be at play, that dualism is not true, or that there isn't some non-chemical property of particles that makes consciousness possible.
I only point out that there is no evidence for any of those things. The only evidence is that consciousness is brain-based.