In my humble opinion, in a nutshell: There is no such thing as consciousness, i.e. a mechanism that defines consiousness. There is only a simulation process i

In my humble opinion, in a nutshell: There is no such thing as consciousness, i.e. a mechanism that defines consiousness. There is only a simulation process inside organisms that tries to mimic reality in order to predict the outcome of the current situation and subsequently produce a 'get away'-oriented or 'stay'-oriented response. This simulation process' complexity is relative to the complexity of the organism. The more complex the simulation is, the clearer the definition of objects in it is. The clearer the definition of objects is, the clearer the definition of self is. The clearer the definition of self is the higher the degree of 'consciousness' is. I.e. consciousness can be defined as the ability of something to perceive itself. With that definition, it is clear that that ability of self-perception changes from organism to organism. Thus plants have a low ability to perceive themselves, and humans have the highest. If we are searching for the mechanism of consciousness, we will never find it, because it doesn't exist: consciousness is an emergent phenomenon that arises from the operations of an organism.