Consciousness Is Emergent Need

First, understand the 'emergent' behavior. Traffic jams "emerge". They are not related to cars. They can happen with people pushing through an exit or sand clogging up a hole. Second, understand "need". Things that impact a system and threaten its smooth functioning create a "need". For instance, you "need" to urinate. A cell "needs" to eliminate waste. A city "needs" to remove trash. Needs generate a response. The response (urinating, cell waste dumping, trash collection) is a systematic attempt to reduce the "need". "Consciousness" is the "awareness of the need" giving focus to a response. Many non-human things exhibit "consciousness". If a traffic jam blocks a major highway into a city the city will mobilize resources to clear the road (otherwise "city death" due to lack of, say food delivery, will occur.) Cells need to eliminate waste or cell death occurs. Computers show no signs of having any need and thus are not conscious. The internet, however, does show "emergent need" since an outage will generate a reponse to repair, reroute, or correct the problem. There are many "sensory systems" in the internet that can detect and respond to threats that might cause failure. Thus "consciousness" is an emergent behavior.