Agreed. And because consciousness is not physical, I can't fathom where it comes from. Like...I can grasp the idea of abiogenesis [0], the concept that organi

Agreed. And because consciousness is not physical, I can't fathom where it comes from. Like...I can grasp the idea of abiogenesis [0], the concept that organic molecules started self-replicating through chemical reactions that over millions of years started forming single-celled life that after a couple billion years turned into complex multi-cellular life and evolution has put us into the form we (and all other life) is today. But this understanding just makes life look like nothing more than a very specific set of chemical and electrical reactions. To a naive external observer, the human brain is essentially nothing more than a highly complex electrical circuit, and yet, it is conscious. We know what consciousness is, but it is very hard to define, because as you basically said, it is not physical. It exists, but can't be seen or even measured. You can see evidence of it by interacting with other life that appears conscious, but you can't prove it. If you could assemble a brain atom-by-atom, it could appear to be conscious, but would it? You won't know, and won't be able to know. Even if we created "perfect" AI and put it into a "perfect" artificial body that was indistinguishable from an actual human (I'm imagining the hosts in the Westworld TV series), most people would say it wasn't conscious, but you couldn't prove it either way. EDIT: In addition, we think about "conscious" decisions, but are your decisions truly made by consciousness? Think about how drugs will chemically affect the brain and can change behaviors. It makes me believe that free will is an illusion. Your consciousness doesn't make decisions, your physical brain does, and your brain can be altered. You're just a few million altered neurons away from an entirely different personality. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis