I certainly do acknowledge a subjective experience of consciousness. However, I don't understand why you treat its interruption as so catastrophic. Sleep does it all the time. If you define "I" solely in terms of consciousness, do you agree that "you" have only truly existed since you last awoke?

It does seem probable. Certainly if I didn't need to sleep, I wouldn't agree to start sleeping, on these grounds - it looks much too dangerous!

As I just wrote in another reply, I am convinced that my way of looking at things is incomplete and does not extend to new types of experiences (e.g., cloning), but I am not at all convinced that any of the alternative theories proposed in this thread are better.