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bogus comments on There just has to be something more, you know? - Less Wrong
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If you taboo the word 'function', all you're left with is an explanation of what the brain does. The question is whether such an explanation exists which can account for our conscious experiences. The kinds of materialistic explanations which tend to be favored here do not account for conscious experience; at best, it's bolted on as a (non-materialistic!) afterthought, or handwaved away as magical and spiritualistic "emergence". This is not a satisfactory situation.
What kinds of explanations are you talking about that are unsatisfactory? Most of us have only been issuing promissory notes based on a confidence that there is such an explanation, not building that explanation. (Hint: anyone who says "emergence" and isn't being wrong in doing so is declaring that they aren't explaining it yet.)
That does clarify some things, but why are so many of you bothered by the claim that conscious experience may in fact be a basic physical phenomenon? It seems that many physicalists here are putting up semantic stopsigns to compensate for the fact that they don't really have an explanation yet.
It's a mysterious answer to a mysterious question. If consciousness were basic, what would that rule out?* Nothing, so far as I can see. It's the same kind of 'explanation' as "phlogiston".
(A lot of this is connected with the MAtMQ sequence, if you're wondering where I'm coming from on this.)
* Edit: Quick summary of the link: this is equivalent to "what would it imply" - logically, A -> B and A -> ~~B are the same - but because it's much easier to fool yourself into thinking that A implies an observation than that it prevents one. The latter is usually only managed by theories which actually explain.
What do you mean when you suggest consciousness is a "basic physical phenomenon"? The handwave may lie in the question you give to the materialist, not the answer the materialist gives to your question.
Yes indeed, mind is what the brain does - and mind includes consciousness. I will give a picture, but I do not believe that this is the explanation as there are many such explanations - it is just an illustration of how it might be so as to show that such things are possible. Suppose - the brain does the work of perception, and goal directed motor planning etc. and then creates a model that predicts what the incoming data will be in a fraction of a second. It takes a fraction of a second (same fraction) to do this. It then compares the model with what is coming in and makes corrections to the model based on errors in its prediction. The model is stored in short-term memory to assist in the construction of the next frame of the model and the more permanent memory a little later. This model is shared by all the parts of the brain that require it to do their work (more of less the whole brain). The model is involved in predictive monitoring, sharing of information and memory storage. How would this 'feel' any different from conscious experience? Experiments in neuroscience have given evidence of the movie-like frames, the prediction, the link to memory, the periodic synchronous communication across the brain etc. This is not handwaving but science. And there are other just as reasonable ways to envisage the evidence.