Beat me to it, so *promote what may be exurb1a's deepest vid yet.

There is a generally held belief that consciousness is a mystery of science or a miracle of faith; that consciousness was attained instantly (or granted by god), and that one has either attained self awareness or has not.

I don't believe any of that. I believe like all things in biology, consciousness evolved to maximise a benefit, and occurred gradually, without any magic or mystery. The closest exurb1a gets to that is when he says at 6:28:

"Maybe evolution accidentally made some higher mammals on Earth self-aware because it's better for problem solving or something"

We need to know what other people are thinking and this is the problem that consciousness solves. If a neighbouring tribe enters your territory then predicting whether they come to trade, mate, steal or attack is beneficial to survival.

Initially this may be done through simulation - imagining the future based on past experience. A flood approaching your cave is bad news. Being surrounded by lions is not good. Surrounding a lone bison is dinner. Being charged by a screaming tribe is an upcoming fight.

We could only simulate another person's actions, but we had no experience that allows us to simulate another person's thoughts. You may predict that giving your hungry neighbour a meal may suppress their urge to raid your supplies but you still can't simply open their head and see what they are thinking.

Then for the benefit of cooperation and coordination, we started to talk, and everything changed.

Communication not only allows us to speak our mind, but allows us to model the minds of others. We can gain an understanding of another person's motivations long before they act upon them. The need to simulate another person's thoughts becomes more nuanced and complex. Do they want to trade, or do they want to cheat?

Yet still we cannot look into the minds of others and verify our models of them. If we had access to an actual working brain we could gradually strengthen that model with reference to how an actual brain works, and we happen to have access to such a brain, our own!

If we monitored ourselves then we could validate a general model of thought against real urges, real experiences, real problem solving and real motivations. Once we apply our own selves to a model of thought we become much better at modelling the thoughts of others.

And what better way to render that model than with speech itself? To use all of our existing cognitive skills and simply simulate others sharing their thoughts with us.

At 3:15 exurb1a referenced a famous experiment that showed that we make decisions before we become aware of them. This lends evidence to suppose that our consciousness is not the driver of our thoughts, but a monitor - an interpretation of our subconscious that feeds our model of how people think.

Not everybody is the same. We all have different temperaments. Some of us are less predictable than others, and we tend to avoid such people. Some are more amenable to co-operation, others are stubborn. To understand the temperament of one we must compare them to another. If we are to compare the model of another's mind to our own, and we simulate their mind as speech, then we must also simulate our own mind as speech. Then not only are we conscious, we are self-aware.

Add in a feedback loop of social norms, etiquette, acceptable behaviour, expected behaviour, cooperation and co-dependence, game theory and sustainable societies and this conscious model eventually becomes a lot more nuanced than it first started - allowing for abstract concepts such as empathy, shame, guilt, remorse, resentment, contempt, kinship, friendship, nurture, pride, and love.

Consciousness is magical, but not magic.

I think exurb1a got laid.

Your video, exurb1a - Wheel of Future History, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

*promote the goodness that is exurb1a

.... and cats.

Also one of my favorite thumbnails ever.

My five in no particular order are:

Nerdwriter https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJkMlOu7faDgqh4PfzbpLdg
kaptainkristian https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuPgdqQKpq4T4zeqmTelnFg
Kurzgesagt https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsXVk37bltHxD1rDPwtNM8Q
exurb1a https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCimiUgDLbi6P17BdaCZpVbg
CGP Grey https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2C_jShtL725hvbm1arSV9w

This man is the modern Jesus. Helping people whilst being completely irreverent, hilarious, and "lacking in social niceties". Like Albert Rosenfield. I love you exurb1a.

exurb1a has a collection of short stories"; one of them is called "The Dance" and it's essentially a fictionalised version of this video.

Great story (even if it is slightly ripping off Asimovs Last Question).

exurb1a never disappoints

What can I say, im a huge exurb1a fan *quality *promote

*related=http://videosift.com/video/An-Open-Letter-from-Exurb1a-to-YouTube

An Open Letter from Exurb1a to YouTube has been added as a related post - related requested by ChaosEngine.

Congratulations! Your comment on Why is the milk gone? - exurb1a has just received enough votes from the community to earn you 1 Power Point. Thank you for your quality contribution to VideoSift.

This achievement has earned you your "Silver Tongue" Level 18 Badge!

It's about time His videos are amazing http://videosift.com/tag/exurb1a

Can't go wrong with exurb1a videos http://videosift.com/tag/exurb1a