Comment by arafa

I always thought Hofstadter's argument (I see he's discussed elsewhere in this thread) was that consciousness was a convenient illusion, which is kind of like the idea that it's a feeling here. And that the key insight is that consciousness arises through self-reference in a non-obvious way. It's kind of like bootstrapping an operating system. It's the only explanation I've ever read where it all made sense and you could see all the mechanics of how it worked if they were explained in-depth. Maybe psychoanalysis and philosophical arguments can point you in the right direction or develop your intuitions, though.