I don't think the fact that we are conscious and created evolution implies that consciousness *per-se* increases reproductive fitness. The seemingly-more-plausible possibility is that evolution created brains with ability to think so they could perform good actions without "knowing" about qualia, and in the process "accidentally" created…
I don't think the fact that we are conscious and created evolution implies that consciousness *per-se* increases reproductive fitness. The seemingly-more-plausible possibility is that evolution created brains with ability to think so they could perform good actions without "knowing" about qualia, and in the process "accidentally" created consciousness. That's possible (after all, we _are_ conscious, so one explanation must be true!) but it just seems weird—and even more weird when you think about feelings.
I don't think the fact that we are conscious and created evolution implies that consciousness *per-se* increases reproductive fitness. The seemingly-more-plausible possibility is that evolution created brains with ability to think so they could perform good actions without "knowing" about qualia, and in the process "accidentally" created consciousness. That's possible (after all, we _are_ conscious, so one explanation must be true!) but it just seems weird—and even more weird when you think about feelings.