The Opulence of Consciousness and its Origin

ooking over a few of the "musings" that I've written and even pondering the capability of "looking over" in the first place, I have become absolutely enraptured by the idea of consciousness. The ability not only to listen to music, but to "enjoy" it, recognize it, and even classify it in some cases seems miraculous in itself. What seems to be even more enrapturing is the proposition that all of these thoughts, enjoyments, and recognitions occur in a fist-sized object in the middle of my head; some may say that this idea is impossible and that the brain is only a mode of transportation for some ethereally centered locus of the mind, but that seems a bit too mystical for my taste. This idea, while initially may sound as the only rational prospect for prospect, is oddly reminiscent of the old cartoon "Casper". How could something by definition "non-material" interact with the brain, a material object? Obviously, for an object to have the ability to interact with the material world, it too must be a material object. Past the philosophical disputes I have with dualism, I also think that the very idea of resigning to mystery as, on an intellectual level, almost lazy. Instead of attempting to dissect and quantify what our experiences may be, the idea of dualism basically resigns itself to the ethereal. If the idea of materialism in the field of consciousness is true, then in my opinion, the field of philosophy of mind and neuroscientists alike have so much more mystery to unravel in the process. Think of attempting to quantify the ability to see an image, interpret it, then feeling something corresponding to personal taste of the environment. Man, think of quantifying "personal taste"! Mindblowing, huh?