I think people have made a big mistake on the question of consciousness, because they have ASSUMED that the low-level mathematical-type world would automatically know itself, i.e. automatically know its own law-of-nature relationships, categories and numbers, WITHOUT the existence of a separate knowledge aspect.
I.e., people have made a BIG ASSUMPTION that a separate knowledge aspect was not necessary in the low-level world, because somehow a mathematical-type system is supposed to automatically know itself.
But I’m contending that a consciousness/ knowledge aspect IS necessary in the low-level world of particles and atoms, as well as the higher-level world of living things.
This low-level knowledge aspect of the world is the foundation upon which higher-level knowledge and consciousness of one’s physical self and one’s physical surroundings can be constructed. Consciousness is always associated with matter: there is no spooky free-floating higher-level consciousness.
Consciousness is as simple as this: it is the necessary, passive, knowledge aspect of the world.
Agency is a different thing, an active thing: consciousness is not agency, and so consciousness is not the type of thing that could collapse the purportedly-existing wave function.