No one is really sure where the original matter of the universe comes from, but we do know that the very smallest particles which have been measured seem to pop in – and then back out of – existence in infinitely small amounts of time. However, as we all know, some matter doesn’t pop back out of existence, but endures. It is qualia, of course, which accomplishes this.
Atoms and molecules may not have consciousness, but if they do it would be determined from the outside, from the qualia around which they form themselves, which enables them to endure. The stars and the planets endure, also, because of the qualia around which they form.
You see, what we call the laws of physics are qualia – they don’t have any material existence in themselves, but the material world forms around them – just like the snowflake forms around the hexagon, or water molecules in a wave.
And, when matter finally came to life on earth, consciousness was still determined by the outer landscape. The earliest creatures, one-celled animals, were moved by light, or chemicals, or vibrations in the landscape.
More complex creatures, with the ability to move, and to sense qualia more keenly, still merely reacted to the outer landscape via instinct.
Consciousness was inside only because their bodies became landscapes for other, less complex creatures (such as Mitochondria, which now exists in the cells of almost every life form, and which was once a separate being). Biology, of course, like the laws of physics, is qualia, and matter forms around it, and so the body, with all its organs and microbiomes, is filled with reactive, instinctive beings.
But the laws of physics, and the laws of biology, and the laws of all the sciences, are complex – made up of qualia that has evolved to endure just like us. As I’ve said often, qualia is like an invisible window, through which we see only the matter on the other side; but the real secret to being a human being, the real blessing, is to concentrate on the qualia.
Paying attention to qualia is what made us human in the first place; it gave birth to our big brains, which, like some theater-sized Petri dish, allowed qualia to form qualiadelic relationships with other qualia, to become a colloseum of thoughts and complex ideas. At some point the fireworks within the brain began to endure just like a subatomic particle that doesn’t flash out of existence – they endured and eploded into a spectacle the size of the universe – the mind!
The mind is not made of matter. Matter forms around it, and that’s why qualia (ahem!) matters.