The zombie in us

According to Christof Koch, a neurobiologist at CalTech in Pasadena, "Zombie agents control your eyes, hands, feet, and posture, and rapidly transduce sensory input into stereotypical motor output. They might even trigger aggressive or sexual behaviour when getting a whiff of the right stuff. All, however, bypass consciousness. This is the zombie in you."
...
In a 2001 article in NATURE entitled "The Zombie Within", Koch and Crick first speculated that: "It may be because consciousness allows the system to plan future actions, opening up a potentially infinite behavioural repertoire and making explicit memory possible."

Thus, consciousness would appear to be more varied, useful, and adaptable.

Interesting article.

--This has been a  prime  Zombie Alert brought to you by jomama.