Consciousness

I started reading "The Mystery of Consciousness" by John R. Searle a couple of days ago, and so far it's been pretty interesting. I'm only on the first chapter (where he delves into dualism), but it's already poking at my brain.

The main question that he asks is, "How exactly do neurobiological processes in the brain cause consciousness?" I've always been amazed by the complexity and development of the organ, but it has never crossed my mind just how bizarre the concept of consciousness is. I mean, here is this giant sheet of tissue balled up into what we see in diagrams constantly, and that alone is responsible for a majority of our physical senses and all of our emotional thoughts.

The emotional part is what really interests me. The brain is a physical organ, and all the processes that we see are completely physical; neurons connecting to other neurons, transmitting electric signals. How does this process give us the ability of consciousness? And when you drive deeper, what gives us the ability to have such discreet, introspective, and abstract thoughts? What is it that allows us to feel? Obviously a cat or a dog can be just a conscious as a human (physically), but they are far from this aware. Or maybe it just hasn't been able to be proven yet. Apes are closest related to humans, but do they have that awareness aspect? If a human doesn't understand a language, that person realizes that, or if a human runs into a table, (s)he knows that (s)he walked into it... would another animal (say apes, since they are the closest relative) realize that it was the fault of the animal, or would it assume that something ran into it (even if it was inanimate)? And how far does that go? Can a flea be aware that it is alive, or do small organisms like them just live, because that is all they know? I guess that plays a part in the dualism concept too... Searle seemed to have a fine line between the physical side and the psychological. In that case, does it mean only humans are able to access the mental side (as well as the physical side) of it, and the mental aspect of dualism is just voided for any other animal/organism?

Ramble, ramble, ramble... more to come after I read more of this book.