Well, the reason we have experience at all is because that is being simulated by the brain. For me a more interesting question is how it is being simulated by the brain.
Isn't that just layering an extraneous concept on top without explaining anything? Is there a difference between experiencing something (real) and having a "simulated" experience of experiencing it?
I mean "simulated" in the same sense as how computational machines can simulate any other computational machine, as in you can define some arbitrary state and arbitrary rules and with such a machine apply those rules to the state to change it.
I say that because of that's what I best understand the neocortex doing (it does that and probably something more). If you buy in what the Numenta people are talking about, then certain neurons in your neocortex configure themselves to be able to predict their inputs better, so they start to form a model of their input. In aggregate, these neurons probably start to learn multiple sequential models of their input.
My guess it that these models in the brain interact with each other. I think some of the larger models that the brain models is us (individually), the environment we find ourselves in, our mind, how we relate to it, the 3D space that we find ourselves in, and such.
This is a simulation to explain what is going on "out there" (the physical world) so that the physical organism can successfully navigate "out there".
This simulated world, body, and such, is what is "real" to us.
