Scott, you may be unaware of quite a lot of research into the neurological basis of consciousness. Furthermore, it's blindingly apparent that there's no such thing as consciousness per se as an all-or-nothing phenomenon. We know that human consciousness is partial, sporadic, and easily manipulated. Both psychology and neuroscience have shone a great deal of light on the topic of consciousness over the last 50 years. As for such things as associations between sensory inputs and emotional responses, we know that this is how evolution works for all creatures with complex nervous systems. Sure, the baleful influence of morons like B F Skinner set the field back decades, but few researchers these days regard Skinner's ideas as anything more than an unfortunate blunder. And yes, too much of the recent work has been naive and loaded with preconceptions, but slowly and surely the science is improving and the knowledge base is expanding.