For me there is no bigger step between to wonder about how conscience arises from a universe made by atoms in a Newtonian universe, particles in a quantum universe, quarks in a quantum relativistic universe and finally, superstring/n-branes in a 11 dimensional universe for one side and, on the other side, to wonder about how SAS in a complex enough mathematical structure can have a sense of conscience.
Conscience has evolutionary advantages in biological terms, and probably the conscience will emerge, with time, in any description in which the rules permit a replication-with-variations/selection and where one objects feeds from others. It doesn't matter if the description is made of n-branes in 11 dimensional spaces or in any other mathematical/algorithmical construct. These self aware structures in their particular space-time will describe trajectories in which a superintelligent and supradimensional observer could see, inside the SAS, some components: neurons, or alike, that shows signs of troughs about themselves and the rest of their world in a way that interactions between SAS will depend on the changes of their brains -or something like brains-. This is the most that an external observer can experience about the conscience of other beings. These beings will think, so they will exist -and they will think that they exist, that is crucial - . That must be true either in our "physical" world or the world of a geometrical figure in a n-dimensional spacetime, or in a computer simulation defined by a complex enough algorithm (These three alternative ways of describing universes may be isomorphic, being the first a particular case or not. The computability of our universe doesn't matter for this question). So the mathematical existence, when SAS are possible inside the mathematical formulation, implies existence (the expression "physical existence" may be a redundancy) But, for these mathematical descriptions to exist, it is necessary the existence of being with a higher dimensionality and intelligence that formulate these mathematical descriptions? That is: every mathematical object does exist outside of any conscience? The issue is not to question that "mathematical existence (with SAS) implies physical existence", (according with the above arguments it is equivalent). The question is the mathematical existence itself.
