John Henry

If by 'conscious', you mean 'aware', then is answer is that we don't know, but we have no reason to assume that this system of phones would be conscious. We could create an artificial neural network which would respond to a set of stimuli in exactly the same way as a real neural network that it had been modelled on, but this would not mean that it was conscious.

Speaking as a conscious being myself, I can say that there is an element of consciousness, which distinguishes it from mere responsiveness and that this is not externally observable. Given that we cannot externally observe this defining element of consciousness, why should we assume that it exists inherently and exclusively in the structure of neurons? Admittedly we don't have anywhere better to put it yet, but that's no reason to jump to conclusions about where it is.

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"No one was behaving from very Buddhist motives. Then, thought Pigsy, he was hardly a Buddha, nor was he a monkey. Presently, he was a pig spirit changed into a little girl pretending to be a little boy to be offered to a water monster. It was all very simple to a pig spirit."