What's amazing is that the human brain does it all on the equivalent of like 20 watts of power. That's basically a couple of LED light bulbs.
The software is a different story. Sure, the brain does all sorts of things that aren't necessary for $TASK, but we aren't necessarily going to be able to correctly identify which are which. Is your inner experience of your arm motion needed to fully parse the meaning in "raise a glass to toast the bride and groom", or respond meaningfully to someone who says that? Or perhaps it doesn't really matter - language is already a decent tool for bridging disjoint creature realities, maybe it'll stretch to synthetic consciousness too.