What does it mean, exactly, for a given system to be a "neural correlate of consciousness"?

Within psychology and neuroscience, some new and rigorous experimental paradigms for studying consciousness have helped it begin to overcome the stigma that has been attached to the topic for most of this century.

Actually, I think most people accept the existence of qualia.

I think that consciousness has always been the most important topic in the philosophy of mind, and one of the most important topics in cognitive science as a whole, but it had been surprisingly neglected in recent years.

It probably helps that my background is in the sciences and I can speak the scientists' language.

I had the idea that it would be wonderful to be a physicist or a mathematician maybe 500 years ago around the time of Newton when there were really fundamental things just lying around to be discovered.

There's certainly nothing original about the observation that conscious experience poses a hard problem.