Lovely.
Where I take it is that above Bill’s postulated transition and event levels, beginning with relationships the brain works by associative memory. Categorization is orthogonal to the hierarchy and categorizing can be done over perceptions at any level. The shift from analog to discrete-element (‘digital’) control rests on categorization and the discrete cusps of categories (discrete at higher levels where the cusp has been decided, fuzzy at lower levels). Physiologically, a likely place for this is in the astonishingly dynamic architecture of the cerebellum, which I have hypothesized is responsible for I/O mapping between levels both afferent and efferent. There are pointers to this discussion in this post. (That was in December 2025. There have been no responses to it.)
It is true that a person born without a cerebellum can get by (see Richard Kennaway’s rejoinder to Ted Cloak’s similar claim in 2014 here.) This is accomplished by the great plasticity of the brain, which is now well known; it does not replicate the functions of the cerebellum, such a person has great cognitive and behavioral deficits which have yet to be analyzed from this point of view; and among these deficits we should expect that further plasticity of the brain is sharply curtailed.
The higher levels are all learned through the capacity to construct relationships among categories, including relationships among relationships. These become sequences when the means of controlling the reference perceptions which are associated to node n_j must first be made available by controlling the reference perceptions which are associated to node n_i. Sequences become plans or socalled ‘programs’ when the actual results of controlling the references at node n_i constrains a set of possible n_j1 ‥ n_m. Principles and system concepts are all relationships among relationships including categorizations of them.
Another place I take it is the Buddhist and Daoist realization of mind. The subjective impression of a point of view, of an ego, is false. That is,
This is the Buddhist report exactly.