Webs, cell assemblies, and chunking in neural nets: introduction

This introduction to Wickelgren (1992), describes a theory of idea representation and learning in the cerebral cortex and seven properties of Hebb's (1949) formulation of cell assemblies that have played a major role in all such neural net models. Ideas are represented in the cerebral cortex by webs (innate cell assemblies), using sparse coding with sparse, all-or-none, innate linking. Recruiting a web to represent a new idea is called chunking. The innate links that bind the neurons of a web are basal dendritic synapses. Learning modifies the apical dendritic synapses that associate neurons in one web to neurons in another web.