A General Framework for Parallel Distributed Processing

In Chapter 1 and throughout this book , we describe a large number of models , each different in detail-each a variation on the parallel distributed processing (PDP) idea. These various models, and indeed many in the literature , clearly have many features in common , but they are just as clearly distinct models. How can we characterize the general model of which these specific models are instances? In this chapter we propose a framework sufficiently general so that all of the various models discussed in the book and many models in the literature are special cases. We will proceed by first sketching the general framework and then by showing properties of certain specific realizations of the general model. I