Every data-storage needs primary entities, and we can only store data using the primary entities we have available on any given system. These are the entities we lose when transferring information out of the mind – or the entities we gain when moving information into the mind.
These primary entities we’re looking for must have a few characteristics that make them different than all other “data” entities.
First, primary entities aren’t knowledge. They are the things that knowledge is made of. They aren’t data that’s in the brain, but they are the structure of the brain itself. It is something that you have simply because you use the system.
Therefore, primary entities must be fixed and independent of any definition.
Primary entities are the constants and they remain the same through the entire life-cycle of the system. Primary entities (1)do not need to be learned; (2)can’t be forgotten, and (3)can’t be changed or manipulated.
That would also entail that, since they are ingrained in the structure, they are (4)independent of any definition.
Unlike learned concepts, that need to be defined before use, primary entities can be used without defining them. Furthermore, any definition we might attempt to impose on them will serve only as a description of our subjective experience of them, as it cannot bind them or change the entities in any way.
These are the traits I used in order to hunt down the primary entities and set them apart from other entities.
Primary entities aren’t islands. They exist as parts of greater primary functional units of mind – unconscious sub-systems – that require these entities in order to function.
You’ll notice is that I’ve taken the liberty of already dividing the primary entities into 4 clusters. Each cluster dealing with a different entity type and containing a button-up and a top-down interpretation of it.
Note that the followings are not definitions but merely descriptions of undefinable terms. Please bear with me as you try to connect with the meaning of the term rather than the words.