An information-processing analysis of the functional architecture of the primate neocortex

Working at the systems level of analysis, we will use the term functional architecture to concern what processing components exist, how they are interconnected, and what information-processing functions each is involved in. In this paper, experimental evidence for the primate neocortex is analysed for conclusions concerning the existence of neural areas, for corticocortical connectivity among neural areas, and for the involvement of each cortical neural area in the functioning of the brain. We characterize the information-processing function for each neural area in terms of the types of information it is associated with, and conceive of its activity as processing, storage and transmission of data of the corresponding types for that area. We also adapt concepts of goal, plan, sequence, event and context for the description of information processing in the neocortex. This analysis shows that the primate neocortex consists in the main of a perception hierarchy, an action hierarchy and connections between them. In other words, from an information-processing point of view, the primate neocortex has a hierarchical perception–action architecture.