ABSTRACT
The intuition that the world can be ordered into a hierarchy of levels is nearly ubiquitous in cognitive neuroscience and the special sciences generally. The levels metaphor is spatial. Consequently, the levels metaphor is used in different domains to relate different items by different relations. At the highest level is the behavioral or cognitive phenomenon of spatial memory, studied as the capacity of animals to solve different types of maze. Levels of control and levels of processing are species of causal levels, which are defined by a particular asymmetrical causal relation among the hierarchically ordered items. In levels of control, the relata are agencies and the relation is some sort of dominance or subordination. Higher levels of control, direct, or regulate the goings-on at lower levels. Bosses and employees, sheriffs and deputies, and queen bees and drones are at different levels of control. Levels of mechanisms should also be distinguished from levels of realization.
