ABSTRACT
In the most general way of speaking, people use the noun "memory" to refer to instances where information of the past is made available for present purposes. This chapter begins with as broad a view on memory as possible to provide a context for the narrower memory phenomena. It focuses on non-linguistic approaches towards taxonomizing memories. In the literature, a variety of taxonomies with different taxonomical maxims have been offered. The chapter evaluates the most prominent taxonomical approaches towards memory along their general structure by distinguishing scalar, hierarchical, and natural-kind based taxonomies. Ultra-short-term memory, or sensory memory, makes sensory information that does not exist anymore in the physical world available for processing for less than 1 second. While a scalar taxonomy is appealing due to its simplicity, a tremendous number of empirical studies in psychology and neuroscience have revealed that many instances of long-term memory appear quite distinct from one another.
