Having relational memory means that if I want to get you to think of a
fire truck, I can induce the memory in many different ways. I might make the
sound of a siren, or give you a verbal description (“a large red truck with
ladders on the side that typically responds to a certain kind of emergency”). I
might try to trigger the concept by an association game, by asking you to
name as many red things as you can in one minute (most people come to “fire
truck” in this game), or to name as many emergency vehicles as you can. All
of these things and more are attributes of the fire truck: its redness, its
emergency vehicle-ness, its siren, its size and shape, the fact that uniformed
men and women are usually found riding both in and on it, that it is one of
only a small subset of motor vehicles that carries a ladder around.
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