Patent attributes
One or more multi-layer systems are used to perform inference. A multi-layer system may correspond to a node that receives a set of sensory input data for hierarchical processing, and may be grouped to perform processing for sensory input data. Inference systems at lower layers of a multi-layer system pass representation of objects to inference systems at higher layers. Each inference system can perform inference and form their own versions of representations of objects, regardless of the level and layer of the inference systems. The set of candidate objects for each inference system is updated to those consistent with feature-location representations for the sensors as well as object representations at lower layers. The set of candidate objects is also updated to those consistent with candidate objects from other inference systems, such as inference systems at other layers of the hierarchy or inference systems included in other multi-layer systems.