CAs Compete

CAs are collections of neurons, that tend to activate each other.

Two CAs that are near each other will compete for neurons.

CAS 'try' to get neurons from each other.

Of course each neuron doesn't know about this, but an emergent proprety is that neurons that have little connection strength will be recruited by near by CAs.

This competition is essential for differentiating concepts. A dog and a cat look a lot a like. Their CAs are probably in similar places in the brain. Separating them is important.

Unfortunately, there is little experimental neural evidence for this, but this may be largely due to the difficulty of getting such evidence.

Ancedotal evidence exists with the phenomenon known as Phantom Hand. Each part of the body has part of the brain associated with it. This part of the brain is stimulated and learns to interpret the stimulation.

If the hand is lost, the associated part of the brain no longer gets external stimulus.

Gradually, neighboring parts of the brain will start to recruit it's neurons.