Our humanity rests upon a series of learned behaviors, woven together into patterns that are infinitely fragile and never directly inherited.
- Margaret Mead, anthropologist, (1901-1978) -
The most basic patterns are based on repetition and periodicity. A single template, or cell, is combined with duplicates without change or modification. For example, in aviation, a "holding pattern" is a flight path which can be repeated until the aircraft has been granted clearance for landing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patterns
