Neuroscientists are searching for the engram within the conceptual framework established by John Locke's theory of mind. This framework was elaborated before the development of information theory, before the development of information processing machines and the science of computation, before the discovery that molecules carry hereditary information, before the discovery of the codon code and the molecular machinery for editing the messages written in this code and translating it into transcription factors that mark abstract features of organic structure such as anterior and distal. The search for the engram needs to abandon Locke's conceptual framework and work within a framework informed by these developments. The engram is the medium by which information extracted from past experience is transmitted to the computations that inform future behavior. The information-conveying symbols in the engram are rapidly generated in the course of computations, which implies that they are molecules.

神经科学家正在约翰洛克的心智理论建立的概念框架内寻找印迹。这个框架是在信息论发展之前，在信息处理机器和计算科学发展之前，在发现分子携带遗传信息之前，在发现密码子代码和编辑信息的分子机器之前该代码并将其翻译成转录因子，标记有机结构的抽象特征，例如前部和远端。寻找印迹需要放弃洛克的概念框架，并在这些发展所告知的框架内工作。印迹是从过去的经验中提取的信息被传输到告知未来行为的计算的媒介。印迹中传递信息的符号是在计算过程中快速生成的，这意味着它们是分子。