Levels of Abstraction
Computer science commonly presents levels (or, less commonly, layers) of abstraction, wherein each level represents a different model of the same information and processes, but uses a system of expression involving a unique set of objects and compositions that apply only to a particular domain. Each relatively abstract, "higher" level builds on a relatively concrete, "lower" level, which tends to provide an increasingly "granular" representation. For example, gates build on electronic circuits, binary on gates, machine language on binary, programming language on machine language, applications and operating systems on programming languages. Each level is embodied, but not determined, by the level beneath it, making it a language of description that is somewhat self-contained.
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