This paper is about the SP-Multiple-Alignment (SPMA) concept which, as described in other publications, is largely responsible for the versatility of the SP Theory of Intelligence and its realisation in the SP Computer Model (SPCM) in modelling diverse aspects of intelligence, diverse kinds of intelligence-related knowledge, their seamless integration in any combination, and some other potential benefits and applications. The paper aims, firstly, to describe how the SPMA concept is founded on ‘Information Compression (IC) via the Matching and Unification of Patterns’ (ICMUP), and then, secondly, to show with examples how the SPMA concept is a generalisation of six other variants of ICMUP—a generalisation that appears to be largely responsible for the intelligence-related and other strengths of the SPMA concept. Each of those six variants is described in a separate subsection, and in each case, there is a demonstration of how that variant may be modelled via the SPMA concept. To provide some context for this paper, those six variants are also the basis of arguments, in another paper, that much of mathematics, perhaps all of it, may be understood as a set of techniques for the compression of information, and their application; and there are potential benefits from the creation of a New Mathematics as an amalgamation of ‘IC as a foundation for intelligence’ and ‘IC as a foundation for mathematics’.
