The object system supplies a set of meta-objects, called standard meta-objects. These include the class standard-object and instances of the classes standard-method, standard-generic-function, and method-combination.
[Editorial Note by KMP: This is said redundantly in the definition of STANDARD-METHOD.]
The class standard-method is the default class of methods defined by the defmethod and defgeneric forms.
The class standard-generic-function is the default class of generic functions defined by the forms defmethod, defgeneric, and defclass.
The class named standard-object is an instance of the class standard-class and is a superclass of every class that is an instance of standard-class except itself and structure-class.
Every method combination object is an instance of a subclass of class method-combination.