Metaphor

Not every metaphor can be literally paraphrased by a corresponding simile – the metaphorical meaning of ‘Juliet is the sun’, for example, is not the literal meaning of ‘Juliet is like the sun’. But every metaphor can be literally paraphrased, since if ‘metaphorically’ is prefixed to a metaphor, the result says literally what the metaphor says figuratively – the metaphorical meaning of ‘Juliet is the sun’, for example, is the literal meaning of ‘metaphorically, Juliet is the sun’.

Much of the recent philosophy literature on the topic of alternative conceptual schemes responds to Donald Davidson. Davidson makes an argument by applying his system to the question, “Could others have an alternative system of concepts, an alternative conceptual scheme?” But he also remarks on the metaphor of organizing. A number of others have joined in. Why? This material may seem unimportant, but I present some reasons for why, and respond to other remarks, by P.M.S Hacker and Hans-Johann Glock.

This paper tries to present Donald Davidson on metaphor in a way which appears more systematic than his own celebrated essay. On this interpretation, he uses his principle of charity to make sense of metaphors: taken literally, a metaphor is patently false or trivially true, but because there is normally no reason to utter such a statement and because we must assume fellow speakers to have largely true beliefs, we take it as a metaphor. I consider the concern that Davidson’s (...) principle is much better for processing metaphors which are patently false, when taken literally, rather than trivially true. We must interpret charitably and charitable interpretation requires us to treat speakers as having largely true beliefs by our lights and the best way to meet this requirement when faced with some patently false statements is treat them as not intended to be taken literally. But what is the situation with metaphors which, when taken literally, are trivially true? I give an example where Davidson’s system can cope with this. The interpreter must consider why a trivially true statement was uttered and charity requires preferring some other explanation to: the uttered falsely believed that you did not know this. (This is also material before my own system on metaphor!). (shrink)

My philosophico-poetrical system is not all my own. I built upon Valéry's remark: "To write regular verses destroys... an infinite number of fine possibilities but at the same time it suggests a multitude of distant and unexpected thoughts." The problem with pursuing the project and allowing for metaphor is that one starts with a line and searches for a line that rhymes and chooses a line with a metaphor in it which expresses common thoughts. By banning metaphor, one increases the (...) chances of distant and unexpected thoughts figuring the rhyme. (I think the AI has cut my remark "That's not how I interpret the lyrics."). (shrink)

Humanity's persistent endeavor to understand existence has unfolded through two seemingly distinct yet deeply linked paths: the vibrant stories of myth and the detailed explorations of molecular biology. This paper argues that these fields, rather than being separate, are fundamentally influenced by a common cognitive framework-a profound, embodied structure of comprehension. We contend that essential patterns of human thought, stemming from our basic interactions with the physical environment, form the underlying support for both age-old stories and modern scientific explanations. Utilizing (...) ideas from philosophy of mind, cognitive science, linguistics, literary theory, neuroscience, and psychology, we examine how bodily experiences of force, containment, transformation, and causation do not simply reflect but actively shape the conceptual structures within these different areas. Through a thorough quantitative analysis of carefully crafted mythological and biological sentences, aimed at highlighting these shared cognitive patterns, we uncover remarkable metaphorical similarities. These connections, illustrated by concepts such as the Earth Mother and Soil Health, or the Phoenix and Cellular Respiration, imply that the human mind utilizes a consistent framework of conceptual mappings to make sense of intricate phenomena across vastly different levels of reality. This study promotes a more unified understanding of human knowledge, where the imaginative essence of myth and the analytical rigor of science are viewed not as rival paradigms, but as complementary manifestations of an embodied consciousness striving to express the fundamental truths of existence. -/- . (shrink)

Metaphor is not ornamental language but a foundational mechanism of human cognition. Research in cognitive linguistics and philosophy of mind demonstrates that metaphor structures conceptual thought, emotional understanding, identity formation, and social connection. As artificial intelligence systems increasingly mediate communication, interpretation, and meaning-making, metaphor is being systematically flattened into explicit, literal language. This paper introduces the Metaphor Integrity Framework (MIF), a theoretical model that treats metaphor as cognitive infrastructure rather than stylistic expression. The framework identifies metaphor collapse as a form (...) of premature semantic closure and examines how contemporary AI systems accelerate this collapse through optimization for explicitness, speed, and disambiguation. Drawing on cognitive science, symbolic anthropology, media theory, and AI ethics, this work argues that metaphor erosion represents an under-recognized cognitive and cultural risk with consequences for empathy, imagination, identity, and collective meaning-making. The framework provides a foundation for studying symbolic cognition in both historical and AI-mediated contexts without reducing meaning to belief or prediction. Keywords: symbolic cognition, metaphor, AI ethics, cognitive linguistics, meaning-making, interpretability, human–AI interaction. (shrink)

Understanding how language reflects human cognition continues to present a notable challenge given the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence (AI), and above all, implicit biases in linguistic expressions. While AI fairness research has increasingly focused on bias against gender, race, and other human categories, little focus has been placed on nonhuman animals as potential targets of prejudice. While animal metaphors often reflect speciesist assumptions, this is underexplored in AI ethics. To fill this void, the current study explores speciesism in Bengali (...) social media discourse using metaphorical animal expressions. First, it presents the manually annotated Bengali Figurative Animal Dataset (BeFAD), and a three-layer annotation structure that records sentiment, metaphor type, and kind of cognitive framing. Using Conceptual Blending Theory, the paper offers insight into how metaphorical language taps into mental spaces where the hierarchy of perceptions about animals persists, even in what seem to be benign uses. The analysis is supplemented by a classification task, done Hateful/Non-hateful, which utilizes IndicBERT to look at how an Indian language-specific AI system interprets figurative animal content. Overall, they highlight the need to address speciesism in both human and AI-mediated communication, and offer as an initial starting point for further research in low-resource languages. (shrink)

Knowledge can be transmitted through testimony. What about understanding? In this paper I argue against the possibility of testimonial understanding by giving an account of understanding in terms of ‘mental structures’. Then I argue while we cannot integrate communicating understanding into a propositional model of epistemic communication, we can do so on a perspectival model. I highlight the importance of this to the epistemology of education throughout.

One can lie by asserting non-literal content. If I tell you “You are the cream in my coffee” while hating you, I can be rightfully accused of lying if my true emotions are unearthed. This is not easy to accommodate under many definitions of lying while also preserving the lying-misleading distinction. The essential feature of non-literal utterances is their falsity when literally construed. This interferes with accounts of lying and misleading, because such accounts often combine a literal construal of what (...) is said by an utterance with a falsity requirement for lying. In the presence of non-literal lies such definitions struggle to make plau- sible predictions for non-literal lies and merely misleading utterances together. In this article I aim to fix this by extending Daniel Hoek’s pragmatic account of conversational exculpature to assertions in general. Since this mechanism is designed to compute the intended meanings of non-literal utterances, it straightforwardly predicts non-literal lies to be as such. The lying-misleading distinction is also preserved, because merely misleading utterances arise out of exploiting a different pragmatic mechanism—Gricean additive implicatures. Along the way I also draw some general lessons about assertion and implicatures. (shrink)

Since the latter half of the twentieth century, science fiction narratives centered on humanoid robots have continuously explored the future of human–machine symbiosis through embodied character design, providing a conceptual testing ground for real-world robotic development. This study focuses on the metaphorical mechanisms underlying the “quasi-body” of robots in such narratives, revealing how they challenge the stability of the human concept. By analyzing how various humanoid robotic figures in science fiction narratives are modeled upon the human “body” and how the (...) robots’ “quasi-body” reciprocally reshape the concept of the “human”, this article employs a dual perspective integrating phenomenological embodiment theory and conceptual metaphor theory. The argument unfolds in three progressive stages: deconstructing the metaphorical imitation of human in robotic embodiment within science fiction narrative, critiquing the simplified functional body that overlooks the fundamental role of the body in cognition, and tracing the reverse influence of humanoid metaphor modeling on the conceptualization of the human. This study seeks to expose the intrinsic tensions embedded in bodily metaphorization within human–robot modeling. As human–robot/machine symbiosis becomes an increasingly normalized condition of existence, only by disrupting entrenched cognitive frameworks of body stereotype can we cultivate novel relational paradigms imbued with greater ethical imagination in the technological reality. (shrink)

The social-organism metaphor remains a powerful heuristic in social theory yet carries persistent epistemic risks when transferred uncritically. This paper defends a practice oriented middle path: metaphors are human artifacts and therefore subject to epistemic governance. First, the argument diagnoses three category errors that commonly afflict organismic reasoning, namely teleological importation, reductive biological literalism, and boundary mismapping across levels of organization. Second, the paper connects philosophical criteria for analogical strength to concrete methodological consequences, showing how Hesse, Cartwright, and Kuhn bear (...) on case selection, hypothesis design, and sensitivity analysis. Third, a set of reflexive safeguards is proposed, including explicit mapping of positive and negative analogies, formalization tests, scale audits, and a normative audit that reveals who benefits from particular framings. Two worked examples and practical templates demonstrate how hybrid models that combine organismic, network, and cybernetic perspectives can preserve heuristic value while avoiding distortions. The conclusion recommends procedural rather than prohibitive responses: discipline metaphorical reasoning so that it illuminates rather than obscures social complexity. Clinical trial number: Not applicable. (shrink)

Nonliteral uses of mental illness terms abound. Common examples include criticizing a person’s mood swings by saying “you’re bipolar”, hyperbolically exclaiming that a particularly difficult college exam “gave me PTSD”, or responding to a compliment about the cleanliness of one’s home by saying “I just have OCD.” There has been some pushback in recent years, both socially and within the philosophical literature, against using mental illness terms nonliterally to imply something negative about the subject. The focus so far has been (...) on the pejorative nature of the utterances. Nonliteral uses which imply something positive about the subject have all but gone ignored. One might think that these positive uses are innocent, perhaps even helpful in combatting stigma. On the contrary, as I argue in this paper, all nonliteral uses of mental illness terms are harmful, and they are harmful for the same reason. I argue that they contribute to what I call hermeneutic hijacking. Hermeneutic hijacking occurs when a term’s literal meaning is eclipsed by a nonliteral usage in a way that prevents the original term from functioning as it should. Though people have recognized the harm of pejoration, they have overlooked the way that nonliteral uses of mental illness terms, even absent pejoration, cause hermeneutic injustice. (shrink)

The topic of conceptual change is a natural target for integrated history and philosophy of science. Scholars working in this tradition have investigated concepts from many different sciences, often supplementing familiar historical and philosophical methods with tools from ethnography, cognitive science, and the digital humanities. After reviewing the literature, we single out two themes that seem especially promising targets for future work. First, as we point out, many &HPS analyses of conceptual change lean on metaphors likening concepts to biological species (...) or artifacts. Drawing on previous studies of metaphors in science, we encourage more attention to the substantive impact of metaphor choice. Second, &HPS scholarship has often moved beyond describing and explaining conceptual change to address normative questions. This agenda is echoed by the recent trend of conceptual engineering in analytic philosophy. Though the two bodies of research have hardly interacted so far, we point out several opportunities for fruitful mutual contribution. (shrink)

This paper explores the inferential processes underlying analogical reasoning, with a focus on its relationship to abduction. Peirce identified abduction as a central element of analogy (CP 1.65), and more specifically, as the cognitive mechanism uniquely responsible for the generation of new knowledge (CP 5.171). From this perspective, in this paper, I propose a typology of analogical reasoning based on the varying roles that abductive inference plays in the formation of analogical thought. To develop this framework, I draw on Peirce’s (...) theory of abduction, as further refined by Eco’s ( 1981 ) typology of abductive processes. I argue that different types of abductive inferences give rise to distinct forms of analogy, each producing specific epistemic effects, ranging from quasi-immediate understanding to more elaborate processes that activate creative capacities. The typology of analogical reasoning developed here is then applied to metaphorical cognition in order to account for the different levels of cognitive complexity and the distinct epistemic functions that metaphors by analogy may have. (shrink)

Metaphor is a pragmatic device that might influence how arguments are evaluated. Beyond its cognitive and aesthetic value, metaphor also fosters linguistic intimacy, i.e., the feeling of belonging to an intimate community. The paper hypothesizes that linguistic intimacy might be particularly relevant in ad populum arguments, where a sense of belonging to the community endorsing the argument might influence the acceptance of the conclusion. In ad populum arguments, indeed, metaphors might act as a “concealed invitation” to accept and share a (...) conclusion, encouraging effortful interpretation that results in a feeling of shared community. However, not all ad populum arguments are fallacious: they may reflect reasonable consensus, with the agreement with their conclusion depending on how they are framed. The article presents an empirical study investigating whether conventional and novel emotive metaphors vs. their literal counterparts within ad populum premises increase participants’ acceptance of the argument conclusion. The results showed that especially novel and negative metaphors in the premises make people less prone to evaluate the conclusion of ad populum arguments as logically acceptable, while conventional and positive metaphors in the premises makes them feel intimacy with the group of people supporting the conclusion, more easily leading to agreement with their conclusion. (shrink)

Analogy is central to human language and cognition. It has also been proposed to play an important role in language evolution. For these reasons, the evolution of analogy and the cognitive processes supporting it are an important explanatory target for evolutionary accounts of human language. We integrate data from comparative psychology and cognitive archaeology to investigate the evolution of analogy as well as its evolutionary foundations. We present evidence supporting the view that a number of capacities underlying analogy display evolutionary (...) continuity between humans and nonhuman animals. In addition, we propose that analogical capacities can also be inferred from the archaeological record by looking at productional diversity in tool‐making. To gain further insight into the evolution of complex human analogical capacities, we investigate comparative and archaeological evidence for one cognitive process intricately linked to complex forms of analogy and the evolution of language, that of metaphor. Overall, we propose an interdisciplinary framework for understanding the evolution of analogy and argue that analogy has deep evolutionary roots, supporting cognitive capacities such as metaphor and language. (shrink)

This paper examines how metaphors shape our thinking about and conceptualizing of artificial intelligence (AI), noting that their inherent imprecision leads to discrepancies in our understanding and objectives for AI. By exploring the concept of 'bad metaphors' that equate artificial intelligence with human intelligence, paper argues that these metaphors often carry additional, unintended meanings that distort our understanding and expectations of AI. The terms “artificial” and “intelligence” themselves are ambiguous and ideologically loaded, contributing to the complexity. The paper critiques the (...) anthropocentric and mechanistic metaphors, like “AI as human” and “brain-computer,” which perpetuate unrealistic expectations. By deconstructing these metaphors within broader cultural and historical contexts, the paper calls for a more nuanced and precise understanding of AI, moving beyond simplistic and potentially misleading analogies. (shrink)

Non-Cognitivism about metaphor – the thesis that there is no such thing as metaphorical meaning or content – is defended in a 1978 paper by Donald Davidson, and the view has lately enjoyed a revival due to work by Ernie Lepore and Matthew Stone. I argue that while non-cognitivists are right to emphasize that certain characteristic effects of metaphor – especially its relationship to ‘seeing as’ and the imagination – cannot be explained in terms of meaning, it does not follow (...) that there is no work for metaphorical meaning to do. Metaphorical language (i) has non-literal truth conditions, which call for explanation in terms of meaning and content, and (ii) is compositionally operative: to determine the content of a complex sentence that embeds a metaphorical phrase, metaphorical contents must be composed along with literal contents. This fact is best explained through recourse to semantic compositionality and therefore the notion of metaphorical meaning. (shrink)

Research on pernicious language tends to focus on harmful beliefs and associations generated by such language. In this paper, I explore the idea that pernicious language often carries harmful mental imagery. Empirical studies suggest that mental imagery is a pervasive feature of language processing. Furthermore, mental imagery prompted by language can influence our memories and judgements in an insidious way. Focusing on language containing misinformation about witnessed events, as well as pernicious generics and metaphors about social groups, this paper argues (...) for the importance of mental imagery for theorising harmful language and suggests ways to counter the influence of the harmful imagery that language generates. (shrink)

In this paper, we investigate the use of non-epistemic values in the communication of scientific information. We examine how values, by way of the precautionary principle, have been used to move from a deeply uncertain scientific concept, climate tipping points, to a metaphor which promotes political action. We argue that the precautionary principle has been used to produce a metaphor which idealizes the tipping point context. The idealization highlights specific features that are relevant for decision-making, including the potential for catastrophe, (...) while omitting others, such as the deep uncertainty related to specific climate tipping points. We discuss the negative impacts of using precautionary principle-like reasoning when communicating about tipping points, highlighting the potential to (1) mischaracterize the uncertainty present within the decision-making context, and (2) further politicize a scientific debate to the point of hyperpolarization. We conclude that when communicating about deeply uncertain events the precautionary principle ought to be used as a meta-principle directed at the research community, the more-research-needed argument, rather than as a decision-making principle for policy. (shrink)

The function of chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT is based on detecting probabilistic patterns in the training data. This makes them vulnerable to generating factual mistakes in their outputs. Recently, it has become commonplace in philosophical, scientific, and popular discourses to capture such mistakes by metaphors that draw on discourses about the human mind. The two most popular metaphors at present are hallucinating and bullshitting. In this paper, we review, discuss, and criticise these mental metaphors. By applying conceptual metaphor theory, we (...) provide numerous reasons why they do not succeed in providing us with a better understanding of factual chatbot mistakes. We conclude by calling for justifications of the epistemic feasibility and fruitfulness of the metaphors at issue. Furthermore, we raise the question what would be lost if we stopped trying to capture factual chatbot mistakes by mental metaphors. (shrink)

Abstract: Contemporary analytic philosophers of the “reactive attitudes” tend to share a simple conception of guilt as “self-directed blame”—roughly, an “unpleasant affect” felt in combination with, or in response to, the thought that one has violated a moral requirement, evinced substandard “quality of will,” or is blameworthy. I believe that this simple conception is inadequate. As an alternative, I offer my own theory of guilt’s logic and its connection to morality. In doing so, I attempt to articulate guilt’s defining thought (...) or proposition through an extended investigation and analysis of guilt’s many competing metaphors, which I trace from the Hebrew Bible to the New Testament to Shakespeare to contemporary vernacular. My interpretation of this literary genealogy offers a way to understand guilt’s seemingly disparate metaphors in terms of a single master-image that illuminates our self-conceptions and our relationship to morality. I conclude by making a very brief start toward a moral vindication of guilt against the backdrop of Nietzschean and Freudian analyses that explicitly call guilt’s place in a healthy social and personal life into question. I suggest that once guilt’s logic is made explicit, we can see that it makes sense of, honors, and addresses some of our deepest aspirations and needs. (shrink)

How can social critique respond to a catastrophic world? From Emerson to Adorno, a tradition of radical social critique has flourished that utilizes methods which disclose rather than judge the form of life: instead of trying to say what is wrong and what would be better, these criticisms seek to show how the world is false and to reveal how we might escape the vicious circles of present society—pointing out its catastrophic state and directing readers to the real possibilities for (...) another form of life. -/- This book presents an incisive history of critical disclosure by looking at its common metaphors. As Särkelä illuminates, circular metaphors continually interact in the works of 19th- and 20th-century European and American authors including not just Emerson and Adorno, but also Nietzsche, Tarde, Freud, and Dewey. By reconstructing the driving examples of such disclosing critical gestures, Särkelä articulates their similarities and differences, and considers their potential for contemporary social critique. The result points the way toward the cultivation of critical skills relevant for our own age of catastrophe. -/- "Vicious Circles advances an exciting, ambitious, and original vision of disclosive critique. Through the careful excavation of prominent historical exemplars, Särkelä develops a compelling alternative to the normative, juridical conceptions of critique that predominate in contemporary critical theory." —Amy Allen, Pennsylvania State University -/- "What are the conditions and nature of effective social criticism? In this groundbreaking study of disclosive critique without conceptual guardrails, Särkelä moves the terms of this long-standing debate decisively forward." —Espen Hammer, Temple University -/- "Särkelä succeeds brilliantly in his principal task of placing disclosing critique on the radar screen of social philosophers. I am confident that this book will quickly become a classic text in critical theory, both within and outside the boundaries of the Frankfurt School." —Frederick Neuhouser, Columbia University. (shrink)

Apophaticism is usually defined as the view according to which God’s essence is unknowable and, thus, ineffable. Despite constituting a venerable tradition in all global faiths, it has been largely ignored by analytic philosophers of religion. In the past decade, efforts have been made to rectify such a situation, and some scholars have sought support for their apophatic views in medieval sources. Against this background, the present paper aims to contribute by offering a new and more accurate depiction of medieval (...) apophaticism. More specifically, the claim is that it should not be conceived as a continuous theoretical spectrum. Departing from the scholarly mainstream, the paper proposes to distinguish between two discrete kinds: ‘moderate apophaticism’ and ‘radical apophaticism’ – the latter of which has gone unnoticed in the relevant literature. It will be shown that these two independent positions – exemplified by Thomas Aquinas and John Scotus Eriugena, respectively – derive from opposite conceptions of God. To highlight the relevance of this proposal, the paper will demonstrate how the recognition of radical apophaticism leads to challenging the so-called ‘standard narrative’ on metaphors, especially regarding whether they could be admitted into philosophy. (shrink)

This essay mobilizes popular insights about the 'law of the jungle' to conceptualize and critique prevalent consumption and policy attitudes in urban environments, with a focus on residential infrastructure. A phrase used metaphorically to describe a given situation where competition, aggression, and 'survival of the fittest' prevail, it is here used in order to formulate a new characterization of contemporary cities as environments where there is minimal housing regulation or oversight (architectural occupation as survival-of-the-fittest battle), and where individual dwellers are (...) left to operate without significant constraints. In the first section of the paper, I introduce a commonplace interpretation of the 'jungle metaphor', commenting on sets of characteristics and values which are associated with it. In the second section of the paper, I paint a portrait of contemporary socio-economic environments, with a focus on urbanity and its distributive ordering of housing resources. I describe these environments as constructed (formal arrangements; architecture and urbanism) and policed (institutional arrangements; governments and state authorities) in manners which acutely—and problematically—emphasize market laissez-faire and self-interest. In the third section of the paper, I link this portrait of the contemporary city to survival-of-the-fittest jungle-like spaces, commenting on rivalrous competition between dwellers and, in the fourth and concluding section, I briefly propose one possible, normatively desirable form of urban market regulations. (shrink)

This article contributes to ongoing debates in the philosophy of mind concerning the ontological status of mental states by examining mental fictionalism. Within a pragmatic and naturalist framework, mental fictionalism reconsiders the tension between the Cartesian legacy, which treats mental states as metaphysically and ontologically serious entities, and strict behaviorism, which entirely neglects this inner dimension. Drawing on the work of analytic philosophers such as Sellars, Ryle, and Quine, mental fictionalism suspends commitment to the ontological status of mental states. Instead, (...) it legitimizes the functional role of folk psychology. On this account, mental states are grounded not in inner representations but in patterns of behavioral regularity and social norms. The article consists of three sections: the first outlines the theoretical framework of mental fictionalism; the second discusses the place of folk psychology within this framework; and the third examines the epistemic and pragmatic implications of these two lines of inquiry. The aim of this paper is not merely to describe mental fictionalism, but to show that metaphorizing the mind may offer a way to reconsider its epistemic and pragmatic function. Within this framework, metaphorizing the mind is understood not as a form of reduction, but as a strategy for preserving the epistemic strength of mental discourse. (shrink)

This article reexamines genius and extraordinary talent within the framework of predictive processing. Drawing upon an interdisciplinary synthesis of neuroscience, philosophy, chaos theory, information theory, and critical epistemologies, it attempts to analyze the genius mind as a dynamic, self-regulating system capable of reducing local entropy. From the perspective of local learning-global optimization, the genius, through deep focus on a specific domain, reconstructs global structures. The genius mind functions as a generative model with extensive scope, capable of minimizing prediction errors and (...) utilizing them as raw material for creativity, constructive chaos, and semantic reconfiguration. (shrink)

Multiple sclerosis is a chronic and debilitating disease of the central nervous system that significantly impacts cognitive, motor, and social functioning. This article, by combining predictive processing models and embodied philosophy, examines the role of myelin damage in cognitive and social disorders in MS. The body functions as an active predictor capable of complex predictions about various bodily and social states. In this article, the processes of prediction and body reconstruction are comprehensively examined from philosophical and scientific perspectives, and novel (...) treatments, including combined approaches based on predictive processing and embodied philosophy, are proposed. (shrink)

Developmental dyscalculia is generally recognized as a challenge in learning or processing numerical information, often associated with weaknesses in working memory or symbolic representation. This article introduces a more comprehensive and integrative perspective: examining dyscalculia through the framework of predictive processing (PP), which conceptualizes the brain as a system that continuously anticipates and refines its internal models to minimize unexpected outcomes. We investigate how dyscalculia may arise not solely from specific impairments, but from more profound disruptions in the brain's ability (...) to allocate attention, formulate abstractions, and condense experiences into numerical representations. By integrating concepts from cognitive science, philosophy, deep learning, and anthropology, we analyze the difficulties faced by children with dyscalculia in establishing reliable predictive models of numbers, time, and quantity. Their challenges do not indicate a deficiency in intelligence, but rather a dissonance between conventional mathematics education and their brain's distinctive method of interpreting the world. By synthesizing insights from Piaget, game theory, category theory, and cultural numerical systems, we propose innovative, adaptable strategies for mathematical education. These strategies encompass embodied, metaphor-driven, rhythmic, and game-like methods that honor the variety of cognitive styles. Instead of compelling all children to conform to a singular mathematical paradigm, we advocate for a pluralistic and predictive approach to numbers that can accommodate dyscalculic learners at their current level and facilitate their growth from that point. -/- . (shrink)

Embodied Cognition holds that bodily (e.g. sensorimotor) states and processes are directly involved in some higher-level cognitive functions (e.g. reasoning). This challenges traditional views of cognition according to which bodily states and processes are, at most, indirectly involved in higher-level cognition. Although some elements of Embodied Cognition have been integrated into mainstream cognitive science, others still face adamant resistance. In this paper, rather than straightforwardly defend Embodied Cognition against specific objections I will do the following. First, I will present a (...) concise account of embodied conceptual processing and highlight some of its advantages over non-embodied accounts, specifically focusing on the role of metaphors. Second, I will detail the influence of computational metaphors on theories of cognition and evaluation of these theories. Third, I will argue that embodied cognitive mechanisms, specifically those operating through computational metaphors, may drive some of the resistance to Embodied Cognition - and that Embodied Cognition is able to offer a uniquely compelling account of this. Ultimately, this will contribute to an improved understanding of Embodied Cognition, its explanatory power, and how it ought to be evaluated. Additionally, it will shed light on the role of metaphors in shaping philosophical thought and highlight the importance of these influences. (shrink)

Classical deviance theories about metaphor argue that the metaphorical sense of a word or expression, w, deviates from the sense of the word or expression interpreted literally. Developments in lexical pragmatics challenge these theories by claiming that deviance pervades (nearly) all aspects of linguistic communication. If deviance is the norm, then classical explanans offer little to no insight. In fact, many theorists have abandoned the idea of the literal-metaphorical distinction. This move carries significant consequences for theories of language and communication. (...) We argue against this move and in favour of a linguistically robust literal-metaphorical distinction. We have three goals: The first is to argue that the literal-metaphorical distinction is important for theories of language and communication. The second is to assess Allott and Textor’s Non-Conformity View of deviance which gives up the idea that deviance is marked by a departure from conventional word meaning. Pace Allott and Textor, we claim that the literal-metaphorical distinction must ultimately be couched in some account of lexicalised meaning. Our third goal is to develop a form of qualified deviance that avoids what we take to be shortcomings of the Non-Conformity View. (shrink)

Though Mathias Risse and Gabriel Wollner’s _On Trade Justice_ admirably incorporates the history of European philosophy and U.S. government, their otherwise reasonable proposals rest on dubious grounds. The book derives both much of its appeal, and its primary vulnerability, from a cluster of central terms that are situated precariously at the intersection of metaphors and concepts, or what Lakoff and Johnson call “metaphorical concepts.” In this article, I explore the three most important such terms, as featured in the following paraphrase (...) of theirs: “_Trade_ is an _embedded ground_ of justice.” For each italicized term, I conclude, Risse and Wollner vacil-late between its most conceptual and metaphorical meanings, thereby attempting to (a) stretch “trade” to identify prehistoric exchange with global capitalism, so as to (b) rebrand the contextual “ground” of this universal activity as a foundation, even though (c) foundations “embedded” in other foundations simply reduce to their lowest common denominator. The latter, in this case, is global capitalism, the most immoral practices of which they are thereby pressured to defend, including temporary forms of the very exploitation that they so persuasively reconceive and otherwise condemn. (shrink)

Certain emotive factive reports and knowledge reports appear to violate their entailment relations in both embedded and unembedded environments. To account for these cases, I propose that these problematic attitude reports should be understood as instances of non-literal speech and, therefore, as cases that trigger a pragmatic mechanism of content subtraction. By adopting an analysis that employs this mechanism, this paper argues that the problematic cases ultimately convey unproblematic propositions that do not violate any entailments.

Bu yazının asıl amacı, bir öğreti olarak değil, refleksif bir yaklaşım olarak dil eleştirisinin nasıl sadece felsefenin değil, daha geniş anlamda tüm eleştirel düşüncenin temel ve belirleyici bir boyutu olduğunu göstermektir.Wittgenstein’ın felsefeyi “Sprachkritik” olarak tanımlamasından (1) ve kavramsal bir açıklamadan (2) yola çıkan bu bölüm, Fritz Mauthner (1849-1923) gibi felsefe tarihyazımında marjinalleştirilmiş yazarların yazılarına dayanarak, dilsel pürizme kurucu bir karşıtlık içinde (3), içkin bir kullanım eleştirisi olarak bir dil eleştirisi anlayışı (4) sunmaktadır.

Mind as Metaphor develops a new approach to the mind. This approach is called mental fictionalism. It claims that our concept of mind is fundamentally metaphorical: we project the “outer world” of human culture (especially spoken and written language) onto the “inner world” of the mind. This inner world is a useful fiction: it does not exist, and yet talking as if it exists allows us to make sense of people’s behavior. The result is a view that sits somewhere between (...) Cartesianism and behaviorism. If Cartesianism takes the metaphor of the inner world metaphor too seriously, behaviorism fails to take it seriously enough, overlooking the crucial role it plays in our concept of mind. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic paved the way for the emergence of the Boys’ Love (BL) theme and genre throughout various media platforms, causing disruptive visibility to the narratives and representation of gays (Andrada in an interview by Antonio, 2021; Ting, 2020). This disruption may have started a dialogue in social media, but this dialogue was only a limited attempt given that most of the discussions have stereotypical representations of gay men (Celso, 2020). This study analyzes how humor was applied in the (...) online comic, SariSari Story, and how humor is used in the portrayal of the gay characters in this online comic. The analysis uses Grice’s (2012) pragmatic framework of conversational maxims: quality, quantity, manner, and relation. Humor was indicated in the non-observance of one or more maxim(s), which, then, caused the implicatures. The study found that the most non-observed maxims were quantity, manner, and relation. The prominent type of humor present in the comic was the Freudian slip, where the slips contained sexual metaphors mostly associated with the characters’ sexual desires towards each other. As an example of the BL genre, the Sari-Sari Story online comic stereotyped its presentation of gay characters as hypersexual in their relationships with each other. In this, it deviated from the conventions of the Pinoy BL present in the mainstream media. (shrink)

Some ideas seem to possess a disproportionate ability to lead to new insights, new discoveries, new ideas, and even entirely new ways of thinking. Such ideas are said to be fruitful. Looking across the history of science and mathematics, we see creative minds preoccupied with the search for ideas of this kind. More precious than truth, fruitful ideas provide those in pursuit of knowledge with a seemingly bottomless well of innovation from which to draw as they attempt to solve new (...) problems and to refine solutions to old ones. Professional researchers have a nose for these ideas. They often can see in an instant that some way of approaching a problem will eventually result in a solution to it and to a whole host of other problems, all of which suddenly seem related. In this book, Chris Haufe explains how these ideas are detected and developed into large-scale frameworks for research. He argues for a philosophical perspective on scientific knowledge that places the search for fruitfulness at the heart of the scientific enterprise. (shrink)

According to a now-standard theory, ‘Juliet is the sun’ is supposed to be a ‘pregnant’ metaphor, ready at any moment to beget a sprawling heap of adorable semantic puppies. Its two parts—‘Juliet’ and ‘the sun’—ostensibly meet at a virtually endless number of points, and it’s allegedly illuminating, enjoyable, or at least interesting to sit there all day spelling them out. But what if none of that is true? What if, instead, a successful creative comparison tends to offer exactly two points (...) of contact, the first of which makes it adequate, while the second gives it power? To put it metaphorically (as is only appropriate): such an image is neither an iceberg (à la Cavell) nor a simple triangle (à la Aristotle) but a tetrahedron, a muscle, a covalent bond. And the telos of such images isn’t to transmit additional information but intensify, or disorient, or even—surprisingly—make us feel at home in this miserable world. (shrink)

What is the status of metaphorical meaning? Is it an input to semantic composition or is it derived post-semantically? This question has divided theorists for decades. Griceans argue that metaphorical meaning/content is a kind of implicature that is generated through post-semantic processing. Others, such as the contextualists, argue that metaphorical meaning is an input to semantic composition and thus part of “what is said” by an utterance. I think both sides are right: metaphorical meaning is an input to semantic composition (...) and it is also derived post-semantically. I explain how this is possible by positing that successful metaphor involves coining a new word on the spot; this new metaphorical word is ambiguous with its literal counterpart. I show that an ambiguity theory of metaphor, far from being the obvious non-starter that it has long been treated as, actually offers elegant predictions of a whole suite of otherwise recalcitrant linguistic data. (shrink)

Fictionalist theories of metaphor hold that metaphorical utterances aim at fictionality. Fictionalism successfully explains speaker judgments about the truth and aptness of metaphorical utterances, and it also accurately predicts the data around metaphor and autistic individuals (who have deficits in both imaginative play and metaphor comprehension). But fictionalism is not a viable theory of metaphor, despite these merits, because of (what I call) the problem of semantic entailment: semantic entailments that are normally valid fail under metaphorical interpretation, but fictionalism predicts (...) otherwise. I argue this to ultimately show that theorists of metaphor should reject the linguistic side of the fictionalist story; but this leaves open the possibility of accepting psychological fictionalism, i.e., the hypothesis that fiction/make-believe is central to the cognitive processing of metaphor. Coupling psychological fictionalism with a different theory of metaphorical meaning and content (such as contextualism) promises to keep the explanatory upsides of traditional fictionalism while avoiding the problem of semantic entailment. (shrink)

Nietzsche’s metaphor of seduction suggests that language catches philosophers in the trap of metaphysics. Nietzsche uses the poetic powers of language to fight against this metaphysical language. However, his use of the metaphor of truth as a woman seems to seduce him back in metaphysics. Metaphors become seductive because of their rhetorical and performative power. One must therefore be wary of the seduction of metaphors when attempting at revaluating the metaphysics of language. Hélène Cixous undertakes such a task, using a (...) poetic language in order to escape the metaphysical dualisms embedded in language without falling back into its traps. (shrink)

The German philosophers Ernst Cassirer and Hans Blumenberg have thought differently about the role of the ‘image’ in thought. This article presents Cassirer as the philosopher of ‘reading’, whereas Blumenberg appears as the philosopher of ‘seeing’. Cassirer wants to show that each act of figurative-pictorial inner representation in thought can be deconstructed into smaller elements of signs that need to be “read” before they can be “seen.” In turn, Blumenberg bases the very act of conceptual thinking on rhetoric, namely on (...) the figurative images that are literally ‘visible’ in the structure of metaphors. In his underground of thought, “seeing” precedes “reading”. By situating these two approaches in the context of the post-Kantian quarrel over the use of images in 20th century physics, this article uncovers some of the pre-history of what has today become known as the “visual turn” in the humanities. (shrink)

O presente estudo tem por objetivo identificar a presença de Gottlob Frege na filosofia da arte de Arthur C. Danto. Partimos do pressuposto de que algumas das principais soluções teóricas encontradas por Danto têm por base e inspiração a semântica fregeana. Para isso, analisamos o corpus em filosofia da arte de Danto, e mapeamos as passagens mais características do fenômeno observado, correlacionando com alguns trechos da obra de Frege.

The general consensus emerging from decades of empirical investigation of metaphor processing is that, when appropriately contextualised, metaphorically used language is no more demanding of processing effort than literally used language. However, there is a small number of studies which contradict this position, notably Noveck, Bianco, and Castry (2001): they maintain that relevance-based pragmatic theory predicts increased cognitive costs incurred in deriving the extra effects that metaphors typically yield, and they provide experimental results that support this prediction. In our study, (...) we first surveyed and assessed the tasks and stimulus materials of many experiments on metaphor processing from the 1970's to the present day. The most telling result was an apparent disparity between the processing of metaphorical language used predicatively versus referentially. We then ran two self-paced reading experiments to test our hypothesis that when used as a predicate, metaphorical language is no more costly than literal language, but when used referentially, it does incur extra costs, even given a preceding biasing context. In the first experiment, all metaphorical referring expressions were in subject position so occurred early in the sentence; in the second experiment, we controlled for any effect of sentence position by placing metaphorical referring expressions in object position, thus later in the sentence, similar to the predicate metaphors. In both cases, metaphorical referring incurred significantly greater costs relative to literal equivalents than did metaphorical predication, with no effect of sentence position. We end with a brief analysis of why the referential use of metaphor is special and effort-demanding. (shrink)

Many sentences can be interpreted both as a metaphor and as a literal claim, depending on the context. The aim of this paper is to show that there are discourse-based systematic constraints on the identification of an utterance as metaphorical, literal, or both (as in the case of twice-apt metaphors), from a normative point of view. We claim that the key is contextual coherence. In order to substantiate this claim, we introduce a novel notion of context as a rich and (...) heterogeneous body of information, including previous discourse, elements coming from the surroundings of the utterance, background information, and Questions Under Discussion (QUD) issued from these three sources. We then define contextual coherence as a relation between what we call the minimal paraphrase of the metaphor and the context, and argue that for an interpretation to be coherent two conditions must be met. First, the minimal paraphrase must address some question in the QUD stack. Second, it must be externally consistent, i.e. consistent with the available contextual information. Finally, we argue that an approach based on contextual coherence is better suited to deal with twice-true and twice-apt metaphors than traditional approaches based on semantic deviance or pragmatic lack of fit. (shrink)

This essay characterizes the perception of the visual hybrid as nonconceptual, introducing the terminology of nonconceptual content theory to aesthetics. The visual hybrid possesses a radical but nonetheless exemplary aesthetic composition and is well established in culture, art, and even design. The essay supplies a philosophical analysis of the results of cross-cultural experiments, showing that while categorization or conceptual hierarchization kicks in when the visual hybrids are juxtaposed with linguistic descriptions, no conceptual scheme takes effect when participants are presented with (...) mere visual hybrids. In isolation, the hybrids do not lend themselves to classification. I draw four conclusions from these experimental outcomes: 1. The perception of visual hybrids follows the structure of a nonconceptual mental content, because the original categories or concepts of the hybrids’ components are not combined into one, and their properties are not applied to one another, therefore none of the components reconstructs the other such that it is introduced to a new category. 2. Language freezes the hybridity of the visual hybrid into conceptuality. 3. Given that language has a freezing effect in the case of an extreme visual phenomenon such as the hybrid, it is all the more restraining in moderate artistic compositions, such as visual metaphors, in which properties of one component (the source) are applied to the other (the target). In those, nonconceptuality emerges from relatively organized compositions, forms, and relations, and from the dependence of objects and their properties on perceptual context. 4. Thus, the nonconceptualist terminology is suitable for the analysis of aesthetic perception in general and aesthetic perception’s relation to language. Keywords aesthetics, perception, nonconceptual content, hybrids, visual metaphors. (shrink)