What shows the use of metaphors?
Is like is not is, or is it – in a way?
Otto B. Wiersma

13 Oct 2005 – 15 Jan 2007 (last update)

abstracts home
 
keywords: knowledge, meaning, metaphor
  
Introduction
  
At best metaphors are stepping-stones for knowledge towards the touchstones of science.
At worst metaphors are stumbling-blocks for knowledge into the pitfalls of credulity.
 
It takes two to tango – and to metaphorize well.
A metaphor relates two eventities (e.g. objects, thoughts, ideas or concepts). The metaphorical relation is not a correlation or correspondence (like in metonymy, e.g. container-content, model-thing). Also it’s not a logical connection (like in synecdoche, e.g. part-whole, species-genus). And it’s not an opposition (like in irony) but a factual or imposed resemblance, a sharing of factual or new or even fictional properties. Richards (1936) labeled the two related eventities with the technical concepts ‘tenor’ and ‘vehicle’, being metaphors themselves. The concept ‘tenor’ refers to something unknown going into an at the offset unspecified direction. The concept ‘vehicle’ refers to a kind of carrier, transporting an at the offset unspecified content (sc. a selection of its denotations and/or connotations). The relations between tenor and vehicle of a ‘fresh metaphor’ do normally not immediately form some fixed meaning, but something that develops while re-reading and re-thinking the metaphor. During this process one can sometimes even find remarkeble shifts in tenor and vehicle positions (Richards, 1936, p 121, Kövecses (2005) gives the next example: ARGUMENT IS WAR (from written argument > oral dispute > quarrel > brawl > fight, the target becoming the source becoming real). The tension between tenor and vehicle is not solved with some kind of clear solution. What a fresh metaphor tends to mean, is always open to new interpretations of the ‘similarities in the dissimilar’ and/or the ‘differences in the similar’ and/or the ‘resemblance of irreducibilities’ in the relations between tenor and vehicle. This fits nicely into the dynamical Aristotelian concept of ‘eu metaferein’ (the verb (!) ‘metaphorize well’, which can be applied not only to the process of producing metaphors, but as well to the process of interpreting metaphors).
 
A fresh metaphor does not define or explain what the tenor is, but provides as utterance together with its context a narrative framework within which can be explored what tenor and vehicle in this utterance and what the utterance as a whole in its context could mean. This exploration takes place by the interaction of (dis-)similarities between tenor and vehicle or by the collision of irreducibilities of tenor and vehicle.
 
This way metaphors are used to throw light on
the tenor ( focus / principle subject / target) by the vehicle (frame / modifier / source)
an unfamiliar eventity by a familiar eventity
an uncomprehended eventity by a comprehended eventity
a complex eventity by a simple eventity
an abstract eventity by a concrete eventity
 
 
Metaphors and meaning
  
The linguistic metaphorical construction presupposes that the combination of two (dis-)similar or even irreducible eventities makes sense. The plain fact that two eventities in a specific field have a more or less stable relation, can be regarded as the core of their ‘meaning’ or ‘sense’. For example in chemistry the atoms C and O with their specific properties can be connected to the molecule CO with new properties of CO which can’t be reduced to the properties of C or the properties of O. Something like that happens in other fields when eventities are related.
 
Let’s first concentrate on the linguistic field. Using the two terms tenor (T) and vehicle (V), a linguistic metaphor can be shortcutted by ‘T is V’. In this expression the semiotical and semantical properties of T and V can be made explicit by ‘TDC is VDC’. Here DC stands for denotations & connotations and for dynamic content. Dynamic, because the actual dominant denotations are not fixed, but depend on contextual use, while the actual connotations still play a secondary role like overtones in a musical chord.
Let’s take for granted that both TDC and VDC, when separately used in remote contexts, actualize in those contexts something of their specific semiotical and semantical potential. When TDC and VDC are brought together in one utterance ‘TDC is VDC‘, the question raises what specific ‘metaphorical twist’ can take place? How can one conclude to a specific ‘metaphorical meaning’ of this particular expression: ‘(TDC is VDC)M’? These questions are complicated by the fact that most expressions can be given a literal interpretation: ‘(TDC is VDC)L’ as well, given the appropriate context. The question is whether this holds for all expressions, e.g. it’s hard to think of a context that makes the expression (‘green love’)L anything else but a category mistake (although cf (‘green number’)L 2 ), where (‘green love’)M could mean something like first love in an early stage of development. Some expressions even can be ‘twice-true’ (e.g. ‘The man has a wooden leg.’).
 
Regarding metaphors and metaphorical meaning one can find two extreme positions:
 
Rousseau (1712-1778): ‘As man’s first motives for speaking were of the passions, his first expressions were tropes. Figurative language was the first to be born. Proper meaning was discovered last.’ (Essays on the Origin of Language, ch 3).
Nietzsche (1844-1900) regards metaphors as essential to all knowledge. We know, we experience reality metaphorically. Truths are metaphorical understandings that have become conventionalized to the point where their metaphoricity is forgotten; they are illusions, worn-out metaphors.
 
Davidson: Metaphors mean what the words, in their most literal interpretation, mean, and nothing more (1978, 32). Metaphors belong to the domain of use, pragmatics, not semantics.
 
The concepts used by these philosophers (literal vs figurative, pragmatic vs semantic) are not the only ones in a whole range of theories of meaning.
Below I like to give some more concepts, more or less ordered by the dimensions externalist_internalist and non-linguistic_linguistic, in order to illustrate that in most theories meaning is not limited to the linguistic field, but concerns non-linguistic fields as well.
 
Theories of meaning prefer or combine some of the next concepts

meaning is…

 externalist internalist
non-linguistic the referent (Ogden/Richards)
the reference (Frege)
the literal
denotation
extension (what the defined refers to)
signified
the verifiable (positivism)
the response (behaviorism)
the consequence (pragmatism, Pierce)
the truth conditions (Tarski)
the communicative practice
somatic (e.g. blushing, tears (joy or sadness))
natural (e.g. dark clouds mean rain, animal skin means predator)
iconic		 the reference (Ogden/Richards)
the sense (Frege)
the figurative
connotation
intension (the defined)
the idea, thought (Berkeley, Yoos)
the intention (what the speaker’s utterance intends, Grice, Austin, Searle)
the contingent
the ascribed (believed to be)
the associated
symbolic (conventional)
fictional
linguistic the reference
the literal
denotation
signifier
the use of the proposition in a specific language-game (Wittgenstein)
words referring to words (Derrida)
symbols and signs (semiotics, Goodman)
sentences (semantics, Ricoeur)
iconic		 the sense (Frege)
the figurative
connotation
intension (the defined)
the contingent
the ascribed (said to be)
the associated
interaction of sentence and its words (Ricoeur)
fictional
 
Often in a specific theory of meaning two of these concepts from two of the four dimensions are combined in order to cover different but complementary aspects of meaning: literal-figurative, denotation-connotation, reference-sense, extension-intension. In each dimension one can place philosophers who tend to reduce meaning (if not reality as such) to this specific point of view, e.g. in the externalist-linguistic box Goodman (1993), who states that contemporary philosophy does not deal with the structure of the world (pre-Kantian period), nor with the structure of the mind (Kantian period), nor with the structure of concepts (C.I. Lewis), but with the structure of symbols and signs (semiotics).
 
A specific theory of meaning will play its role in the choosen theory of metaphorical meaning. Below I mention the theories that are found most often in the literature about metaphors.

Theories of metaphorical meaning
Metaphorical meaning can be found by or in:
substitution paraphrasing (T1 is V1)M > (T1 is V2)L, (T1 is V3)L, .., (T1 is VN)L
comparison similarity T and V (T is like V – set of similarities) (Miller, Ortony)
anomaly dissimilarity T and V (T is unlike V > create similarities) (Katz, Levin)
interaction associated commonplaces of T and V interact to produce emergent metaphorical meaning (Richards, Black)
category-inclusion T included in a prototypically by V indicated ad hoc category (V being the best representation of the ad hoc category, eg ‘sigarettes are V’, ad hoc category: ‘unexpected death’ > best V = ‘time bomb’or ‘plane crash’ or ‘racing car’ or.. , Barsalou, Glucksberg & Keysar)
conceptual structure our conceptual structure is metaphorical: conceptual metaphors (like ‘love is a journey’, ‘argument is war’) determine the construction and interpretation of other metaphors (Lakoff & Johnson, Gibs, Kövecses)
anthropological context man’s place in the world as origin of metaphors and metaphorical meaning (Casirer, Ricoeur)
 
According to e.g. Kövecses (2005) metaphors have several dimensions or aspects: neural-bodily (embodiment), conceptual (cognitive preferences and styles), contextual (social-cultural experience) and linguistic (semiotical and semantical). Although I think the number of dimensions, aspects or fields could be extended (e.g. by the logical, historical or ethical), I agree with the thought that metaphors are not pure linguistic eventities. In order to be adaequate and relevant, a theory of metaphorical meaning should take into account a variety of dimensions, aspects or fields.
 
In line with these considerations I like to suggest that a metaphor can be seen as an elliptical system of a multidimensional variety of meanings:
 

 
Elliptical refers to the dynamics of somatic, conceptual, social-cultural, (..), semiotical and semantical meanings (old ones moving around and new ones coming into existence) around the two poles of the metaphor: the tenor and the vehicle (Richards, 1936), or the focus and the frame (Black, 1962), or the principle subject and the modifier (Beardsley, 1967), or the target and the source (Lakoff, 1980, 1999). The connotations of the word elliptical (sc. concise and incomplete) are relevant as well.
 
In a lot of metaphors (but not in all) the vehicle is a concrete (‘simple’) eventity brought in tension with an abstract (‘complex’) eventity in order to throw light on the last one. But this is often only the first phase of the metaphorical movement.
 
Most metaphors start as a ‘fresh’ metaphor ending up as ‘trite’ ( or ‘hibernating’, attributes I prefer to the more often used expression ‘dead metaphor’, which better could be reserved for metaphors that are not used at all any more).
This process can be described in terms of transference of denotations from the vehicle to the tenor becoming tenor-connotations, followed by the transformation and transference of these tenor-connotations into (new) denotations of the vehicle (which holds for metaphors that contain terms that are (forced to be) comparable or similar). Once the vehicle has gained homonymous properties, normally the utterance (the relation of speaker, situation and sentence) will provide immediately the relevant set of denotations (sc dominant connotations). Some examples: ‘She is warm’ (temperature, feverish, loving, caring, sociable,close). ‘He is high’ (nummerical, in the air, pitch, rank, social position, stoned).
The dynamics of this fresh-to-trite process relativizes the often applied distinctions between literal and figurative, denotation and connotation, extension and intension, reference and sense.
 
An interesting question is how metaphors, that relate irreducible eventities, are created and how meaning is assigned to those metaphors, for which comparison or similarity do not seem to make any sense. For example kinetical/temporal metaphors like ‘time flies’, ‘the hours crawled by’ or quantitive/orientational metaphors like ‘more is up’. ‘less is down’. Human experience seems to establish a conventional association in these cases (experiential association). But as Johnson states, there is no one-way-relation between experience and metaphors. Metaphors that alter our conceptual structures, will also alter the way we experience things. Metaphors create similarities (ontological link) and conceptualize experience (epistemological link) (Johnson, 1981, p. 41-43)
 
 
 
Functions of metaphors
  
To metaphors the next functions are ascribed: ornamental/decorative (poetical expression, Cicero), emotive (express and transfer emotional attitudes), persuasive/rhetorical (persuade an audience to a point of view or course of action), didactive (explain a principle or law by something familiar, e.g. pressure in a volume of gas by a spiral spring, Vroon, 1986), cognitive (add something to the description of the world, Ricoeur, 1975, empiricists like Hobbes and Locke question this function), comparative (Fogelin, 1988 [but: Ricoeur, 1975,186: similitudo (‘is like’) is not comparatio (e.g. more, less, etc.]), contextual (Levin, 1993), generative (generating new perceptions and inventions, Ankersmit, 1993), heuristical (from known to unknown, e.g. stone in water > golf-behavior of light, Ricoeur, 1975, Loewenberg, 1995, Vroon, 1986, Barbara, 1993, Draaisma, 2003), explanatory (Hesse, 1966, McCormac, 1976), theoretical (properties of the vehicle are tranferred to a theory about the tenor, Vroon, 1986).
 
If it’s not (yet) possible to determine what kind of properties an eventity does and does not encapsulate, a fresh metaphor can express this as problem of understanding and at the same time start up a tentative process of understanding.
Three classes of problems can be distinguished: 1. problems that can be solved, 2. problems of which it’s not known whether they can be solved or not, 3. problems that can’t be solved at all.
These three classes of problems match their own classes of discourse:
1 demonstrative (epistemological discourse leading to grounded theories and proofs)
2 explorative (heuristical discourse leading to hypotheses and speculations)
3 persuasive (rhetorical discourse leading to cutting Gordian knots and compromises)
The problems of understanding can be ordered likewise: 1. definite understanding can be reached 2. it’s not clear whether definite understanding can be reached, 3. definite understanding cannot be reached.
Matephors can be ordered within the same scheme, fresh metaphors starting most of the time in 2. and moving from there to their trite or hibernating phase in 1. or 3.
 
 
Metaphors of metaphor
  
Looking for ways to develop a touch of metaphorical feeling, I gathered a series of metaphors that metaphorize the concept metaphor itself.
Here some examples of metaphors that tell what a metaphor is like, ordered by the specific fields these metaphors were borrowed from.
 
field: metaphor is like…
arithmetics (numbers) two [colliding networks of literal algorithms] merging into one [metaphorical algorithm] (OBW)
logic planned or calculated category mistake (Goodman, 1968, Ricoeur, 1975 cf Gilbert Ryle)
geometry (space) figure of discourse (Ricoeur, 1978)
  remote ideas operating now as close (Ricoeur, 1978)
  perspective (Henle, 1958)
point of view (Loewenberg, 1975, 1978)
informatics strange loop (Hofstadter, 1980, 1981)
kinetics (movement) metaphorize welll, dynamical process (metaforein, Aristotle)
  movement through temporary ‘points of view’ (OBW)
physics curvature of semantic fields (OBW)
  filter (out of the system of associated commomplaces, standard beliefs and plattitudes) (Max Black, 1955)
astronomy elliptical system of a multidimensional variety of meanings (OBW)
chemistry fusion of atoms into molecules;
fusion of simplex molecules into complex molecular structures (OBW)
  catalyst (in the creative growth of language) (Owen, 1962)
  alloy with improved or new properties (OBW)
biochemistry environmental-dependent cooperation (sc interactive folding) of proteins (OBW)
biology creation (innovation) by (re-) combination (e.g. of DNA) (OBW)
paleontology guiding fossil (Draaisma, 1986,2003)
geology erosion, sedimentation (of a trite metaphor: usure – Derrida, 1971: the entropy of language from living to worn-out metaphors)
linguistics violation of the codes of speech and language (Ricoeur, 1975)
  complete conceptual migration of a ‘realm’ (Ricoeur, 1975)
  rule-changers (sc grammatical rules) (Price, 1974)
  good jokes (Cohen, 1978)
  a (forced) complexity-reducing two-unity of conceptual networks (OBW)
psychology dreamwork of language (Davidson, 1978)
economics a sort of ‘linguistic surplus value’ (Derrida,1971)
music uttering a word is like striking a note on the keyboard of the imagination; the meaning of a word is its use in language (Wittgenstein, 1960)
  overtones of a musical chord in its connotations
literature novel (invitation to enter a different reality – Gass, 1970), work of fiction (creating a new view, new perspectives – Loewenberg, 1978)
 
 
 
Metaphors in science
  
It has been argued that scientific transformation is marked by the removal of metaphors from reasoning, because telling what an eventity is like can’t be a proof of what’s the case.
Contrary to the intention to free science from poetry (which is not a bad idea as far as some types of poetical reasoning tend to obscure in stead of clarify states of affairs) one could point at a lot of metaphorical cross-references between different fields of science. For example (Ankersmid, 1993, Barbara, 1993, Pen,1993, illustrating how sciences metaphorize each other):
 
 
from:		 to:
 physics medicine economy politics
physics   force, e.g. vital forces flows in turmoil (Keynes)  
medicine     depression illness, desease, disorder, sympathy
juridical law law law law
faction > party
politics   exchange,
regulatory devices (>cell)		    
 
 
 
Root Metaphors
  
If a type of explanation has been widely accepted, it can found to be used as metaphorical frame of reference for reality (e.g, nature as animated with spirits, as organism (Aristoteles), as a book to be read and interpreted, as a machine that keeps running or as a computer with self-organizing algorithms).
 
Similar metaphorical ‘frames of reference’ can be found in science.
 
Some authors can be mentioned here, who suggest the existence of ‘root-‘ or ‘master-‘ metaphors in different fields of research.
economy clock (neo-classical: order and self-regulation), flows in turmoil (keynesian: disorder/depression/inlation), chaos (post-keynesian: butterfly effect), battlefield (marxist) (Pen, 1993)
linguistics structural (conceptual, physical and orientational) metaphors (Lakoff/Johnson, 1980)
epistemology optical (picture, mirror), spacial (perspective) (Ankersmit, 1994)
metaphysics formalism, mechanism, organicism, contextualism (Pepper, 1948)
physics Platonian tradition (formalism, realism), Newtonian tradition (mechanism), Quantummechanics (organicism), bootstrap physics (contextualism) (Pepper applied by Vroon/Draaisma, 1986)
 
 
 
Conclusion
  
The previous sections show the multidimensionality and multifunctionality of non-linguistic and linguistic metaphors.
The use of metaphors shows the tendency to distinguish, express and relate again multiple irreducible and compatible fields of reality.
It also shows intrinsic relations between simple and complex eventities (sc. the simplicity of initial conditions and rules (as implemented in metaphors) that generate complex behavior (for humans e.g. the effects of comprehending and living metaphors)).
 
 

Links to places on this page where you can find abstracts of / about:
  
Ankersmit, F.R., & J.J.A. Mooij, Knowledge and language. III Metaphor and knowledge, 1993
Ankersmit, F.R., History and tropology: the rise and fall of metaphor, 1994 Edmonds, David & John Eidinow, Wittgenstein’s Poker: the story of a ten-minute argument between two great philosophers, 2001
Hester, Marcus B., The meaning of poetic metaphor: an analysis in the light of Wittgenstein’s claim that meaning is use, 1967
Hobart, R.H., Physics as metaphor, 1974
Hoorn, Johannes Ferdinand, Metaphor and the brain: a behavioral and psychophysiological research into literary metaphor processing, 1997
Johnson, Mark ed., Philosophical perspectives on metaphor, 1981
Kövecses, Zoltán, Metaphor in culture: universality and variation, 2005
Moore, Gregory, Nietzsche, biology and metaphor, 2002
Richards, I.A., Philosophy of Rhetoric, 1936
Ricoeur, P., La métaphore vive, 1975 (UK translation: The Rule of Metaphor, multi-disciplinary studies of the creation of meaning in language, 1978)
Rispens, S.I., Machine Reason. A History of Clockes, Computers and Consciousness, 2005
Rutten, Ellen, Unattainable Bride Russia. Engendering Nation, State and Intelligentia in Twentieth-Century Russian Literature, 2005
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, On Certainty, 1951

Links naar abstracts in het Nederlands
  
Draaisma, Douwe, De metaforenmachine. Een geschiedenis van het geheugen. 2003
Dunk, Allard den, "Misschien kunnen we daar eens naar kijken?" Over nieuwe metaforen voor een nieuwe filosofie. 2005
Haak, Pieternella Jacoba van den, Metafoor en filosofie: studie naar de metaforische werking in de filosofie aan de hand van Julia Kristeva en Paul Ricoeur, 1999
Jaspers, Jürgen, Denken over Metafoorkwaliteit. Kwaliteit van het Metafoordenken. Een Psycholinguistische Studie over Metaforen met Interdisciplinaire Wenken. 1998
Lyotard, J.F., Het postmoderne weten (vertaling van: La condition postmoderne – rapport sur le savoir, 1979)
Lyotard, J.F., Het postmodernisme uitgelegd aan onze kinderen (vertaling van: Le Postmoderne expliqué aux enfants, 1986)
Lyotard, J.F., Het onmenselijke. Causerieën over de tijd (vertaling van: L’inhumain, causeries sure le temps, 1988)
Lyotard, J.F., Postmoderne fabels (vertaling van Moralités postmoderne, 1993)
Vroon, Pieter & Douwe Draaisma, De mens als metafoor: over vergelijkingen van mens en machine in filosofie en psychologie, 1986

Sites
  
Link to the text of Wittgenstein’s On Certainty (1951)
 

Literature
  
Ankersmit, F.R., & J.J.A. Mooij, Knowledge and language. III Metaphor and knowledge, 1993
Ankersmit, F.R., History and tropology: the rise and fall of metaphor, 1994
Beardsley, M.C. Metaphor (in Encyclopaedia of Philosophy), 1967
Black, Max., Models and Metaphors, 1962
Bosman, Johannes Alphonsus Maria, Betekenis en overtuigingskracht van politieke metaforen, 1993
Cooper, David E., Metaphor, 1986
Danesi, Marcel, Vico, metaphor, and the origin of language, 1993
Draaisma, Douwe, De metaforenmachine. Een geschiedenis van het geheugen, 2003
Derrida, Jacques, La mythologie blanche, in Rhétorique et philosophie, Poétique 5, 1971 (English translation: White Mythology)
Dunk, Allard den, "Misschien kunnen we daar eens naar kijken?" Over nieuwe metaforen voor een nieuwe filosofie. 2005
Edmonds, David & John Eidinow, Wittgenstein’s Poker: the story of a ten-minute argument between two great philosophers, 2001
Fauconnier, Gilles & Mark Turner, The way we think: Conceptual blending and the mind’s hidden complexities, 2002
Haak, Pieternella Jacoba van den, Metafoor en filosofie: studie naar de metaforische werking in de filosofie aan de hand van Julia Kristeva en Paul Ricoeur, 1999
Hester, Marcus B., The meaning of poetic metaphor: an analysis in the light of Wittgenstein’s claim that meaning is use, 1967
Hintikka, Jaakko, Aspects of metaphor, 1994
Hobart, R.H., Physics as metaphor, 1974
Hoorn, Johannes Ferdinand, Metaphor and the brain: a behavioral and psychophysiological research into literary metaphor processing, 1997
Jaspers, Jürgen, Denken over metafoorkwaliteit, kwaliteit van het metafoordenken: een psycholinguïstische studie over metaforen met interdisciplinaire wenken, 1998

Johnson, Mark ed., Philosophical perspectives on metaphor, 1981
Kittay, Eva Feder, Metaphor: its cognitive force and linguistic structure, 1987
Kövecses, Zoltán, Metaphor in culture: universality and variation, 2005
Lakoff, George & Mark Johnson, Metaphors we live by, 1980
Lakoff, George & Mark Johnson, Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought, 1999
Leezenberg, Maarten Michiel, Contexts of metaphor: semantic and conceptual aspects of figurative language interpretation, 1995
Loewenberg, I., Identifying Metaphors, in: Foundations of Language 12 (1975), 315-338
Lyotard, J.F., La condition postmoderne – rapport sur le savoir, 1979
Lyotard, J.F., Le Postmoderne expliqué aux enfants, 1986
Lyotard, J.F., L’inhumain, causeries sure le temps, 1988
Lyotard, J.F., Moralités postmoderne, 1993
MacClintock, Alexander, The convergence of machine and human nature: a critique of the computer metaphor of mind and artificial intelligence, 1995
Marks, Lawrence E. e.a., Perceiving similarity and comprehending metaphor, 1987
Moore, Gregory, Nietzsche, biology and metaphor, 2002
Radman, Zdravko, From a metaphorical point of view: a multidisciplinary approach to the cognitive content of metaphor, 1995
Richards, I.A., Philosophy of Rhetoric, 1936
Richardt, Susanne, Metaphor in languages for special purposes: the function of conceptual metaphor in written expert language and expert-lay communication in the domains of economics, medicine, and computing, 2005 (letteren fac)
Ricoeur, Paul, La métaphore vive, 1975 (UK translation: The rule of metaphor: multi-disciplinary studies of the creation of meaning in language, 1978)
Rispens, S.I., Machine Reason. A History of Clockes, Computers and Consciousness, 2005
Rutten, Ellen, Unattainable Bride Russia. Engendering Nation, State and Intelligentia in Twentieth-Century Russian Literature, 2005
Shibles, Warren A., Essays on metaphor, 1972 (Bibl. Wijsbegeerte ST 2.4 25}
Spek, Erik van der, Taalmaskerade: over beeldspraak, metaforen & vergelijkingen, 1993
Steen, Gerard, Understanding metaphor in literature: an empirical approach, 1994
Turbayne, C.M. The Myth of Metaphor, 1962, 1970
Verhoeven, Cornelis, Zijn en staan: metaforen van aanwezigheid, 1999
Vroon, Pieter & Douwe Draaisma, De mens als metafoor: over vergelijkingen van mens en machine in filosofie en psychologie, 1986
Wheelwright, Philip, Metaphor and Reality, 1962,1968
White, Roger M., The structure of metaphor: the way the language of metaphor works, 1996
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, On Certainty, 1951
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Philosophical Investigations, 1960
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Brieven. Samengesteld en bezorgd door Joachim Leilich, 2000
 

Artificial Memory

Abstracts in this file
  
 
Ankersmit, F.R., & J.J.A. Mooij eds, Knowledge and language. III Metaphor and knowledge, 1993
Different views on metaphors: 1 projection from one scheme onto something else (Max Black), 2 no-semantics approach – no metaphorical meaning > no truth (Donald Davidson), 3 metaphor as primary, original vehicle of meaning, later developing into literal language (Nietzsche, Gadamer), 4 anthropological approach (man’s place in the world as origin of language (Casirer, Ricoeur), 5 comparison view (comparison as mechanism of the metaphor, Fogelin).
Goodman: contemporary philosophy does not deal with the structure of the world (pre-Kantian period), nor with the structure of the mind (Kantian period), nor with the structure of concepts (C.I. Lewis), but with the structure of symbols and signs (semiotics). Lorentz: > ontology and epistemology two sides of the same coin: relativized distinction of world and language.
J.J.A. Mooij, Metaphor and Truth: a liberal approach (67-80). Functions of metaphors: 1 emotive (express and transfer emotional attitudes), 2 persuasive (persuade an audience towards a point of view or course of action), 3 cognitive (express coginitive insights), 4 decorative. Empiricism questions the third function (Hobbes, Locke), opposing the idea that metaphors are vehicles of truth, revealing (hidden) aspects of the world. The structure of the world as (partly) a human construction involves a road from persuasion through agreement to accepted models and theories. Along this read metaphors can be inspiring. Ultimately truth is a matter of using and accepting a sentence as an adequate description of a state of affairs. cf ‘theories are nets’ (Novalis, Popper, Hempel). So use is a matter of choice, convenience and decision.
J. Pen, Economics and language (137-142). There are different economical schools in which science mixes with political elements. > McCloskey: economics is deeply rhetorical. There are a lot of economical metaphors (invisible hand, depression, natural rate of growth, equilibrium of the market etc). The great economical theories can be classified according to a type of metaphor: 1 neo-classical theory: society as orderly and self-regulating (clock, steam-engine, nature), 2 keynesian theory: disorder/depression/inflation – flows in turmoil (> post-keynesian theory: butterfly effect – chaos) 3 Marxist theory: battlefield. Pen warns that the economist may be carried away with his metaphor: ‘Beware of false arguments and of excessively reductive metaphors.’
Maria Luisa Barbara: Sciences metaphorize each other. Physics > Medicine (force, e.g. vital forces). Biology > Medicine (e.g. tissue (Bichat). Medicine > Politics (e.g. metaphors of illness, disease, disorder, sympathy). Juridical > Physics/Chemistry/Medicine (e.g. metaphor of law). Politics > Medicine (liberalism as exchange philosophy, exchange within limits, moderating and regulatory devices metaphors for the cell (Vichow: how cells determine metabolism and bodily growth). 152 Heuristic capacity of political metaphors by giving medical language new meaning.
F. Ankersmit, Metaphor in political theory (155-202). Contract as metaphor for the legality of the political order. Juridical > Political (shift from the word ‘faction’ to the juridical word ‘party’). Plato regarded the statesman as technocratic specialist and metaphorized the state as a ship, steered by the captain-statesman. Elements of this metaphor: 1 state as being on a course to a goal, 2 distance centre-of-decision-making and the people, 3 coherence and unity of the state. (..) One doesn’t find elephants under a microscope, so find big truths by investigating big problems. (..) Generative function of metaphors: generate new perceptions and inventions. (..) Metaphors predispose us in favor of a specific line of action (cf characterizing a slum as ‘a cancer’ or as ‘a natural community’). (..) Metaphors as self-referential (not corresponding to reality). (..) The State is no longer the unitary agent. State > civil society. Ancient political liberty: citizen’s right to participate in the process of policy-making, now modern civil liberty: freedom of the citizen from immixture of the State into his affairs. (cf Benjamin Constant 1767-1830: freedom & independence: independence presupposes the presence or background of dependence) (..) From rulers and ruled (until 19th century) to system of dependence and independence. Anonymous and unpredictable power > powerlessness of the State > loss of manouvrebility of the State. But it could work, cf the ‘empty center’ in Japan, where not universal, but particularist values (and ‘empty values’ obligation and loyalty) dominate, related to the wish to realize some specific goals. Cf Shinto as typical anti-foundationalist religion and the complete dependence as the center of everything (the emperor – the child). Contrary to Western power which is always wanting to represent something else (God, people, history,…). The Western power of language: political metaphors have to give meaning. The Japanse language of power takes meaning back again, permitting to tell any number of stories, without presupposing anyone of them.
 
 
Ankersmit, F.R., History and tropology: the rise and fall of metaphor, 1994
Metaphor sees one thing in terms of another > see part of (historical) reality in terms of a (metaphorical) point of view, making the unfamiliar familiar. Using a (fixed or final) point of view (with its logic of the center, but the eye ( the transcendental ‘self’) cannot see ‘itself’ – ‘blind spot’), metaphor is inherently transcendental and transcendental philosophy is metaphorical (11-13). FA moves from the Kantial transcendentalist ontological gap between subject-object, mind-world, language-reality to the Aristotelian-Freudian continuity between object and perception (with its metaphors of ring>wax (Arist.), mystic writing pad (Freud), string that has the potentiality to actually resonate with the sound of a certain pitch by change of length (Ankersmit, 26)). Historical writing should not be organized metaphorically (according to the aristocratic point of view of e.g. a nation state or social class, the past being (like) its narrative interpretation), but should be led by nostalgic experience of a difference between present and past, allowing the flowing together of subject en object, experiencing a former part of ourselves (..) from which we became enstranged (30, cf ‘historical sensation’, Goethe, Meinecke, Huizinga).
Postmodernism, disintegrated past: particularism, localism, regionalism, relative autonomism, incommensurabilism, accidentalism (contingency), anecdotalism, historicism, micro- hetero- poly-, pull of the detail (193), opposing the extremes of objectivism (positivism, historism) and textualism (idealism) (195). Nostalgia (the uncanny, unheimisch): awareness of displacement (here and now is not the center of experience) (199), experience the difference of distance between the present and the past (201), experience in the present is also experience of the past (203))
All epistemology is inherently metaphorical. Reality is [like] language (214). Master-metaphors at the end of epistemological systems: optical metaphors (e.g. Wittgenstein: sentence as picture of reality (Tractatus, 4.01), Rorty: language/mind as mirror of reality (Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, 1980, 42) (216). spacial metaphors (perspective (Nietzsche), conspectus (Cassirer), configurational comprehension (Mink), point of view), [OBW and kinetical metaphors, like FA’s ‘movement’ for Gadamer’s ‘Wirkungsgeschichte’ (221,222).] FA Metaphorizing metaphor means the elimination of metaphor [sc a fixed or final point of view] and hence of the whole epistemological apparatus originating in metahpor [presupposing fixed/final points of view], adopting the point of view of not having a point of view. FA In the movement of the Wirkungsgeschichte, points of view absorb points of view and since there is no end to this movement, there can be no final or ‘master’ point of view (222). Postmodernism vs historist transcendental historical subject, vs historist fixed or final points of view (222), vs historist illusion of depth (foreground – background), vs historist reification of the past (224,225). From a unified whole to an anarchistic totality of independent petits récits (Lyotard) (224). From ‘familiarity with the past’ to ‘defamiliarization’ of the past as historical program: enstrange what is familiar, dissolution of the linear, coherent past (227).
OBW A metaphor chooses a specific point of view, but (according to postmodernism) there is no fixed, final or ‘master’ point of view and according to FA there is a ‘movement’ through points of view, which according to OBW means there are at least ‘temporary points of view’ (like a series of ‘locations’ along which any movement takes place). Point-of-view relativity (analogous to space-time relativity). So relativized metaphor revived again (vs FA’s rise and fall of metaphor).
 
 
Edmonds, David & John Eidinow, Wittgenstein’s Poker: the story of a ten-minute argument between two great philosophers, 2001
Epistemologists disputing the facts regarding the encounter of Wittgenstein and Popper on 25.10.1946.
(..)
 
 
Hester, Marcus B., The meaning of poetic metaphor: an analysis in the light of Wittgenstein’s claim that meaning is use, 1967
According to the physicalist W meaning does not involve inner experience. W presupposes for meaning 1 public actions 2 common physical environment 3 common body of conventions. Correct use of words is settled by reference to these criteria: observable features selected by convention. So according to W use can involve no private aspects.
Hester adds 4 intersubjective experience-act of seeing as, because conventions cannot give definitive explanations of metaphors and because reference to the metaphor as read is not reference to observable features. So W’s criteria are necessary, but not sufficient for understanding the meaning of metaphors. Metaphorical langauge is a fusion of sense and sensa (language and imaginary (beeld(spraak)), an overlap of concepts and percepts. The metaphor as read is intersubjective but not publicly observable. Hester refers to image-laden metaphors in physics (examples: Newton: time .. flows; electrical current). Max Black: use of theoretical models resembles the use of metaphors in requiring analogical tranfer of vocabulary (..) suggest novel hypotheses and speculations in the primary field of investigation (M. Black, Models and Metaphors, 1962). Stephen Pepper: metaphysical root-metaphors (formalism, mechanism, contextualism, organicism – S.C. Pepper, World Hypotheses: A Study in Evidence, 1948). Hester: almost any word will show a metaphorical origin if its etymology is studied (..) through custom or habitual use becoming ‘dead’ metaphors, such as ‘neck of a bottle’ or ‘arm of a chair’ or ‘leg of a table’. So metaphorical tranference is a (not the only) principle of language growth. Discovery of metaphorical meaning is flexible (two-way influence between language and imaginary in the metaphor) and stable (accessibility to the metaphor as read). Reading is an active openness to the text (131). The metaphor as read involves observable features, but also additional features in its imagery, which are not observable. W erred in not seeing that we can internally name and recognize sensations. W failed to see that there can be public language with private criteria. W denies the validity of any justification of first-person psychological statements, stating that there are no criteria to determine their correct use. W refuses to admit that ‘pain’ is a word with an ostensive (pointing at) meaning. H: memory associates language and images of referents (142). Not relevant categories, related to metaphors: existence or non-existence, true or false, correspondence reference and referent (157ff). Difference concept and act of seeing as (178ff). No observable criteria to determine the relevant aspects that are shared by tenor and vehicle (179). It’s categorically impossible to reduce seeing as to a set of rules or criteria. Seeing as has ‘grounds’, metaphors reveal relations. (183). W’s metaphor "Uttering a word is like striking a note on the keyboard of the imagination (#6). The meaning of a word is its use in language (Investigations #43)." is striking: it reveals a one-way relation between piano-key and note. But a metaphor involves a two-way influence of meaning and imagery. The intersubjective assumptions for discussion of metaphorical meaning involve private criteria. (210)
 
 
Hobart, R.H., Physics as metaphor, 1974
Our knowledge of the physical world is metaphorical rather than literal. (..) Popper: a scientific theory must be at risk [of being rejected: falsifiable] relative to observation. (..) Induction (from particulars to generalities) – empiricism: laws of nature follow from observation by inductive reasoning. This inductive basis of empiricism destroyed by Hume (generality assumed). (..) Popper: deduction as logic of science – theory precedes experiment. (..) Duhem: relation background assumptions, theory and refutation. (..) Old theories, as limiting cases of more extensive new theories, are falsified, but are not thereby made useless (cf Newton’s theories of mechanics and gravity within specific boundaries). NB refutation <> rejection. (..) To suggest that infinite accuracy is possible even in principle, is unwarranted. Theories are verbal while nature is nonverbal. There is an unbridgeable gap. The best we can hope for is a metaphorical relationship (..). Hayakawa: The map is not the territory. (..) Feyerabend: theoretical pluralism. (..) Newton’s mechanical theory of nature is deterministic, not nature. (..) Hobart rejects Popper’s realist assumption that some of our theories can be true. (..) Popper’s falsifiability criterium itself is not falsifiable, and therefore not part of science. Hobart thinks it is reasonable to classify philosophies of science with ideologies. (..) Popper: theories which are not falsifiable are not science. Logical positivists: theories which are not verifiable are nonsense. (..) The scientific community officially supports empiricism. (..) Example: how the Michelson-Morley experiment should have played a genetic role in Einstein’s formulation of SRT > empricist view that experiment leads to theory / unique laws of nature (Feyerabend: theoretical monism). (..) Assumptions as sufficient (not necessary) to explain certain observations. (..) Hobart regarding academic ideological disputes: we should strive more to groom each other like monkeys rather than to convert each other like missionaries.
 
 
Hoorn, Johannes Ferdinand, Metaphor and the brain: a behavioral and psychophysiological research into literary metaphor processing, 1997
This study describes a comparative research with three types of expressions:
type of expression example Dutch example
literal (LE) love is an emotion woede is een drift
metaphorical (ME) love is a rose woede is een slang
anomalous (AE) love is a blib woede is een zwik
In these different types of expressions H. distinguishes in the A- [love] and B- [emotion/rose/blib] terms. These terms activate what he calls ‘feature-sets’ (semantic properties), which can be organized into literal and figurative feature sets. H. investigates how this organisation of literal and figurative feature sets leads to the identification of the relevant type of expression. A point of research is also the question whether the linguistic context plays any significant role in this identification-process.
In this study H. tests the predictions he derived from three competing metahporical theories:
theoretical
model		 similarity / dissimilarity feature sets number of stages response time electrocortical effect (N400) linguistic context
comparison similarity A and B
 two fixed feature sets one LE shorter than ME and AE no no effect
anomaly dissimilarity A and B four fixed feature sets (literal and figurative for A and B) two LE shorter than ME and AE yes for ME and AE no effect
interaction similarity and dissimilarity A and B equally important three not fixed feature sets (third: relations) two LE shorter than ME and AE no effect
H found that a parallel anomaly model provides the best explanation of the results of feature elicitaion and reaction times (254). Further he concludes that the electrocortical effect (N400: a negative polarity 400 ms after the presentation of an anomalous word) is not part of the metaphorical process, but is an additional effect, based on a mismatch of semantic categories, so N400 can be interpreted as a reflection of lexical integration (do words match?) (298, 299).
From the interaction model H. takes over the not-fixed character of features. The interaction-specific relations can according H. and others be seen as features [OBW literal or figurative? Anyway: the core of the LE/ME/AE-identification-process according H. is counting semantic properties and categorizing them (literal or figurative).]. The importance of the linguistic context for the possibilities and limitations of the features (as predicted by the interaction model) did not play a significant role.
Based on his findings H. presents a parallel 2-stage anomaly race model.
In its encoding phase literal and figurative feature sets are activated parallel and there is a check for category membership (N400 yes or no). If instances and categories match then LE & stop.
If N400, then parallel calculation of the shared mixed literal and figurative feature sets (comparing phase).
This comparing phase leads to one of the three conclusions:
If < minimal size shared mixed figurative set then AE & stop.
If > minimal size shared mixed figurative set and < minimal size shared mixed literal set then ME & stop.
If < minimal size shared mixed figurative set and > minimal size shared mixed literal set then LE & stop.
H: Ultimately no model is definite and no experiment is the final test. Therefore, if the Tables and Figures turn out to be nothing more than rhetoric [OBW sic: analogy scientific models and metaphors], then at least I hope they may serve as a captatio for better researchers (325),
[OBW This research presupposes a clear difference between figurative and literal features, qoud non. OBW experimental psycho-physiological research of the process of making fresh metaphors, comparing the effects in those who are ‘metaphorizing’ with those wo are for the first time reading and interpreting these constructed fresh metaphors.]
 
 
Johnson, Mark ed., Philosophical perspectives on metaphor, 1981
Plato: ignorant men see things only through words (vs poets and sophists) (5)
Aristotle: 1. metaphoric transfer is located at the level of words (sc changing meaning of words); 2. metaphor as a deviance from literal usage of words; 3. metaphor based on similatirites between two things (sc shared properties) (5) metaphors must fairly correspond to the thing signified (A. Rhetoric) (6) and a good methaphor gives new light, new ideas (7).
Cicero: metaphors have only an ornamental function, no cognitive function (8).
Medieval view: metaphors are good when used in the Scripture and bad when used (sc misused) to mask untruths with seductive figures (11).
Empiricists vs metaphors. Hobbes (1588-1679): literal truth paradigm: 1. the human conceptual system is essentially literal (‘words proper’ are the only adequate vehicle for expressing meaning precisely and making truth claims); 2. metaphors imply a deviant use of words (confuse and deceive); 3. the meaning and truth claims of metaphor (if any) are its literal paraphrase (12). John Locke (1632-1704) vehement attack on tropes. Berkeley ( ): a philosopher should abstain from metaphor. John Stuart Mill (1806-1873): metaphors only to suggest proofs and to aid in the apprehension of proofs (13).
Kant (1724-1804): there is no set of rules of concepts or algorithm to guide creative activity (..) not a mere mechanical following of rules for producing a thing (Critique of Judgement, par 49); creative metaphors contain more thought than can be captured by literal concepts (14).
Romanticists. Rousseau (1712-1778): As man’s first motives for speaking were of the passions, his first expressions were tropes. Figurative language was the first to be born. Proper meaning was discovered last. (Essays on the Origin of Language, ch 3).
Nietzsche (1844-1900): metaphors as essential to all knowledge, as process by which we encounter the world. We experience reality metaphorically. We know metaphorically (15). Truths are metaphorical understandings that have become conventionalized to the point where their metaphoricity is forgotten. Truths are illusions of which one has forgotten that they are illusions (worn-out metaphors). (16).
The Romantic dissociation of metaphor from ‘rational’ scientific discourse caused a delay of serious philosophical study of metaphors (16).
Also positivism (logical empricism) vs the use of metaphors, based on two foundations: 1. distinction cognitive and emotive functions of language; 2. scientific knowledge is reducible to literal and verifiable sentences (17).
Richards (1936): 1. metaphor as principle of thought; 2. metaphor permeates all discourse (ordinary & scientific language); 3. metaphorical thought influences our experience; 4. in a metaphor two thoughts of different things are active together (.) whose meaning is a resultant of their interaction; 5. in metaphors are images often not involved; metaphors are based on dissimilarities and similarities; metaphors cannot be reduced to literal statements; interaction of contexts (18).
Max Black: metaphors may creatie similarities rather than merely express preexisting similarities (19).
Three issues: Q1. howto identify a metaphor? Q2. how does a metaphor work (especially in processing creativity)? Q3. what is its cognitive status (truth claims or reducible to literal paraphrases)? (20)
ad Q1 howto identify a metaphor?
syntactic deviance is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition of metaphor
semantic deviance in a given context
Beardsley (1962) metaphorical twist: a logical opposition between the meanings of the terms in the metaphorical expression, but: semantic deviation is not a necessary condition of metaphor, because ‘any sentence can be provided context (.) in which it can receive either literal or metaphorical interpretations (Loewenberg, 1975) (21). Not the level of words, or of sentence, only the utterance in its total context [metaphorical], but than still ‘twice-true’ expressions (e.g. Jan is een boer, letterlijk en figuurlijk) (22).
Tension between literal reading and context, or illocution (e.g. promise to x) and perlocution (effects of promise in relation) (Austin, 1975, Cohen, 1975) (23).
ad Q2 how do metaphors work?
3 theories:
T1. substitution (A is B > A is C, man is a wolf > man is fierce)
T2. comparison (A is B > A is like B in being [literal set of similarities])
but… Richards: also dissimilarities; Searle (1979): non-existent terms, beliefs about objects [OBW factual – actual properties] Lakoff & Johnson : no similarities, but e.g. ‘orientational metaphors’, like ‘more is up’, connected with experiences (24-27).
T3. interaction (A and B as systems of associated commonplaces that interact to produce emergent metaphorical meaning. Black: filtered projection of one system onto another, with a logical opposition of ordinary designated properties and connotations that surpress the denotations) but… Ricoeur: where do the new connotations come from? Wittgenstein: not only perception but also the will to see the duck or the rabbit; Hester: see how two dissimilar things share a common ground; Lakoff & Johnson: experiental gestalts (structured meaningful wholes), e.g. gestalt for war > argument is war (30)
metaphors serving as a device for reorganizing our perceptual and/or conceptual structures [Popper’s 3 worlds – why using the metaphor ‘world’?]. Black: metaphors create novel meaning by giving modified senses to various concepts – restructuring concepts and categories (cf ‘category mistake, Ryle 1949) (31) > metaphor as calculated category mistake (Goodman, 1968) Searle: difference word/sentence meaning and the speaker’s utterance meaning (32)
How does the hearer know to look for a metaphorical intepretation? Strategies to compute possible values of C (in A is B, A is C); specific principles; common experience within cultures; alter conceptual systems in terms of which we experience and talk about the world; consistency with psychological research on metaphor processing (33)
Donald Davidson (1978): there is no ‘metaphorical meaning’. Metaphors mean what the words, in their most literal interpretation, mean, and nothing more. Metaphors belong to the domain of use (pragmatics, not semantics) (34).
Q3. cognitive status of metaphor (truth claims)
positivists: metaphors are reducible to literal language > no truth claims at all (35).
Black: metaphors organize relations in another field of implications and create similarities (36).
Loewenberg (1975) vs truth claims: metaphors as proposal about a way to view and to understand (36). Literal assertions are not unproblematic either as far as truth claims are concerned (37).
Lakoff & Johnson: even the most ‘literal’ expressions involve unnoticed ‘conventional’ metaphors, e.g. orientational metaphors like ‘up/down’, ‘in/out’, ‘near/far’, ‘on/off’ (38).
Johnson (1980) distinguishes a comparative level (concepts that unify varied forms - cf Kant’s teleological reflective judgement) and an interactive level (the reflection that felt adequate without concepts – cf Kant’s easthetical reflective judgement). The imaginative leap occurring in metaphors is not rule-governed and therefore not reducible to a set of rules or a systematic procedure of understanding (39) [OBW line of Kant, but … Stephen Wolfram (2002): some simple initial conditions and some simple rules can generate unpredictable and irreducible complex behavior (like an ‘imaginative leap’)]
Fundamental ontological and epistemological issue: is reality objectively given OR do we have a ‘world’ by language and value-laden concepts that make experience possible? Metaphors that alter our conceptual structures, will also alter the way we experience things (41).
Turning away from narrow positivist and narrow empiricist view, moving away from the ‘literal truth paradigm’. Metaphors also in science: all theories are elaborations of basic (systems of) metaphors (42). Metaphor is not merely linguistic, but a fundamental principle of thought and action. The metaphoric process can be seen as a principle of cognition, meaning: all experience has an ‘as’ structure. Metaphors create similarities (ontological link) and conceptualize experience (epistemological link) (43).
Max Black (1955): In the connection (of ideas/concepts) resides the secret and the mystery of metaphor (73). Classify metaphors as instances of substitutions (by literal expressions), comparisons (of (dis-)similarities) or interactions (77).
Henle (1958): examples of tropes: synecdoche (part for whole, e.g. tongue > speech), metonymy (e.d. read Kant > his books), irony (opposite, e.g. you’r smart > stupid). In all tropes one term figurative (86). Similarity sometimes antecedent, but often induced conceptual content (100).
Beardsley (1962): contrasts thing-approach (connecting objects) and word-approach (semantical: involving two levels of meaning: literal and figurative, central meaning (denotative) and marginal meaning (connotative)) (105-107). A fresh metaphor transforms a property (acutal or attributed) into a sense (meaning), establishing a new connotation of a word (114).
Goodman (1976): the picture is gray – the picture is sad: two ways of classifying the picture (124) [OBW modal shift]. Metaphor: change of range and change of realm: calculated category mistake (cf Ryle, 1949) (126). Non-linguistic metaphors in e.g. cartoons (133).
Binkley (1974): Statements can be literally and metaphorically true (e.g. man is an animal) (140). Literal statements are more precise only with reference to particulars, not a more exact expression of meaning (145). Is ‘green ideas’ a category mistake? Could also be interpreted as ideas in an early stage of development. (146). Scientific theories sometimes [? often] rest upon metaphors which are difficult to replace with literal expressions (147). First establish the meaning of the expression, then the truth of the meaning of the expression (150).
Loewenberg (1975): We can treat sentences as ambiguous with respect to whether they will be literal or metaphorical as utterance, and we can consider any metaphorical utterance as ambiguous with respect to which term is the ‘focus’ (162), because any sentence can be given a context for literal or metaphorical interpretation (163). We have to concern ourselves with utterances (occurrences in the world) rather then with sentences (formal linguistic objects) (163). In order to identify the metaphoricity of an utterance, beliefs about the truth or falsity of statements and about the intention of the speaker are necessary (170). Russell: there is only one world, the ‘real’ world (Convention, 1969, 178/9); L: there is only one kind of truth; the metaphor is a proposal about a way to view, to understand the referents of the words in the expression (172). Metaphors propose a certain view of things, having a heuristic value (no truth value). Continuity in function: family-metaphor-analogy-model-theory (175).
Cohen (1975): sentence + situatie = speech act. Austin: theory of speech-acts:
Davidson (1978): metaphors mean what the words, in their most literal interpretation, mean, and nothing more. A metaphor has not a ‘special’ meaning and a metaphor is not a vehicle for conveying ideas (201). It’s not about what the expressions mean, but what they do (pragmatics): what makes us see new meanings, a certain view of the subject (216). Much of what we are caused to notice is not propositional in character, and what can be made propositional, is unexhaustable (cf Wittgenstein’s duck/rabbit: seeing as is not seeing that) (218).
Ricoeur (1978): the metaphoric utterance makes sense as a whole (231). The semantic innovation is not only thought, but also seen (imagined, pictorial, iconic dimension) and felt. Metaphorical meaning denies the Fregean distinction between sense and representation, exploring the borderline between the verbal and the non-verbal (237,238). Metaphor as a model for changing our way of looking at things, of perceiving the world (138). Split-reference (cf the Majorca story tellers: aixo era y no era – it was and it was not): suspension (epoché) of the ordinary descriptive reference (239). Kant’s aesthetics: the central role of pleasure > feeling (<> emotions but as second order intentional structure (Strasser), interiorized thoughts) in the metaphorical process (242). cf Befindlichtkeit and Verstehen and Aristotelian catharsis (245).
Searle (1979): In general the literal meaning of a sentence only determines a set of truth conditions relative to a set of background assumptions, which are not part of the semantic context of the sentence (253). In a metaphor ‘S is P’ means ‘S is R’, but the metaphor is more than the paraphrase (255). Comparison is part of the meaning (sc truth conditions of the metaphoric statement), similarity is a principle of inference (step in the process of comprehending the metaphoric statement) (257). S gives several principles of metaphoric interpretation of metaphor ‘S is P’ means ‘S is R’, involving different types of meaning: definitional (giant – big), contingently (pig – dirty), ascribed (said or believed to be.., e.g. gorilla – mean), associated (taste – person, space – time)
Lakoff & Johnson (1980): Our conceptual system (what we perceive and how we relate) is fundamentally metaphorical in nature (286/287). 1. structural metaphors: conceptual metaphors like ‘ideas are objects’, ‘linguistic expressions are containers’, ‘communication is sending’; 2. physical metaphors: projecting entity/substance status upon something not having that status inherently; 3. orientational metaphors like up/down, front/back, on/off, central/peripheral (290-295). More examples: ‘theories are buildings’, ‘ideas are food’, ‘ideas are light sources’, ‘seeing is understanding’ (305). A concept (e.g. love) has not a clearly delineated structure; it gets such structure only via conventional metaphors (like ‘love is war’, ‘love is a journey’, ‘love is madness’, ‘love is a game’, etc). (311). Most concepts are partially understood in terms of other concepts, e.g. our bodily spatial experience > up (unlike the Cartesian orientation: no up/down) > the metaphors we live by (312). Metaphors grounded by virtue of systematic correlates within our perceptual and emotional experience, e.g. ‘time is a container’ (he did it in ten minutes), ‘time is a moving object’ (time arrives) (313). We typically conceptualize the non-physical in terms of the physical, e.g. ‘Harry is in the kitchen’, ‘Harry is in love’ (314). Vs ‘building-block’ theory of unanalyzable semanticle units (linguistic atomism): see categories and concepts as experiential gestalts – irreducible in terms of grounding our conceptual systems, e.g. children learning causation by constantly dropping the spoon (Piaget) (315). Eleanor Rosch: objects are categorized not in set-theoretical terms, but in terms of prototypes and family-resemblances; gestalt: complex of together occurring properties (316). Concepts are experientially basic and indefinitely analyzable, because the terms with which the prototype is analyzed are also characterized by prototype and as such capable of further analysis (317). Metaphor, truth and action, e.g. war metaphor > network of entailments > view entailments as being true > licence for political and economical action (318). Concepts are not determinable in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions for their application – instead we graps them always in a partial fashion by means of various metaphorical concepts (323).
Owen (1962): metaphors are catalysts in the creative growth of language; they extend meaning, making the unconscious conscious, increasing accuracy and variety (330).
Berggren (1962): It’s abuse taking metaphor literally, thereby making it into a myth.
Bickerton (1969): Context validates the extension of ‘marked signs’ (= lexemes to which attributes have been assigned).
Binkley (1974): There is no pure core of precise literal meaning (333).
Cohen (1978): See metaphors not for knowledge, but as good jokes (334)
Edie (1962): Words point to meaning, but don’t encapsulate the complete meanings, which are ambiguous, multidimensional and changing. Metaphor is a new dimension of meaning.

Gass (1970): Metaphors put two domains together (cf science: observed data and mathematics/logic). Metaphors argue a point of view, a form of presentation. Metaphors are like novels: an invitation to enter a different reality (337).
Lakoff & Johnson (1980): Metaphorical structures in our thought and experience, not only in speech (341). Basic realities are not objectively given, but defined by the metaphors of our culture (vs absolutism/objectivism) > experientialist approach (vs relativism/subjectivism) (342).
Loewenberg (1978): Metaphors are like words of fiction: a novel metaphor creates a new view of the subject, suggests new perspectives (342).
McCormac (1976): Metaphor as imaginative, explanatory hypothesis. Myth: false attribution of reality to a theory by taking a root metaphor to be literal (344).
Olscamp (1970): a statement needs not be true or false to be meaningful; a statement needs to be meaningful to be true or false.
Ortony (1975): Metaphors fill gaps and make it possible to express the continuous, vivid, fluid and dynamic structure of our experience (346).
Price (1974): Metaphors as rule-changing (sc grammatical rules).
Ricoeur (1973): Metaphors as creative use of polysemy – new meaning is metamorphosis of language and reality (348).
Shibles (1974): All mental activities are metaphorical (349).
Srzednicki (1960): Metaphors do not produce new meanings, but homonyms or new words that are types of homonyms.
Stewart (1971): Inconsistency as mark of metaphor (350).
Turbayne (1970): Abuse of metaphors in the metaphysics of mechanics (vs Descartes, Newton). Alternative: a ‘nature as universal language’ metaphor (351).
Warner (1973): Metaphor as distinct class of speech-acts, having a certain ‘horiatory’ or ‘suggestive’ force; useful as illocutionary acts that open up new ways of seeing and understanding.
Wheelwright (1962): epiphor (similarities between two things); diaphor (juxtaposition of two things, regardsless similarity > new insight). Metaphors vary from epiphor to diaphor, expressing a reality that’s ‘tensive’, ‘perspectival’, ‘coalescent’ and changing.
Yoos (1971): Metaphors at the level of thoughts rather than that or words. We are first aware of the thought that organizes the metaphor – after that the awareness of the words.
 
Kövecses, Zoltán, Metaphor in culture: universality and variation, 2005
cognitive linguistic view of metaphor
Foundational philosophical propositions (Lakoff & Johnson, 1999):
1 thought is largely unconscious (thought is based on correlations in bodily experiences that result in well-established neural connections in the brain)
2 abstract concepts are largely metaphorical (most of non-pysical (social, psychological, etc) reality is conceptualized via physical reality (in terms of physical domains of experience) [ OBW dualistic frame? Eventities are concrete, conceptual eventities as well, also if the physical aspect is not the main one (e.g. neural connections and activation as physiological substrate for a ‘thought’, e.g. a conceptual metaphor). What is called ‘abstract’, is often concrete and more complex. Related to the ‘non-physical’ interpretation of ‘abstract’, see the study p.202ff COMPLEX SYSTEMS (like company, mind, theory) ARE ABSTRACT ; COMPLEX ABSTRACT SYSTEMS ARE COMPLEX PHYSICAL BODIES (e.g. BUILDINGS / PLANTS, where abstract properties like logical and causal relations or temporal progression are ‘projected from concrete to abstract space’ (216) ]
3 the mind is embodied (concepts derive their meaning through sensorimotor experience – either directly or indirectly (i.e. via metaphor) [OBW concepts can also be generated algorithmically outside the brain – the question is whether correlates of concepts can be found inside and outside the brain as well, and which ‘main aspect’ characterizes every correlate]
Example of ‘embodiment’:
AFFECTION IS WARMTH (< experience of bodily warmth)
Examples of conceptual (or primary) metaphors (CMs) [OBW all over the book]:
MORE IS UP
STATES ARE LOCATIONS
STATES ARE ACTIONS
CAUSES ARE FORCES
ACTION IS SELF-PROPELLED MOTION
PROGRESS IS FORWARD MOTION
PURPOSES ARE DESTINATIONS
DIFFICULTIES ARE EMPEDIMENTS
MEANS ARE PATHS
IMPORTANT IS CENTRAL
TIME IS SPACE
TIME IS MOTION
PEOPLE ARE ANIMALS (totemism)
ANIMALS/PLANTS ARE PEOPLE (anthropomorphism)
PEOPLE/ANIMALS/PLANTS ARE STRUCTURES (objectification)
SUBJECT IS A PERSON
SELF IS A PERSON
SELF IS AN OBJECT
SELF IS A LOCATION
INTIMATE IS CLOSE
KNOWING IS SEEING
UNDERSTANDIG IS GRASPING
EMOTIONS ARE FORCES
QUALITY IS QUANTITY
NON-PHYSICAL (e.g. UNION) IS PHYSICAL (e.g. UNITY) > LOVE/MARRIAGE IS UNITY
Conceptual metaphors form together ‘complex’ metaphors, like:
LOVE IS A UNITY / ECONOMIC EXCHANGE / JOURNEY / HUNTING / FLYING A KITE (China)
LIFE IS A JOURNEY / STRUGGLE / STRING ( Hmong, Thailand)
There are ‘conceptual correspondences’, or ‘mappings’ between the source domain (e.g. JOURNEY) and the target domain (e.g. LOVE). Often source domains in sensorimotor areas, target domains in higher cortical areas.
Time is conceptualized in terms of space: static (past, present, future) or dynamic (‘passing’, ‘flow’). Different metaphors: 1 the time orientation metaphor (location of the observer – present; space in front of the observer – future (although: in Ancient Greek a.o. this space represents the past: see what has been done/made); space behind the observer – past (although: in Ancient Greek a.o. this space represents the future: one does not see what’s coming up)). 2 the moving time metaphor (motion of objects passing the observer – flow of time, time as substance, multiple[moments]-to-mass[duration] transformation). 3 the moving observer metaphor (locations on the observer’s path - times; motions of the observer – passage of time; distance moved by the observer – amount of time past). Time-motion frames lead to linguistic metonymies (e.g. Assen is half an hour from Groningen)..
Several unrelated languages share several CMs e.g. for particular emotion concepts, e.g.
ANGER IS HOT FLUID IN A PRESSURIZED CONTAINER (English, Chinese, Hungarian)
But generic-level CMs can also be instanciated in culture-specific ways, e.g. Japanese: ANGER starts in the stomach/bowel (‘hara’), increasing to the chest (‘mune’) becoming uncontrolable in the head (‘atama’), Chinese: ANGER as energy (‘qi’), Zulu: ANGER in the heart. UNDER in Africa: bottocks, anus, Oceania: foot/leg. Compare also these metaphorical characterization of LIFE:
Americans Hungarians
precious possession struggle and war
game compromise
journey journey
There is also within-culture variation, determined by
- gender, e.g. women as small furry animals, birds, sweet food, man as large furry animals;
- regional differences, e.g. in Dutch not many metaphors based on animals, but in Afrikaans a lot + mountains (René Dirven, Metaphor and Nation, 1994);
- style, e.g. slang in all languages highly metaphorical)
- subcultures, e.g. in religious groups dominance of nonvisual metaphors (cf mainstream US metaphor for knowledge: knowing is seeing)
- diachronic changes, e.g. mind automaton > clock > hydraulic system > computer
- developmental dimension, e.g. literal > metaphorical understanding
- invidivual dimension, e.g. sailor > ship metaphors
- aspects of metaphors, e.g. SOCIETY IS FAMILY (1 major authority figure, reward and punnishment or 2 helping, caring, empathizing > difference in social-political issues), also e.g. MOTION (English manner-centered (walk, run, march), in Turkisch direction-centered (fall, come, spread, descend)).
- different mappings, e.g. LIFE IS A JOURNEY
(religious: to eternal after-life, one way, progress and stages are not relevant; secular: purpose in life, several paths, progress, stages in life)
- different bleding, e.g. settlement Puritans in VS blended with exodus Jews from Egypt
CMs can be realized in social-cultural practice and institutions. E.g. seating arrangements. Talk about drugs in terms of ill persons (> hospitalization) or enemies (> war on drugs). E.g. ARGUMENT IS WAR (from written argument > oral dispute > quarrel > brawl > fight, target becoming source becoming real).
The American mind, studied by metaphors:
LIFE IS A SHOW / SPECTACLE / ENTERTAINMENT
SHOPPING IS A SHOW
POLITICS IS SPORT / A SHOW
WAR IS A SHOW
K: determine what metaphorically constituted ideas make up the most important aspects of conceptual systems around the world – see what they share and where they differ, combining the universal and particular aspects of the mind (192).
Lakoff, K: metaphors constitute cultural models (vs Quinn: reflect). Basic experiences select conceptual metaphors that constitute cultural models (222).
Differential experiences (physical environment (cf NL – South-Africa), social-cultural context (cf MiddleAge four humours with Chinese ‘qi’), differential salience of concepts (UK ship; FR food); physical settings (more HEALTH metaphors during winter); power relations (men-women, old-young); differential memory (history VS – Hungary > life/love metaphors) social/personal concerns and interests) and differential cognitive styles (differential experiental focus; viewpoint preference (front of a tree); differential prototypes (HOUSE: VS single, isolated house, RU appartment-block > Gorbochev’s metaphor COMMON EUROPEAN HOUSE emphasizing common responsibilities for a common structure with a plurality of independent living units was misunderstood in VS); differential framing (e.g. LUST IS HEAT English: he or she burns, hot, on fire – Chagga (Africa): only she burns, etc); metonymy-metaphor preference (MOUTH / TONGUE / LIP English a lot of metonyms (more direct negative evaluation), in Malay majority metaphors (more euphemistic style, saving the face of the hearer)) lead to metaphorical variation.
Blending (conceptual integration): metaphorical creativity by extension, elaboration, questioning and combining. The production of novel metaphors is less constrained if embodiment and social-cultural experience are minimized. New metaphors are produced predominantly by human imaginative cognitieve processes. e.g. LIFE IS A COMPROMISE (both abstract). THIS SURGEON IS A BUTCHER (surgeon/butcher patient/carcass blend > incompetence). Different types of conceptual integration: if the source domain largely structures the blend (e.g. BUSINESS IS BOXING > ‘Murdoch knocks out Iacocca’ (defeating the compatitor); if source and target are equally important in blending (e.g. he was so mad, I could see smoke coming out of his ears).
Concluding general propositions [OBW rewritten, abreviated]
a. metaphor (M) is simultaneously neural-bodily, conceptual, linguistic and social-cultural
b. variable dimensions of M reflect differential experiences
c. all aspects of M are involved in M variation
d. neural-bodily basis (‘embodiment’ E), cognitive preferences and styles (S) and social-cultural experience (‘context’, C) cause both universality and variation in M
e. E, S and C are coherent
f. M’s are coherent with E and/or S and/or C
g. universal E can lead to potentially universal M
h. distinct components and multiple aspects of E can lead to alternative (and often congruent) M
.i. two kinds of E: physical (e.g. blood pressure), cultural/psychological (e.g. early childhood experiences)
j. cognitive processes are universal, their applications are not
k. differential S and differential C can lead to M variation [=d.?]
l. E can be overridden by S and C
m. universal aspects of E do not necessarily lead to universal M; C variation does not exclude universal M
n. E, S, C and M evolve together in mutual interaction with each other
 
 
Moore, Gregory, Nietzsche, biology and metaphor, 2002
Nietzsche was a 19th century thinker, sharing a rhetoric of health and sickness (medicalisation), evolution and degeneration (biologisation) that began with the publication and popularisation of Darwin’s The Origin of Species. (..) His critique of traditional morality and his conception of the inherent creativity of the world emerge as coherent strands of his commitment to non-Darwinian forms of evolutionism. (..) N pre-darwinian, romantic ideas about nature (..) conservative ideas on women and sexuality (..) 19th century prejudices and attitudes (..) necessity of ‘contextualising’ or ‘historicising’ Nietzsche’s biologism (..) but his work is not reducible to some general historical ‘context’ (..) both evolutionism and degenerationism continued to form part of the profoundly anti-modernist tenor of much German thougth at the beginning of the 20th century (..) the sense of crisis was fuelled by real economic, political and cultural turmoil (..) cf Lebensphilosophie (Driesch, Bergson) neo-vitalistic reaction against mechanicism in biology (..) glorification of health and strength, gymnastics, eugenetics and ‘scientific’ racism (..) also Brentano: evolution and decadence (..) Heidegger (1910): ‘decadence, to a sad falling away from health’ (..) Max Scheler vs adaptation (being a reactive and passive process) as the principal mechanism by which life advances (..) essence of life in its activity (..) guided by a dynamic vital impulse, modifies the environment to suit its own needs (..) mechanicism as intellectual symbol of the slave revolt in morality (..) Scheler rejected N’s notion that egoism is primordial or even healthy – sympathy is also a fundamental vital impulse (mutual support > more power) (..) adaptation and civilisation have a retroactive effect and give rise to more diseases then can be treated and healed through progress in medicine and hygiene (..) vs modern civilisation as a decline in the evolution of mankind, representing the rule of the weak over the strong, the intelligent over the noble, quantity over quality (..) decadence is that mere means are developed and the goals are forgotten (..) cf also Spengler’s Decline of the West (1918) (..) evolution not as a gradual process, but through saltations, profound and sudden changes – see paleontology (..) cultural evolution governed by the same organic logic (..) modern megalopolis as death of the organic principle (..) megalopolitan art nihilistic, imitative, artificial, inauthentic, faked (..) megalopolis as necropolis of culture (..) cf also Simmel’s The Metropolis and Mental Life (1903) (..) So themes of race, progress and decline can be found in a lot of other writings by the late 19th century and the early 20th century (..) but in Nietzsche the obsessive proliferation of medical metaphors is characteristic of his writings (..) further a characteristic hoovering between literalness and metaphor, sincerity and irony (..) the rhetoric of health and sickness served diverse ideological ends, from anti-Semitism to Zionism, from conservatism to socialism
 
 
Richards, I.A., Philosophy of Rhetoric, 1936
89ff R vs some Aristotelian assumptions (..) 90 Shelly: language is vitally metaphorical (..) 92 metaphor as omnipresent principle of language (..) 93 When we use a metaphor, we have two thoughts of different things active together and supported by a single word or phrase, whose meaning is a resultant of their interaction (..) between aspects of different contents of a word’s meaning (..) 94 borrowing between and intercourse of thoughts, transaction between contents, thoughts proceeding by comparison > metaphors of language (..) 96 the metaphor gives us two ideas – compare the different relations of these two ideas; here R introduces the concepts tenor and vehicle (..) 97 the tenor is the underlying idea or principle subject which the vehicle means (..) 100 tenor and vehicle in co-operation give a meaning of more varied powers than can be ascribed to either (..) 106 tenor and vehicle are not always linked by resemblance (e.g. jovial wine, daring wound) (..) 108/109 our world as projected world itself is a product of earlier or unwitting metaphor (..) 117 the common characteristics [of tenor and vehicle] are the ground of the metaphor (..) often this ground is recondite (..) 118 a word or phrase may be simultaneously both literal and metaphoric (e.g. the man has a wooden leg – cf the leg of a horse, the leg of a table) (..) 119 tenor-vehicle: if we can distinguish at least two co-operating uses, then we have a metaphor (..) 120/121 tenor and vehicle can shift positions [OBW metaphor of shifting poles + tenor and or vehicle can shift positions with the meanings that move around them in the elliptical (bipolar) system of meanings] (..) 124 the mind as connecting organ will try to connect two things belonging to very different orders of experience (..) 125 tenor-vehicle relation not only resemblance, but also disparity; similarities and disparities are operative (..) 129 R vs accent on the imagery-aspect of metaphors: often the metaphore is not about something visual, but about feeling or thougth 130 language is not a mere stimulation to visualization (..) the word brings in the meaning which the image and its original perception lack (..) words are the meeting point at which regions of experience, which can never combine in sensation or intuition, come together (..) 132 R: don’t mistake the tenor-vehicle antithesis for that between the metaphor (..) and its meaning (..)
 
 

Ricoeur, Paul, La métaphore vive, 1975 (UK translation: The rule of metaphor: multi-disciplinary studies of the creation of meaning in language, 1978)
6 seeing as is seeing the similar in the dissimilar (..) 7 the metaphorical ‘is’ at once signifies both ‘is not’ and ‘is like’ (..) 12 Aristoteles: metaphors have a rhetorical (persuasion) and poetic (poiêsis, mimêsis, catharsis) function (..) 15 metaphor as tranfer of meaning (..) 17 epiphore (change of meaning); the word ‘metaphore’ itself is a metaphor, borrowed from another order [OBW sc. kinetics, phora = change with respect to location] (..) 19 transposition [of meaning] is not a substitution (..) 20 the metaphor fills a semantic lacuna (..) 21 it always takes two ideas to make a metaphor (..) 22 metaphors create meaning bij description > deconstruction > redescription (..) 23 Aristoteles: ‘eu métapherein’ - metaphorize well as verb (..) R. there are no rules for inventions (creativity theory) [OBW there are no inventions without initial conditions & rules from which inventions are generated] (..) 30 Aristoteles: pisteis (proofs, objective arguments), pithanon (persuasion, intersubjective aims), eurêsis (discovery of arguments), ta pragmata (bare facts and proof of those facts), 43 mimêsis (poetic imitation of nature) raises being-in-the-world to the level of mythos and the truth of imagination; mimêsis phuseos: revelation of the Real as Act. R: ontological function of metaphorical discourse: lively expression of existence as alive.
44 word or sentence as primary unit of meaning? (..) 45 R vs the tyranny of the word in the theory of meaning which in a purely rhetorical treatment reduces metaphors to ornaments (..) 56 Pierre Fontanier: 3 kinds of relationships: correlation/correspondence (metonymy, e.g. cause-effect, instrument-purpose, container-content, sign-signification, model-thing), connection (synecdoche, e.g. part-whole, material-thing, one-many, species-genus, abstract-concrete), resemblance (metaphor – characterize what already has been named). (..) 60 PF: metaphor only figurative meaning, allegory: literal and spiritual meaning together (..) 63 PF/Humboldt: the limited number of words and an infinite number of ideas ask for tropes (deviations affecting the meaning of a word), but it’s not only this necessity, due to the deficiency of vocabularity, but also pleasure, imagination, spirit and passion (as generative causes) that give colour, astonish, surprise, breathe force and energy into discourse.
67 Emile Beneviste: discourse (difference between the signs and the sentence): meaning is distributed over the ensemble of the constituants of the sentence. 68 the sentence (proposition) is the unit of discourse. 69 EB signs – semiotics (generic or universal function, conceptual), sentences – semantics (singular, particular, contingent). 71 Strawson: polarity of language in identification and predication. Identification: specify one thing, nouns, demonstrative, pronouns, means, something that exists. Predication: universalizing, adjectives of quality (great, good) & their substantival counterparts (greatness), classes (minerals, animals), relations (X inside Y), actions (B killed C), the non-existent. Ontological dissymetry of subject and predicate. (..) The king of France is bold – sense = understand what it means; reference = detemine whether the sentence is true or false. 74 No reference problem in semiotics: signs refer to other signs within the same system. Reference as mark of the self-transcendence of semantics (language – world). 76 paradigmatic (semiotic order) – syntagmatic (semantic order – the specific formation in which the meaning of the sentence is achieved) (..) 77 Richards: words have no proper meaning, they refer back to the missing parts of the context [retraces: traces of communication used as retraces] (..) 78 usage does not fix the meaning of words, the sentence is not a mosaic, but an organism. Ricoeur: this way Richards ignores the duality of semiotics and semantics; 83 Richards ignores as well problems related to the relationship of metaphors and reality. (..) Max Black: a metaphor is a statement in which one word (or some words) are taken metaphorically and other not (cf allegory: all words are used metaphorically). Focus = the metaphorical part, Frame = the rest of the sentence. B vs substitution theory and vs comparison theory. 90 Monroe Beardsley: every metaphor has a primary (what it states) and secondary (what it suggests) signification, cf denotation (explicit meaning) and connotation (implicit meaning). B a metaphor is a logical absurdity at the level of the primary meaning, liberating the secondary meaning 95 metaphor consists of principle subject and modifier (..) 96 B principle of fittingness (congruence): which connotations fit; principle of plenitude: all going connotations. (..) a metaphor combines proper meanings (lexical meanings) with contextual meanings and transfers properties (actual or attributed) into a sense. (..) 98 New metaphors can be seen as semantic innovations. (..) Ricoeur: metaphor as semantic event (..) where several semantic fields intersect, emerges meaning.
102 English analysis: sentence directed > interaction thesis, French analysis: word directed > substitution thesis (..) 103 Ferdinand de Saussure: lexial semantics - idea that the meaning of an isolated word can be understood (..) Joseph Trier: semantic fields theory (..) 105 Cassirer, Bühler: theory of concepts > Hedwig Konrad: relation logical concept (system of relationships that relate the elements of a particular object) and linguistic signification (..) 110 worn-out (trite) metaphors: usée (fr) (..) 112 Ogden/Richards: symbol – thought (reference) – thing (referent); de Saussure/Ullmann: signifier – signified; meaning of a word: unity of name and sense as reciprocal and reversible relation (..) 116 Ullmann: historical semantics: metaphors as sudden innovation, adding meaning (..) 121 vs FdS’s dichotomy signifier-signified a circle running from language with initial polysemy (one name, several senses) to living metaphors in speech to worn-out, trite metaphors to polysemy in language. (..) 125 a metaphorical semantic innovation is a way of responding in a creative fashion to a question presented by things (..) metaphor between sentence and word, between predication and naming (..) 126 semantic fields have variable degrees of organization: exact limits (e.g. colour names, military ranks), but also incomplete patterns with half-finished designs and vague characters of words (..) 128 Wittgenstein: the meaning of a word is its use in the language (..) actual meaning in the sentence as an instance of discourse (..) Beneviste: meaning is the meaning of a sentence in its idea, not of a word in its use (..) 129 Wittgenstein: state of affairs as the referent of a sentence (..) 130 Ricoeur: reciprocal interplay of [potential of the] word and the sentence (..) 131 the context of a sentence reduces polysemy, leaving out irrelevant meanings of the word; the metaphore asks for adding an acceptation [of meanings] that will rescue the meaning of the statement, trying to solve the inconsistencies at the predicative level (..) 133 the [meaning of the] metaphor as the outcome of a debate between predication and naming (..) 152 a kind of counterbalancing operation: first a situation of deviation (impertinence – violation of the code of speech at the syntagmatic level), than metaphor as reduction of deviation (violation of the code of language at the paradigmatic level) (..) 156 the central problem of semantics is the constitution of the meaning as a property of the undivided sentence (..) paradigmatic deviation at the lexical level > new pertinence at the semantical level (..) 157:
metonymy metaphor
signs sentences
lexical predicative
semiotic semantical
deviation of meaning dynamics of meaning
substitution theory interaction theory
language speech
paradigmatic syntagmatic
162 polysemy is lexicalized, newly created [fresh] metaphors are not.
suppression – object (e.g. tree: poplar or oak or willow)
addition – concept (e.g. tree: roots and trunc and branches and leaves)
189 tendency towards further development, e.g. ‘cosmos’: from pleasing sort of array > dispostion of an army > order of the universe (..) 193 Paul Henle: simile (no term taken figuratively), allegory (all terms taken figuratively), metaphor (some terms literary, some figuratively) (..) metaphors of metaphor: transference (Aristotle), vehicle (Richards), screen, filter and lens (Max Black) (..) 195 Aristotle: metaphorize well is: see the similar (epiphora, intuitive process); but no intuition without construction (diaphora) (..) 196 resemblance opposes and unites identity and difference (..) similarity: see the sameness in what is different (..) in a metaphor the ‘same’ operates in spite of the ‘different’ (..) 197 metaphor as ‘planned category mistake’ (cf Gilbert Ryle), breaking old categorizations, establishing new logical frontiers, engendering classification (..) 198 metaphor allows us to intercept the formation of the genus (..) shows the dynamics at work in the constitution of semantic fields; Gadamer: the fundamental metaphoric genesis of concepts as semantic process (..) 207v Ricoer vs M.B. Hester. R. accentuates the verbal aspect of the iconic moment of the metaphor [OBW language/speech cannot be reduced to linguistics] (..) 212 a metaphor is not a ‘duck or rabbit picture’ kind of problem – the point of view to be constructed is that in which tenor and vehicle are similar (..) 214 the tension in de contradictions at the literal level disappear in the dead [OBW hibernating] metaphors (..) Seeing as designates the non-verbal mediation of the metaphorical statement. (..) Gaston Bachelard: image as an aura surrounding speech. (..)
216 Discourse (l’intenté) is about extra-linguistic reality [OBW extra? Linguistics is one of the aspects or fields of reality] (..) signs differs from sign (difference - semiotic), discourse refers to the world (reference - semantic) (..) semiotic is an abstraction of semantic (..) cf Frege: Sinn – Bedeutung (..) sense = what the proposition states; reference = that about which the sense is stated (..) e.g. morning star, evening star, the same reference, but different sense (..) 218 Frege: semantic value through proper name > proposition; Beneviste: semantic value through use of the word/sentence (proposition > words) (..) Wittgenstein: world as totality of facts (Tatsachen, states of affairs = combinations of objects/things), not of things (Dinge) (..) 219 The identifying function (existence) and the predicative function (not existence, but characterizing) are totally asymmetrical (..) A text is irreducible to a sum of sentences – genres regulate the praxis of a text, style makes a work a singular, individual thing (..) 220 sense = the structure of the work; reference = the world of the work; in literature the relation of sense and reference is suspended (..) Frege: only scientific statements have reference, literary work has no reference (..) 221 Ricoeur: suspended reference (second level denotation) (..) metaphor: relationship displaced reference and suspended reference (..) 222 Beardsley: metaphor as a poem in miniature (..) 224 metaphorical truth – cf Majorca story tellers: ‘Aixo era y no era’ (it was and it was not) (..) 226 Frege: the symbol (any discernable unit of meaning) in literary discourse represents nothing outside itself but links the parts to the whole within the discursive framework (..) begin reading [poetry] is accepting its fiction (..) meaning in literature is literal – it says what is says and nothing else (..) 227 relation description and emotion – positivism: opposed; Dufrenne: feeling as property of object, not as state of my being; Cohen: poetic sentence objectively false, but subjectively true; Frye: poem not true or false, but hypothetical; Ricoeur: suspension liberates from descriptive reference; Goodman: emotions function cognitively, symbolic systems make and remake the world (cf Cassirer, Pierce) (..) 233 from symbol to thing (unicorn (null-denotation), dictionary-entries (multiple denotation), portrait of Rembrandt (singular denotation)) and from thing to symbol (pointing out a property or meaning that something ‘posesses’ (..) 234 metaphor concerns an inverted operation of reference plus an operation of transference (..) exemplifying and denoting are cases of reference, with only a difference of direction (..) 235 metaphor: unusual application of a familiar lable to a new object that resists at first and then gives in (..) 236 metaphor’s power of reorganizing our perception of things develops from transposition an entire ‘realm’ (e.g. sound in the visual order), a complete conceptual migration, guided by the use of the entire network in the region of origin (..) Max Black: metaphor creates the resemblance rather than finding and expressing it (..) 237 transfers from one realm to another: personification (from person to thing), synecdoche (from whole to part), antonomasia (from thing to property or label); transfers from intersecting realms: hyperbole (upward displacement), litotes (downward displacement) (..) 239 metaphorical discourse ‘invents’ in both senses of the word: what it creates, it discovers; and what it finds, it invents (..) 240 what a model is to scientific language, is a metaphor to poetic language: heuristic instrument for adaequate interpretation (or ‘redescription’ (Mary Hesse)) (..) model and metaphor belong to the context of discovery, not to the context of justification, or proof (..) Max Black: scale models (e.g. small model of a ship or simulation in slow motion – asymmetrical relation), analogue models (e.g. hydraulic model of economic system – isomorphic relation), theoretical model (e.g. Maxwell’s representation of an electrical field in terms of the properties of an imaginary incompressible fluid) 241 issue: what are the rules for interpretation of the model, how to make ‘use’ of it (deployability, Stephen Toulmin) (..) 243 Mary Hesse: metaphor as one of the ways to continually adapt our language to a continually expanding world (..) 244 Aristotle linked mimêsis and muthos in his concept of tragic poiêsis (..) R: metaphoricity (describing a less known domain) as trait not only of lexis but of mythos itself (..) 245 mimêsis constitutes the ‘denotative’ dimension of muthos (human life as that which the muthos displays) (..) 247 bipolar tension between: tenor and vehicle, focus and frame, principle and secundary subject; between literal and metaphorical interpretation; between identity and difference (relational function of is/as); between epiphor (assimilation at the level of images) and diaphor (combination of discrete terms) (..) 248 the ‘is’ of equivalence is different from the ‘is’ of determination (e.g. the rose is red) – ‘is like’ is a metaphorical modality of the copula ‘is’ itself (..) 251 Turbayne, The Myth of Metaphor – myth = metaphor taken literally, which is abuse instead of use of the metaphor (..) 253 we cannot say what reality is, only what it seems like to us > search for the best possible metaphors (..) 254 at pre-scientific, ante-predicative level the very notions of fact, object, reality and truth, as delimited by epistemology, are called into question by the vacillation of literal reference (..) the creative dimension of language consonant with the creative aspect of reality itself (..) 255 literal ‘is not’ and metaphorical ‘is’ (..) 259 Heidegger: the metaphorical only exists in the metaphysical (..) 260 the question ‘what is being’ is entirely outside the bounds of all language games (..) 263 two senses of ‘is’: being-said-of (Socrates is a man) differs from being-in (Sokrates is a musician) 268 R because of motion ontology is not a theology but a dialectic of division and finitude (..) predication is based on physical dissociation introduced by motion [OBW mix of kinetics and philosophy?] (..) 281 Heidegger two transfers: sensible > non-sensible (metaphysical transfer) and literal > figurative (metaphorical transfer) (..) 284 Derrida (‘White Mythology’, 1971): a philosophy of living metaphor wants to forget the entropy of language (> worn-out, dead metaphors) 285 metaphor as a sort of ‘linguistic surplus value’ (economic field) (..) 286 wherever the metaphor fades, there the metaphysical concept rises up (..) cf Nietzsche: truths are illusions of which one has forgotten that they are illusions (..) R: the discourse about metaphor is itself infected by the unversal metaphoricity of philosophical discourse (paradox of the auto-implication of metaphor) (..) 287 the layer of the first philosophical elements (philsophemes) is itself metaphorical (..) Derrida’s strategy: destroying metaphysical discourse by reduction to apories (..) 289 meta: the movement that carries the words and things beyond (..) dominant metaphors: sun ( illustrative (main natural lustre) > metaphors of light, looking of the eye (Plato eidos, Hegel idea), Cartesian lumen naturalis ), ground-foundation, home-return (..) 290 R. metaphors lexicalize, becoming proper words (..) use in discourse specifies the difference between literal and metaphorical (..) 292 living metaphors in philosophical discourse in order to draw out new meanings from some semantic impertinence and to bring to light new aspects of reality by means of semantic innovation (..) 293 that there are philosophical terms is due to the fact that a concept can be active as thought in a metaphor which is itself dead (..) 296 speculative discourse has its condition of possibility in the semantic dynamism of metaphorical utterance, and its necessity in itself, in putting the resources of conceptual articulation to work (..) the semantic shock (the tension between two interpretations of the metaphor) produces a conceptual need, but not as yet any knowledge by means of concepts (..) 197 the gain in meaning remains caught in the conflict of the’same’ and the ‘different’ (..) the gain in meaning at the same time gain in sense and gain in reference (..)
298 two movements while investigating new referents and trying to master their meanings:
300 speculative discourse establishes the primary notions, the principles that articulate primordially the space of the concept (..)
301
intellectio imaginatio
conceptual apprehension exemplification
Aufklärung Erklärung
intellection illustration
concepts images
same similar
303 hermeneutic style of intepretation: seek the clarity [univocity] of the concept and preserve the dynamism of meaning that the concept holds and pins down (..) cf Kant: Geist (spirit) as live-giving principle of mind (Gemüt) (..) presentation of the Idea by imagination forces conceptual thought to think more (..) 304 language can be thought, although not known, as the being-said of reality (..) 306 being-as as being and not-being, the copula between the relational sense and the existential sense (..) cf Aristotle: being as potentiality and being as actuality (..) potency and actuality defined correlatively in a phusis: the source of the movement of natural objects, being present in them somehow, either potentially or in complete reality (..) 309 task of speculative discourse: seek after the place where appearing means ‘generating what grows’ (cf Heidegger: belonging together of Erörterung (search for the ‘place’) and Ereignis (the thing itself to be thought, not to be reduced to event (Geschehnis) or to process (Vorkommnis) – es gibt (gift)) 310 Ancients aim for analogies, Heidegger aims for the ‘same’, an ‘identical’ (typology of Being) (..) 312 belonging together of thinking and being (..) ‘es gibt’ as keyword that decisively carries the whole movement. H thinks this as the end of metaphysics, but Ricoeur regards it as unacceptable claim that it puts an end to the history of being, as if ‘being dissapeared in Ereignis’ (..) 313 poetic discourse (tension) articulates and preserves the experience of belonging that places man in discourse and discourse in being (..) speculative discourse (distanciation) as dynamism of metaphorical utterance leads to the highest point of reflection, contemporaneous with the belonging of poetic discourse
315 Appendix. How to speak of fundamental experiences like guilt or alienation. Heidegger: inauthentic life. Jaspers: Grenzsituationen. Ricoeur: distinguish between finitude and guilt (vs classical existentialism: guilt as particular case of finitude). Fundamental change in the method of description. Husserl, Jaspers, Marcel: reflective method (existential phenomenology: extract essential meanings and structures of purpose, project, motive, wanting, trying etc. from lived experience). But talk about evil/guilt is embedded in symbolic [sc metaphoric] language, which is embedded in narrative of myth. This asks for the introduction of a hermeneutical dimension, not only as a method to decipher double or indirect meanings, but as a method to tackle the more general problems of written langauge and texts. Change of the philosophical scene: structuralism in France, post-Bultmaninain school in Germany (Ebeling, Fuchs), ordinary language schools in UK and VS. Reductive hermeneutics (line Feuerbach, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud) interprets symbols by reducing them. Other hermeneutic trend: recollect or retrieve the original meaning of symbols. Structuralism: from existentialistic subjectivity to the [unconscious] linguistic and semiotic structures. For structuralism language does not refer to anything outside itself, it constitutes a world for itself. Structuralism rejects writer’s intentions and reader’s interpretations as psychologism or subjectivism. Ricoeur: objective meaning of the text as distinct from the subjective intention of the author, but also connected by two discourses: the discourse of the text and the discourse of the interpretation. What has to be interpreted is what a text says and what it speaks about, i.e. the kind of world it opens up or discloses. The world of the text and the world of the reader merge into one another (Gadamer: ‘fusion of horizons’). Ricoeur: effort to co-ordinate phenomenology and the philosophy of language, dealing with problems of the ‘linguisticality’ of human experience > texts > intepretations, like: How functions a word in different contexts? How is a form of discourse linked to a specific content? What is unterstanding in relation to text-explanation? Ordinary language is characterized by variability of semantic values, sensitivity to contexts and the irreducibly polysemic character of lexical terms, which are the basic condition for symbolic discourse. Ordinary language can be seen (in the line of Wittgenstein and Austin) as conservatory for expressions to describe human expierence, particularly in the realms of action and feelings. Linguistic phenomenology tries to recapture the intentions of ordinary language experiences. To understand discourse is to interpret the actualizations of its polysemic values according to the permissions and suggestions proposed by the context.
 
 

Rispens, S.I., Machine Reason. A History of Clocks, Computers and Consciousness, 2005
Main argument: mechanistic philosophy was irrefutable in the 17th century, but appeared not to be ‘true’, so if computational philosophy seems to be irrefutable in the 20th/21st century, we should be aware of it’s perhaps dubious postulates (homogeneity and analyzability of nature and technological equivalence – to understand X is to be able to write software that realizes X [OBW cf Stephen Wolfram (2002): computational equivalence]) and perhaps dubious methods (circular thought experiments (machine analogies can only provide constructive evidence for an existing theory (236)) and simulations overstretching analogues model-reality (which are not related ontologically)). The argument is based on a historical comparative description of the technological development and the scientific (mainly philosophical) and cultural impact of 17th century clocks and 20th century computers.
  clock computer
similarities digital
(continuous gravitional accelleration split up into regulary oscillatory movement: countable bits)		 digital
(steady beat of quartz cristal)
  automation of ‘mental operatoins’ (e.g. calculation) automation of ‘mental operatoins’ (e.g. calculation)
  autonomous autonomous
  symbolic machine
(dealing with number, logic, language)		 symbolic machine (Weizenbaum, 1976
Sybille Krämer, 1988)
  no physical product no physical product
  both produce ‘spirit’, ‘mind’, ‘intelligence’, nothing concrete (222) [ OBW dualist position?]
  early serial production and miniaturization early serial production and miniaturization
  military roots (magister bombardum et horologium: canons and clocks) military roots (radar, cryptology)
  most complex machine of its time most complex machine of its time
  little technical use, high technological esteem
(clock marginal in keeping time)		 little technical use, high technological esteem (big investments in ICT, not related to a similar raise in productivity) [OBW rapid extension of the meaning of ‘product’ from more physical to more virtual (‘brainfood’) > implications for the measurement of productivity]
  clock-games
(sounding melodies, showing moving puppets etc)		 computer-games
  optimistic anticipation
(Leibniz’ mechanical robots: ‘a body capable of counterfeiting a man’)		 optimistic anticipation
(Brooks, Minsky: how robots will change us (Flesh and Machines, 2003)
  machine-related intuition of a ‘deep relation’ between mechanical structures/processes and nature machine-related intuition of a ‘deep relation’ between electronic circuitry and thinking (233)
  machina mundi artificial mind (232)
  hardware containing software separation of hardware and software (248)
philosophical debate bête machine
(Descartes: explain animal behavior with mechanistic concepts)		 brain machine
(Artificial Intelligence - nature as ‘information to be processed’)
Weizenbaum (1976): Like a better clock would never discover Newton’s law of gravity, more powerful computers will not find any law of higher intellectual processes (of humans) (197). Clocks and computer have no physical products, like steam engines and airplanes. (205) [OBW all eventities physical aspects (e.g. substrates and effects, energy in, heat out, entropy) and all eventities symbolic aspects as well (e.g. an airplain always landing at X at 14.00 can function as a clock)] Clocks and computers have no physical product (222). [OBW its physical products are valuated for its symbolic significance – cf a random pattern of bytes and meaningful data, expressed by a physically similar pattern of bytes. cf Pythagoras: everything is number (what was meant by this exactly?). If everything is number, a number-machine is everything. But a number-machine can only produce a simulation of a unicorn – even if all biologically relevant algorithms have been implemented in the simulation, the real unicorn has to be generated by a biological process.] Symbolic machines represent [OBW sic!] formalized symbols such as numbers, operate on symbols, using the rules of symbolic logic (225). Symbolic machines link ideas to physical states of their material parts [OBW physical states as ‘products’?]. Distinction logical system of the symbolic machine and the machine’s physical level:ideal world (numbers, logic, language) vs material world (constantly shifting and changing). R: symbolic machines are inhabitants of [these] two worlds (226). [OBW dualism kept alive or what?]. R: 3 levels of symbolic interaction [of the ideal and material]: mimetic, analogous and symbolic. 1. mimetic: objects prior to symbols as copy, image of the objects 2. analogous: common form in different things; symmetrical relation nature and machines, knowledge becomes technical knowledge [sc of mechanistic principles], ontological reversal: elements of nature defined in mechanical terms (231) Dennett (Consciousness explained, 1991): if all biological neurons would be replaced by electronic circuits, the brain still would be conscious after the replacement – example of circular thought experiment (237). Searl, Mind, Brains and Programs (1980): weak AI (computer as tool to study the mind), strong AI (appropriately programmed computer is a mind), Searl also circular (chinese) thought experiment (239). R La Mettrie’s l’Homme machine (1747, in which he develops Cartesian thought ad absurdum) as dissimulating thought experiment: constructive in form, but deconstructive in effect: satire, irony (cf Alex Sutter, 1988 Ursula Pia Jauch, 1998). Petitio principii: those who use machines as heuristic aids to the secret of life, can only do so by a priori abstracting away from all that is essential to it. More recent examples of dissimulating thought experiments: Weizenbaum’s therapist program Eliza and algorithms simulation autism (‘humming’ as ‘answer’ to every question) (241-246); 3 symbolic : operative relation between symbolized and symbolic reference, ontological shift from things giving meaning to signs to signs constituting things (Leibniz, Weizenbaum, Krämer); symbols not only represent knowledge, but also generate true, rational knowledge, because operative symbols constitute the language of all rational knowledge (251); fundamental idea: every mental activity manifests itself in the operative use of symbols (Leibniz, without making an analogy between the modus operandi of a symbolic machine and the human mind) (253). Also Descartes: machine models only as epistemological models for scientific knowledge, e.g. explaining nature / animals. Thinking is not mere information processing, but reasoning, interacting with will, passions, emotions and morality (254). There are a lot of quantitative improvements (e.g. in speech, image, pattern recognition, expert systems, computational algebra, industrial simulations etc), but does all this imply a qualitative jump to strong AI? Marvin Minsky (1960): within a generation [strong] AI (R: chronocentrism – the idea that own times are paramount and a decisive turning point in history) (259-267). The central questions change through their interaction with the hightech of a given period. Therefore it’s necessary to reflect critically on the postulates (indemonstrable first principles, like homogeneity and analyzability of nature and technological equivalence) and on the methods used (like (thought-)experiments and simulations) and keep an open mind for other approaches that might be as relevant for understanding the working and relation of the biological brain and the cognitive mind (like thermodynamics or quantummechanics) (269-278) A model is not the reality, a plane is not a bird, a computer is not an understanding and feeling mind. R: ‘creativity’ or ‘conscious understanding’ far beyond the scope of any computational approach (278-281). MIT develops the communicaton-robot Kismet with an anthropomorphic body (cf Dreyfus: the body is essential for the organisation of experiences, ordering situations related to needs and interests), applying Piaget’s 15-stage developmental psychology (281-283). R: symobolic systems cannot find laws [? OBW] but (..) the human mind is perhaps also a symbolic machine (285). [OBW Stephan Wolfram: already a CA as universal [symbolic] machine.]
[OBW If there were a difference between matter and mind, an intelligent machine would oscillate between them.] [OBW 17th century: mechanical equivalence, mechanics as explanatory model; 21st century: computational equivalence, computation as explanatory model. The next ‘move’ in a computational (symbolic) system is independent of the choosen physical system that makes the ‘move’ representing the symbolic operation, but without any physical system no computational (symbolic) ‘move’ would be made at all. (..) Game-creativity: what is the best next move, what is the best game-style, what is the best new game?]
 


Rutten, Ellen, Unattainable Bride Russia. Engendering Nation, State and Intelligentia in Twentieth-Century Russian Literature, 2005
Ellen Rutten presented a thorough thesis about the transformations in the use of a specific metaphor in Russian literature within a timespan of over a hundred years.
According to Richards any metaphor consists of a) a tenor or an "underlying idea or principal subject", b) a vehicle, meaning a metaphorical term or "figure" through which the tenor is expressed; and c) a ground, which is a set of "common characteristics" of tenor and vehicle, or the reason why the metaphor is created (I. Richards,The Philosophy of Rhetoric, 1965, 97, 117).
ER describes the personalized, and (logically following from that) genderized metaphor of the relation between three socio-political entities: the Russian people/land/soul as the beloved woman, the state as the rigid husband and the intelligentia as the real lover.
From a lot of texts ER derives several (sometimes contradicting) characteristics of those roles, what makes the imagination more colourful and in a way more realistic, but more diffuse as well: the metaphor seems to encapsulate a manifold of metaphors.
What makes the metaphor special regarding the tensions in the Russian socio-political relations, is the tragical character of the tree-cornered love affair and more specifically the impotence of all parties, be it mainly of the intelligentia.
In the postmodern imagination a radical irony regarding any relation and any metaphorical representation of tensions in relations leads to a dismantling of the metaphor by extreme fysicalization/sexualization of its vehicle-side.
Partly opposing postmodernism new sincerity makes a new move, choosing for sympathetic-critical irony, trying to find a new balance between commitment and relativism.
According to ER through the periods of revolutions, sovietism, postmodernism and new sincerety the metaphor evolves from ‘fresh’ image to one of the vital, although stereotypical myths in the Russian intellectual tradition.
The basic structure of the metaphor seems to keep its attraction to refer to. And in the use of the metaphor ER in most cases manages to find references (be it sometimes inverted) to the Russian socio-political relations.
ER announces further investigations into the use of the metaphor in other Russian art-forms like music, pictural art and films, which will without a doubt strengthen even more her thesis that this triangle-relation metaphor proves itself to be a ‘vital cultural myth’.
Perhaps it’s a good idea to give the personal, psychological aspects of the metaphor also some consideration: the triangle feeling – understanding – action and their tensions. In my view they belong to the ‘depth-structure’ of the metaphor, determining at least partly its attraction.
The personal aspect (how do I feel and understand reality and how can I control reality more or less) is accompanied by the psycho-social aspect, in which sexual differences and tensions are involved as well (how do I relate to other people and to other people of the opposite sex). Also the socio-political aspect joins in, coloured by the local geography and cultures, raising tensions between cosmopolitical and provincial attitudes (how do we relate to people who belong to other socio-political strata, parties, nations, races).
Certainly, the love-game is a power-play as well. And every power-play can be metaphorized as love-game. That’s what those, who use the metaphor as linguistic explanatory simplification, investigate in the different transformations of its use and (e.g. ideological) abuse.
Another chapter of research could be the relation between the Russian postmodernist authors and the ‘original’ postmodern philosophers. In my view those thinkers, by relativizing language(-games) as dynamic cultural phenomenon, aimed at the clarification of the unrelativizable moral task, in which feeling, understanding and action can work together, strengthening each other.
ER provides the data for a mixed conclusion regarding the metaphor:
The question ‘What shows the use of a (sc this specific) metaphore’ can’t be reduced to semantics and pragmatics – that would leave one in the end with an ‘empty metaphor’. The ethical aspect can’t be ignored as another vital part of its relevance: in the ground and in the end there is ethics as well.
ER’s thesis points at two pitfalls for those who look for a balance in feeling, understanding and action: the uncritical absolutization of an ideology and the radical (ironic > cynical) relativation of the ethical attitude (love as unselfish dedication and commitment).
 
 
 


Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Philosophical Investigations, 1960
Uttering a word is like striking a note on the keyboard of the imagination (#6). The meaning of a word is its use in language (#43). An inner process stands in the need of outward criteria (#580). Seeing as (..) half visual experience, half thought (212). Seeing as is not interpretation, it’s like ‘having this image’ (cf Jastrow’s duck-rabbit picture). If there is no seeing as – aspect-blindness (213)
 
 
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, On Certainty, 1951
Quotes from notes (the numbers given are not page-numbers, but note-numbers as added by Gertrude Anscombe and Georg Henrik von Wright).
If a proposition seems to me to be so, it doesn’t follow that it is so. (..) Does it make sense to doubt it? (2)
Only in the use the proposition has its sense. (10)
A doubt about existence only works in a language-game. (24)
One does not infer how things are [sc a proposition being true or false] from one’s own certainty. (30)
"Physical object" is a logical concept (like colour, quantity,…), so the proposition "There are physical objects" is nonsense. (36)
Calculation is how you calculate. Forget transcendent certainty, which is connected with your concept of spirit. (47)
Logical propositions describe the conceptual (linguistic) situation. (51)
We are not coming closer to certainty – doubt gradually looses its sense. The language-game just is like that. And everything descriptive of a language-game is part of logic. (56)
Compare the meaning of a word with the ‘function’ of an official. And ‘different meanings’ with ‘different functions’. (64)
When language-games change, then there is a change in concepts, and with the concepts the meanings of words change. (65)
What counts as an adequate test of a statement belongs to logic. It belongs to the description of the language-game. (82)
The truth of certain empirical propositions belongs to our frame of reference. (83)
The propositions describing this world-picture might be part of a kind of mythology. And their role is like that of rules of a game; and the game can be learned purely practically, without learning any explicit rules. (95)
Yet this is right: the same proposition may get treated at one time as something to test by experience, at another as a rule of testing. (98)
The system is not so much the point of departure, as the element in which arguments have their life. (105)
As if giving grounds did not come to an end sometime. But the end is not an ungrounded presupposition: it is an ungrounded way of acting. (110)
If you are not certain of any fact, you cannot be certain of the meaning of your words either. (114)
(My) doubts form a system. (126)
Not only rules, but also examples are needed for establishing a practice. Our rules leave loop-holes open, and the practice has to speak for itself. (139)
When we first begin to believe anything, what we believe is not a single proposition, it is a whole system of propositions. (141)
What stands fast does so, not because it is intrinsically obvious or convincing; it is rather held fast by what lies around it. (144)
Doubt comes after belief. (160) (..) For whenever we test anything, we are already presupposing something that is not tested. (163)
The difficulty is to realize the groundlessness of our believing. (166)
Of course learning is based on believing. (170)
Doubting our whole system of [historical] evidence has nothing on its side. (185, 188, 190)
 Well, if everything speaks for an hypothesis and nothing against it - is it then certainly true? One may designate it as such. - But does it certainly agree with reality, with the facts? - With this question you are already going round in a circle. (191)
If everything speaks for an hypothesis and nothing against it, is it objectively certain? One can call it that. But does it necessarily agree with the world of facts? At the very best it shows us what "agreement" means. (203)
It is not a kind of seeing on our part; it is our acting, which lies at the bottom of the language-game. (204)
The reasonable man does not have certain doubts. (220)
At the foundation of well-founded belief lies belief that is not founded. (253)
A language-game does change with time. (256)
I would like to reserve the expression "I know" for the cases in which it is used in normal linguistic exchange. (260)
We can see from their actions that they believe certain things definitely, whether they express this belief or not. (284)
We shall stick to this opinion, unless our whole way of seeing nature changes. (291)
 Further experiments cannot give the lie to our earlier ones, at most they may change our whole way of looking at things. (292)
(..) we belong to a community which is bound together by science and education. (298)
(..) about certain empirical propositions no doubt can exist if making judgments is to be possible at all. (308)
Thus we should not call anybody reasonable who believed something in despite of scientific evidence. (324)
But what men consider reasonable or unreasonable alters. (336)
(..) some propositions are exempt from doubt, are as it were like hinges on which those turn. (341)
That is to say, it belongs to the logic of our scientific investigations that certain things are in deed not doubted. (342)
(..) absence of doubt belongs to the essence of the language-game (..) (370)
What I need to show is that a doubt is not necessary even when it is possible. (392)
I don’t show always what I know by thinking it – I show it by drawing its consequenses. (397)
Our knowledge forms an enormous system. And only within this system has a particular bit the value we give it. (410)
And in fact, isn’t the use of the word "know" as a preeminently philosophical word altogether wrong? (..) certain propositions seem to underlie all questions and all thinking. (415)
Or: isn’t this ‘certainty’ (already) presupposed in the language-game? (446)
(..) both propositions, the arithmetical one and the physical one, are on the same level.
I want to say: The physical game is just as certain as the arithmetical. But this can be misunderstood. My remark is a logical and not a psychological one. (447)
A doubt that doubted everything would not be a doubt. (450)
There are cases where doubt is unreasonable, but others where it seems logically impossible. And there seems to be no clear boundary between them. (454)
(..) we learn first the stability of things as the norm, which is then subject to alterations. (473)
(..) ‘knowing something’ doesn’t involve thinking about it - but mustn’t anyone who knows something be capable of doubt? And doubting means thinking. (480)
Am I not getting closer and closer to saying that in the end logic cannot be described? You must look at the practice of language, then you will see it. (501)
(..) a language-game is only possible if one trusts something. (509)
You must bear in mind that the language-game is so to say something unpredictable. I mean: it is not based on grounds. It is not reasonable (or unreasonable).
It is there - like our life. (559)
There is always the danger of wanting to find an expression’s meaning by contemplating the expression itself, and the frame of mind in which one uses it, instead of always thinking of the practice. (601)
Is it wrong for me to be guided in my actions by the propositions of physics? Am I to say I have no good ground for doing so? Isn’t precisely this what we call a ‘good ground’? (608)
At the end of reasons comes persuasion. (612)
For each one of these sentences I can imagine circumstances that turn it into a move in one of our language-games, and by that it loses everything that is philosophically astonishing. (622)
A doubt without an end is not even a doubt. (625)
I cannot be making a mistake about 12x12 being 144. And now one cannot contrast mathematical certainty with the relative uncertainty of empirical propositions. For the mathematical proposition has been obtained by a series of actions that are in no way different from the actions of the rest of our lives, and are in the same degree liable to forgetfulness, oversight and illusion. (651)
If the proposition 12x12=144 is exempt from doubt, then so too must non-mathematical propositions be. (653)
 
Metaphors in Wittgenstein’s On Certainty
  
The next metaphors can be found in the notes Wittgenstein wrote while he evaluated Moore’s essays about common sense, in which Moore claimed to know a number of propositions for sure. Wittgenstein argues that the combination of the expression "I know" with a specific proposition can make sense in one language-game (Frame Of Reference, World-Picture) and at the same time not make sense in another. Only systems of propositions as wholes raise meanings, affirmations and doubts that make sense within that system. (..)
Wittgenstein’s metaphors (the numbers given are not page-numbers, but note-numbers as added by Gertrude Anscombe and Georg Henrik von Wright):
 
To think that different [mental] states must correspond to the words "believe" and "know" would be as if one believed that different people had to correspond to the word "I" and the name "Ludwig", because the concepts are different. (42)
The hypothesis that all things around us don’t exist would be like the hypothesis of our having miscalculated in all our calculations. (55)
Compare the meaning of a word with the ‘function’ of an official. And ‘different meanings’ with ‘different functions’. (64)
The role [of propositions describing a world-picture] is like that of rules of a game; and the game can be learned purely practical without learning any explicit rules. (95)

Some propositions [are] hardened, some fluid, some changing back into a state of flux like the movement of water in a riverbed and the shift of the river-bed itself. (96,97)

The picture of the earth as a ball is a good picture (..) we work with it without doubting it. (147)
I can discover [the propositions that stand fast for me] like the axis around which a body rotates. This axis is not fixed in the sense that anything holds it fast, but the movement around it determines its immobility. (152)
The squirrel does not infer by induction that it is going to need stores next winter. And no more do we need a law of induction to justify our actions and our predictions. (287)
The pupil who casts doubt on the uniformity of nature, that is to say on the justification of inductive arguments, would be as if someone were looking for some object in a room; he opens a drawer and doesn’t see it there; then he closes it again, waits, and opens it once more to see if perhaps it isn’t there now, and keeps on like that. He has not learned to look for things, like the pupil has not learned how to ask questions. (315)
Our doubts depend on the fact that some propositions are exempt from doubt - are as it were like hinges on which those turn. (341)
Using the expression "I know" in "I know that’s a tree" is as if I were to see a painting (say a painted stage-set) and recognize what it represents from a long way off at once and without the slightest doubt. But now I step nearer: and then I see a lot of patches of different colours, which are all highly ambiguous and do not provide any certainty whatever. (481)
I do philosophy now like an old woman who is always mislaying something and have to look for it again: now her spectacles, now her keys. (532)
Pretensions are a mortgage which burdens a philosopher’s capacity to think. (549)
The language-game is so to say something unpredictable. I mean: it is not based on grounds. It is not reasonable (or unreasonable). It is there – like our life. (559)
(..)
 
 
 

Abstracts in het Nederlands

Draaisma, Douwe, De metaforenmachine. Een geschiedenis van het geheugen, 2003.
0 Friedrich Nietzsche: Wat is dus waarheid? Een beweeglijk leger van metaforen.
Veel metaforen danken hun bestaan aan het feit dat ze uitdrukken wat niet letterlijk gezegd kan worden – nog niet of principieel niet (bv in de psychologie veel metaforen waarvoor een letterlijk alternatief niet voorhanden is)
13 Metaforen zijn als literair-wetenschappelijke constructies ook weerspiegelingen van een tijd, een cultuur, een ambiance. (..) Metaforen zijn gidsfossielen, ze helpen de lezer de ouderdom te schatten van de tekst waarin hij ze aantreft. 22 Grieks ‘metapherein’ – overdragen (sc van connotaties van het ene woord naar het andere woord, van de ene contekst naar de andere contekst). Richards (1936) onderscheidt [volgens Draaisma] topic (onderwerp waarover de metafoor iets beweert), vehicle (wat de betekenis uit een andere contekst overdraagt), tenor (de strekking (teneur) van de metafoor - het punt resp de punten van overeenkomst tussen topic en vehicle). [OBW ? verschil terminologie in weergave door Ellen Rutten (zie boven) – verschuiving begrippen bij Richards? Nee. Draaisma geeft Richards (1936) niet goed weer. Bij Richards is ‘topic’ geen technische term bij de analyse van metaforen, wel in de eerste plaats ‘tenor’ en ‘vehicle’ (1936, p 96v) en later komt daar (maar niet zo nadrukkelijk) ‘ground’ bij (1936, p 117) als aanduiding van de punten van overeenkomst (‘common characteristics’).] 25 Richards: "When we use a metaphor, we have two thoughts active together and supported by a single word, or phrase, whose meaning is a resultant of their interaction." [OBW visualiseren als elliptisch systeem: tenor en vehicle als tweelingster waaromheen de ‘meanings’ van de metafoor cirkelen als wolk planeten – variatie van interacties. (..) Metaforen in te tekenen op dimensies concreet-abstract en fresh-trite.] 26 Metafoor als eenheid van tegendelen (concreet en abstract, perceptueel en verbaal, aanschouwelijk en conceptueel) 28 neurologisch samenspel van linguistische en visuele netwerken. 29 Didactische en pedagogische functie van metaforen (Comeniusfunctie – aanschouwelijk onderwijs (1657)). Onderscheid structurele (gebouwd als..) of functionele (werkt als..) relatie topic en vehicle. 30 Plaatjes beter onthouden dan woorden en concrete woorden beter dan abstracte woorden 31 De metafoor stelt het herinneringsvermogen in staat met meer haken tegelijk te vissen 33 Metafoor als heuristisch instrument door nieuwe theoretische noties en nieuwe empirische onderzoeksvragen te introduceren, cf Harvey’s metafoor van het hart als een pomp (1628). 34 John Locke vs gebruik van metaforen (‘instrument of error and deceit’); Francis Bacon metafoor als idola fori (dwalingen als gevolg van verward taalgebruik); Royal Society: verbod op het gebruik van metaforen in wetenschappelijke publicaties.
 
Geschiedenis van metaforen voor het geheugen:
vehicle persoon tijd tenor
schrift     neerslag van ervaring
wastablet Plato
Aristoteles		   te wissen afdruk
volière Plato   kennis bezitten (vogel in je hok)
kennis hebben (vogel in je hand)
opslagplaats Augustinus   in ruimten zoeken en hervinden
boeken, overgeleverde teksten Tomas van Aquino 1250 cumulatie van kennis
boeken met registers scholastieke traditie   indexering van het zoeken
cirkelende wielen (als ars memoriae) Giordano Bruno 1570 hermetisch universum
theater (als ars memoriae) Robert Fludd 1574-1637 harmonie macrokosmos en microkosmos vd menselijke geest
forsforiserende stoffen;
magazijn		 Robert Hooke (cel!) begin mechanistische psychologie 1682 indrukken bewaren, relaties aantal herinneringen en tijdsduur, onderscheid opslaan en reproduceren, actieve rol van aandacht
  mechanisering vh wereldbeeld begin 17e eeuw  
camera obscura     beweeglijkheid van beelden, veranderlijkheid en manipuleerbaarheid van de voorstellingen
 
 
 		 Julien de Lamettrie, l’homme machine 1747  
landschap
labyrinth
weefgetouw		 Romantiek
Carl Gustav Carus		 1790-1840
1829/30		 projectie van buiten naar binnen
ondoorgrondelijkheid
verborgenheid v snelle werking
  Franz Joseph Gall
Pierre-Paul Broca		 1758-1828
1824-1880		 van schrijftafel naar snijtafel
lokalisatie vh geheugen: deelfuncties met eigen loci
fotografie
.
.
telegrafie		 John William Draper 1856 vastleggen en weergeven van beelden (existentiebewijs van het materiële aspect ervan)
gecodeerdheid van de geheugen-sporen
fonograaf Jean-Marie Guyay 1880 vastleggen en weergeven van auditieve sporen
samengesteld portret Francis Galton 1879 samengevloeide herinneringen > prototypische beelden
  Hermann Ebbinhaus
Ueber das Gedaechtnis		 1885  
muzikaal akkoord,
krachtenveld		 Alfred Binet
onderzoek rekenwonders		 1892v zinvolle patronen
cinematografie Henri Bergson 1907 beweging als ‘techniek van..’
toverlei Sigmund Freud 1925 blijvende sporen in de diepere laag, wisbaarheid van de lei
weinig metaforen, bv
telefooncentrale		 behaviorisme 1925-1945 onobserveerbaarheid van mentale processen
verbinding stimulus en respons
doolhof en landkaart
(maze & map)		 Tolman   ruimtelijkheid van kennis
psychic machine Clark Hull 1926 vs mentalisme
universal machine
electronic circuits		 Turing 1937  
transmission of information
computer
hardware
software
representaties
(simulaties)		      
brein
geest (probleem Descartes)
impressions
ideas (probleem Hume)
holografie Piet van Heerden
 1963
 hoeveelheid en snelheid van de parallel verwerkte gegevens,
inhoudadresseerbaarheid van de informatie (ipv lokatieadresseer-baarheid),
gedistribueerde opslag, cf
graduele achteruitgang bij beschadiging (graceful degration)
brein
neurale netwerken		 John Hopfield
connectionisme		 1982 duurzame evenwichtspatronen in een netwerk van homogene elementen
 
76 Tomans Prat (1667): de gebruikte taal in onderzoeksverslagen van de Royal Society diende bondig en eenvoudig te zijn, gezuiverd van de ‘trick of Metaphors’. Samual Parker (1666): Metaforen ‘klimmen met hun brooddronken en weelderige fantasieën in het bed van de Rede, haar bezoedelend met onkuise en ontuchtige omhelzingen (..) de geest raakt bezwangerd, niet met werkelijke concepties en feitelijke constateringen, maar met opgeklopte en winderige fantasterij." (..) 155 knipoog naar Jan Hendrik van den Berg: wonderlijke coïncidentie, op het metabletische af, dat in 1839 de camera obscura metafoor van Beets en de fotografie werd geïntroduceerd (..)160 gevaar van metaforen: ze kunnen de werkelijke problemen aan het oog onttrekken (bv fotografie-metafoor doen geen recht aan de reproductie van voorstellingen). (..) 229 déja-vu: gewaarwording ervaren als herinnering (ondeugdelijke geheugenassociatie – overlap gecodeerde informatie) (..) 251 NB verschil product- en proces-simulaties 252 Dennett noemt product-simulaties ‘cognitive wheels’ 253 veel onderzoek gericht op de leerregels die specificeren hoe het netwerk zichzelf organiseert, 255, bv de vorming van prototypen in semantische netwerken als automatische consequenties van de opslag – 256 cf de vorming van impliciet geheugen (Claparède’s punaise); 261 connectionistische benadering vooral gericht op leren, associatie en patroonherkenning, computationele benadering vooral ‘hogere’ processen als probleemoplossen en redeneren – hoe te vergelijken resp. te combineren? (..) Grote verschillen in typen neuronen, zowel in bouw als functie…262 neuronaal weefsel tot op grote hoogte ‘pre-wired’…[OBW cf ROM read-only-memory met ‘ingebakken software’ met RAM random-access-memory] (..) 277 geheugenprocessen tussen reflex en reflectie 282 bewustzijn dat herkennings- resp herinnerings-beelden ‘bekijkt’ is homunculair (een conceptueel defect) 287 relatie fysische opslag en bewuste herinnering 293 Haldane: problem of meaning and intentionality (..) how can things have them? Draaisma: geen enkele theorie ondervangt de complicaties van het lichaam-geest probleem 294 verlegging demarcatie-lijn: Descartes nog tussen extensio en cogitatio, nu tussen geheugen van anderen (3e-persoons psychologie) en persoonlijk geheugen (1e persoons psychologie) – methodologische cesuur: observeerbaar gedrag vs introspectie. (..) 297 Opvallend kenmerk van de historische ontwikkeling van de geheugenmetaforen: steeds technischer, van wastablet tot neurale netwerken 300 [onderliggend patroon in alle theorieën en modellen, te lezen als loop:] activatie > representatie van ervaring in de dispositie tot activatie (facilitatie) 131 tav het geheugen van de psychologie: het blijven verschijnen van teksten die allang voorhanden waren als ongelezen teksten.
[OBW heuristische waarde van metaforen in onderzoeksvoorstellen: ze helpen bij het gemakkelijker vinden van onderzoeksgeld]
 
 
Dunk, Allard den, "Misschien kunnen we daar eens naar kijken?" Over nieuwe metaforen voor een nieuwe filosofie. 2005
Postmodernisme ontmakerde alle ideologieën als ‘wil tot macht’, als het opleggen van eigenbelang aan anderen. Daarmee is iedereen die oprecht wil kiezen voor een bepaald engagement kwetsbaar geworden. (..) De postmoderne mens kan eigenlijk alleen handelen door zijn eigen daden niet volledig serieus te nemen, oftewel: door op ironische wijze te handelen. (..) Achter de lichtvoetige zelfrelativering (..) gaat een zwaarlijvig cynisme schuil, dat bijdraagt aan het gevoel van onbehagen en zinverlies dat onze samenleving teistert. (..) Richard Rorty: wetenschappelijke theorieën als metaforen (..) filosofie uitgeput door de metafoor van het postmodernisme in zich op te nemen. (..) Postmodernisme als jaren-zestig reactie op modernistische en universalistische idealen. (..) De postmodernistische onthulling van onvrijheid heeft niet de verwachtte vrijheid gebracht. (..) Martha Nussbaum: filosofie discursief, literatuur narratief-metaforisch. (..) Wayne Booth (1988): narratives and philosophies both ‘philosophical’ (in the sense of rendering truths more or less palpable (tastbaar)); WB: truth is partial, scientific truths are metaphors as well. (..) Vanuit de beschikbare pluraliteit aan metaforen een nieuw taalspel creëren. (..) New sincerity, Dave Eggers, Mikhail Epstein e.a.: drang naar een nieuwe, oprechte levenshouding, naar nieuwe bronnen van levensbevestiging en medemenselijkheid. (..) Vergelijk andere bewegingen: neoconservatisme en economisch individualisme (..) Plaats voor de behandeling van menselijke problemen en emoties, zonder dat deze uitsluitend belachelijk worden gemaakt. (..) Het postmodernisme heeft ervoor gezorgd dat een breed scala aan geëngageerde en sentimentele woorden en gedachten, die waren afgesleten en uitgehold door eeuwen van intensief en divers gebruik, een tijdlang zijn doodgezwegen of bespot door carnavalesk en cynisch gebruik. Het gevolg is dat deze begrippen – zoals liefde, geluk, schoonheid en waarheid – als het ware zijn ‘gereinigd’. Nu kunnen ze opnieuw gebruikt worden door een nieuwe generatie schrijvers (..) vanuit het bewustzijn dat de termen dubbelzinnig en relatief zijn, maar tevens in de overtuiging dat het de enige woorden zijn waarmee wij betekenis kunnen geven aan de wereld. (..)
 
 
Haak, Pieternella Jacoba van den, Metafoor en filosofie: studie naar de metaforische werking in de filosofie aan de hand van Julia Kristeva en Paul Ricoeur, 1999
Gaat uit van het interactie-model van de metafoor: spanning tussen negativiteit (destructief) en positiviteit (creatief), identiteit en differentie. Verhouding van het preverbale (driftmatige, lijfelijke) – de taal – het verhaal (Ricoeur’s narrativiteit). Verhouding subject – taal, ’t semiotische – ’t symbolische.
De metafoor raakt aan ontologie. De metafoor is geen filosofische tekortkoming, maar de filosofie is noodzakelijk metaforisch (191).
3e stelling: metaforen zijn geen fricties tussen taal en werkelijkheid, maar fricties tussen strategieën om de kloof tussen taal en werkelijkheid te overbruggen (cf F.R. Ankersmit, De spiegel van het verleden, 1996,83).
 
 
Jaspers, Jürgen, Denken over Metafoorkwaliteit. Kwaliteit van het Metafoordenken. Een Psycholinguistische Studie over Metaforen met Interdisciplinaire Wenken. 1998
Wat maakt de ene metafoor beter dan de andere? J onderzoekt 5 metafoor-theorieën en komt tot de conclusie dat ‘prototypicaliteit’ als cognitieve notie van kwaliteit de belangrijkste interne determinant is (naast externe determinanten zoals vorm, begrijpelijkheid en context). Prototypicaliteit is een begrip uit de categorie-inclusie-theorie, die stelt dat de tenor wordt geïncludeerd in een door de vehicle benoemde ad hoc categorie (Glucksberg & Keysar, 1990, 1992, 1993). Een metafoor is kwalitatief beter, naarmate de gebruikte vehicle de ad hoc categorie het beste representeert – die categorie wordt gekozen waarvan de vehicle prototypisch lid is (96).
Voorbeeld nominatieve metafoor: ‘sigaretten zijn tijdbommen’ (prototype van een ‘onverwachte dood’, kwalitatief beter dan ‘vliegtuigcrashes’ of ‘racewagens’ – dat is empirisch onderzocht mbv volgorde- en rating-taken). Het gaat daarbij soms meer om percepties dan om feiten. ‘goud’ is bv meer prototypisch voor ‘kostbare dingen’ dan ‘platinum’, ondanks dat objectief gezien platinum veel duurder is dan goud (105).
Ander voorbeeld: ‘deze les is een slaapmiddel’; categorie: ‘wat slaapverwekkend is’ (en niet bv wat in een medicijnkast te stoppen is).
Voorbeeld predicatieve metafoor: ‘zij sprong op haar fiets en vloog naar huis’ (‘vloog’ als ad hoc categorie: snelle beweging in een bepaalde richting).
 
J leunt naast de theorie van Glucksberg & Keysar sterk op de theorie van Barsalou. Barsalou (1982,1983,1987) gaat er van uit dat categorieën variabel zijn (vergelijk ‘dier’ voor een huisvrouw met ‘dier’ voor een boer) en bekritiseert het idee van ‘onveranderlijke representaties van categorieën’ in het menselijke cognitieve systeem. B introduceerde het begrip ‘ad hoc categorie’, tijdelijk opgezet met het oog op een bepaald doel (bv ‘wat mee te nemen op vakantie’); een concept is volgens B de informatie die gebruikt wordt om een categorie(-exemplaar) weer te geven in een bepaalde situatie (1987, p 116); concepten zijn temporele constructen in het werkgeheugen en werken op dezelfde manier voor zowel letterlijk als metaforisch taalgebruik; ‘Tom is een varken’ is dan ook een andere conceptualisatie van ‘varken’ (94-96). B beschouwt het idee dat in het lange termijn geheugen onveranderlijke concepten te vinden zouden zijn als een illusie. Concepten worden aangemaakt in het werkgeheugen vanuit context-onafhankelijke informatie (onmiddelijk geassocieerd met de categorie) + doelgerichte informatie (context-relevant, gerelateerd aan recent geactiveerde kennis). Omdat gewone categorieën een deel van de kenmerken van ad hoc categorieën overnemen, vervagen de grenzen tussen categorie-soorten. ‘letterlijke betekenis’ ligt dan ook niet vast, maar varieert oiv verscheidene determinanten. Een woordenboek bevat dan ook slechts descriptief een onvolledige lijst van mogelijke concepten die een woord kan benoemen. Letterlijk taalgebruik kan een gedachte niet ‘precies weergeven’, ‘letterlijke betekenis’ is dan ook een achterhaald wetenschappelijk ideaal: een mythe. (130-134).
[OBW categorische equivalentie van letterlijke en metaforische uitspraken]
Daarbij stelt J (mee op grond van diverse experimenten) vast dat zowel letterlijke als metaforische concepten even snel begrepen worden en dat beiden te beschrijven zijn als nieuwe categorisaties.
 
5 metafoor-theorieën:
visie auteurs specifiek
1 vergelijking Miller, Ortony similariteit kenmerken tenor en vehicle, vergelijken van bestaande overeenkomsten
2 anomalie Katz, Levin dissimilariteit kenmerken tenor en vehicle, afwijkende grammaticale structuur waarvan de anomaliteit opgelost moet worden
3 interactie Richards, Black zowel overeenkomsten als verschillen vd kenmerken van tenor en vehicle in rekening brengen
4 categorie-inclusie Glucksberg & Keysar tenor wordt geïncludeerd in een door de vehicle prototypisch opgeroepen categorie
5 concept Lakoff & Johnson, Gibs onze conceptuele structuur is metaforisch, conceptuele metaforen (bv liefde-reis, ruzie-oorlog) bepalen de interpretatie en beoordeling van uitgewerkte metaforen
Een bezwaar tegen de eerste drie theorieën richt zich op het tellen van overeenkomende en/of verschillende kenmerken, waarbij de conclusie van ‘letterlijk’ minder tijd zou vragen en dus altijd vooraf zou gaan aan de conclusie van ‘metaforisch’ – dit was experimenteel niet vast te stellen. Wat betreft de vijfde theorie is op te merken dat bij experimenten met het parafraseren van metaforen conceptuele metaforen niet een rol bleken te spelen bij het begrijpen van metaforen (120), ze zijn ook niet aangetroffen in kindertaal (123).
Aan het einde van zijn betoog voegt J nog het begrip ‘relevantie toe vanuit de pragmatische relevantie-theorie van Sperber & Wilson (1986): optimale relevantie is het bereiken van maximale contextuele effecten (sc interacties met bestaande opvattingen) met minimale verwerkingskosten.
 
 

Jean-Francois Lyotard, La condition postmoderne – rapport sur le savoir, 1979; NL vertaling: Het postmoderne weten: een verslag. In: Dit is Lyotard. Zijn belangrijkste geschriften (o.r.v. Erno Eskens), 2003.
Erno Eskens, Inleiding
Kern van Lyotard’s postmoderniteit is de gedachte dat toename van kennis niet automatisch leidt tot een rechtvaardige samenleving. Lyotard wil de mensen op een nieuwe manier beschaven, door ze gevoelig te maken voor onrecht dat ieder ideaal, iedere theorie en zelfs iedere zin met zich meebrengt. Dit is een gevoeligheid voor wat zich niet laat zeggen, maar wat wel getoond kan worden (cf Wittgenstein, Gadamer’s ‘hören’). Ook is het een gevoeligheid die zich uit in ‘passibilité’: overgave aan het openstaan voor alle mogelijkheden (‘possibilité’). Voor taal gebruikt Lyotard de metafoor van het eilandenrijk waartussen de mens manouvreert. Er is geen [universele] metataal waarin verschillende talen zijn te vergelijken en te beoordelen. Vergelijk: ‘pak de tomaat’ in de taal van de kok en in de taal van de demonstrant. Elke laatste zin is een zin binnen een bepaald taalspel en kan daarom nooit recht doen aan de mogelijke betekenissen van ‘de zin’ in ‘de taal’. De grote vertellingen [sc van de speculatieve Geest resp. de emancipatie van de mensheid] zijn aan hun eind gekomen omdat ze blijken totalitair, utopisch en gewelddadig te zijn. L verwerpt de opvatting dat rechtvaardigheid op redelijkheid of waarheid is terug te voeren. Daarmee laat hij het ideaal van rechtvaardigheid niet los – het wordt alleen definitief verwezen naar het domein van de politiek, die prescriptieve taalspelen hanteert (taal die voorschrijft). Rechtvaardigheid laat zich niet definiëren (denotatief beschrijven) of (wetenschappelijk) onderbouwen (cf Aristoteles die rechtvaardigheid als deugd zag).
Lyotard – Het postmoderne weten.
De wetenschappelijk-technische informatisering moet invloed hebben op het weten. Wat van het gevestigde weten niet vertaalbaar is in machinetaal, zal verwaarloosd worden. Het weten zal sterk buiten de ‘wetende’ geplaatst worden en de vorming (Bildung) van de persoon zal nog meer in onbruik raken dan het reeds is. Het weten zal worden geproduceerd om verkocht en geconsumeerd te worden – het wordt een belangrijke inzet in de wereldwijde concurrentiestrijd om de macht. Wat gebeurde met de geldstromen (het ontstaan van het verschil tussen kapitaal om te beslissen en geld om slechts mee te betalen) zal zich ook kunnen voordoen met de kennisstromen. (25-30)
L constateert na 1968 een ontmoediging bij wetenschappers (onderzoekers en onderwijzenden) en benoemt dat als het probleem van de legitimatie. Je kunt de legitimatie van wetenschappelijke uitspraken niet bevredigend invullen door te verwijzen naar criteria als interne consistentie en verificatie door experimenten. Het probleem van de legitimatie is daarbij ook nog verscherpt door de onderwerping van het wetenschappelijke weten aan de machten en de inzet van nieuwe technologieën in de machtsconflicten. De vraag naar legitimiteit is zo te stellen als dubbelvraag: wie besluit wat weten is, en wie weet wat gepast is om te besluiten? (31-34)
L gebruikt het onderzoek van taalspelen als methode om het probleem van de legitimatie te analyseren.
Voorbeelden van soorten uitspraken in taalspelen:
De regels van taalspelen (Wittgenstein) hebben hun legitimatie niet in zichzelf, maar berusten op een overeenkomst tussen de spelers. Bij gebrek aan regels is er geen spel. Iedere uitspraak moet beschouwd worden als een ‘zet’ in een spel. Daarom is praten strijden (in de zin van spelen), waarbij er altijd ook die ene tegenstander is: de gevestigde, connotatieve taal. Het waarneembare maatschappelijk verband bestaat uit taal’zetten’. (35-38)
L plaatst zijn analyse van de samenleving binnen de context van de economische wereldoorlog die vanaf de jaren zestig [van de 20e eeuw] hervat is. De technocraten beschouwen [sc behandelen] de samenleving als een functioneel geheel. Daartegenover is te besluiten dat de samenleving geen geïntegreerd geheel vormt en dat de kritische functie van het weten er als een principe van tegenspraak in blijft rondspoken. (39-43)
L stelt dat mee door de informatisering de beslissers niet meer de traditionele politieke klasse, maar de bedrijfsondernemers, hoge ambtenaren en leiders van beroeps- en vakbonds-organisaties zullen zijn. Daarbij is er sprake van sociale atomisering [uiteindelijk mogelijk] in soepele taalspel-netwerken, waarvan de grens aan mogelijke ‘zetten’ altijd voorlopig is. (44-49)
Weten is te beschrijven als dat wat iemand in staat stelt goede uitspraken te doen. Het traditionele weten uit zich vooral in de narratieve vorm, welke een pluraliteit van taalspelen toelaat. De traditie van de vertelling is tegelijk de traditie van de criteria die de competenties ‘weten te spreken’, ‘weten te luisteren’ en ‘weten te doen’, bepalen. L ziet incommensurabiliteit tussen de narratieve pragmatiek van de [zelflegitimerende] volksverhalen en de westerse vraag naar de legitimiteit als referent van het vraagspel. (50-58)
Wat bewijst dat het aangevoerde bewijs waar is? [OBW Wat lijmt de lijm? Zinvolle vraag?] Twee regels als basis voor verificatie/falsificatie: 1 Referent is dat wat kan dienen als bewijsmateriaal. 2 een referent kan niet een veelvoud aan inconsistente bewijzen opleveren. Voor het wetenschappelijk weten is kenmerkend: 1 het denotatieve taalspel, 2 de hergroepering van taalspelen in instellingen, 3 alleen competentie van de zender is vereist, 4 uitspraken zijn door argumentatie en bewijs te verifiëren (wat bij uitstek niet geldt voor het narratieve weten), 5 het is een cumulatief proces: uitspraken over hetzelfde onderwerp moeten verschillen van eerdere uitspraken. De relevante criteria gelden niet zowel voor het narratieve als voor het wetenschappelijke weten. Ze zijn ook niet uit elkaar af te leiden. (59-65)
Aristoteles is modern door het beschrijven van de regels voor het wetenschappelijk weten (Organon) los te maken van het onderzoek naar hun legitimiteit (Metaphysica) en door te suggereren dat wetenschappelijk taalgebruik slechts bestaat uit argumentaties en bewijzen (dialectiek). Als de regels voor wetenschappelijk weten niet transcendent zijn, zijn ze immanent en gebaseerd op consensus van de experts. De moderniteit herstelt de waardigheid van de narratieve cultuur: het volk voert een debat met zichzelf over wat rechtvaardig en wat niet rechtvaardig is en cumuleert wetten met universele pretenties – daarmee (cumulatieve vooruitgang, universaliteit) operatoren van het wetenschappelijk weten gebruikend (wat een breuk is met het traditionele narratieve weten). Het ‘volk’ (sc de Staat) trekt de competentie en zelflegitimatie naar zich toe om uitspraken te doen over waarheid en rechtvaardigheid. (66-71)
Er zijn twee grote vertellingen van de legitimatie van het weten: 1 de mensheid als held van de vrijheid: volk/Staat als subject van weten met staatspolitiek als legitimatie (emancipatie, Frankrijk), 2 de mensheid als held van de kennis: speculatieve Geest als subject van weten met filosofie als legitimatie (speculatie, Duitsland). (72-81)
Deze grote vertellingen hebben hun geloofwaardigheid verloren als gevolg van de accent-verschuiving van doel naar middelen en de herstructurering van het geavanceerde kapitalisme. De crisis van het wetenschappelijk weten wordt veroorzaakt door de interne erosie van het principe van de legitimiteit van het weten. Het wetenschappelijk weten ontwikkelt zich van speculatieve kennis-hiërarchie naar onderzoeks-netwerken. De Verlichting fundeert de legitimiteit op de autonomie van de gesprekspartners. Echter niets bewijst dat, wanneer een uitspraak die beschrijft wat een werkelijkheid is, waar is, de prescriptieve uitspraak die noodzakelijkerwijs de eerste zal veranderen, rechtvaardig is. Dit betekent een aanval op de legitimiteit van het wetenschappelijk weten vanuit het fundamentele verschil tussen de theoretische en de praktische rede (cf Kant). Wittgenstein e.a. trekken daaruit de conclusie dat de wetenschap niet alleen andere taalspelen niet kan legitimeren, maar ook zichzelf niet. Het maatschappelijk verband is een weefsel van een meervoud aan taalspelen zonder universele, unificerende metataal. Legitimatie kan slechts voortkomen uit de taalpraktijk en de communicationele interactie. (82-88)
Volgens de logica moet een formeel systeem voldoen aan consistentie, syntactische volledigheid, beslisbaarheid van uitspraken en onderlinge onafhankelijkheid van de axioma’s. Gödel heeft aangetoond dat de arithmetica niet voldoet aan de voorwaarde van volledigheid. Veralgemeniseerd betekent dit dat formele systemen beperkingen kennen. Vooruitgang in het weten is het bedenken van nieuwe zetten (argumenten) binnen bestaande regels, en het uitvinden van nieuwe regels en daarmee veranderen van het spel. In plaats van een universele metataal komt een veelheid aan formele en axiomatische systemen die beschreven zijn in een universele maar niet consistente metataal. De bewijslevering is verschoven van de vaststelling van wat waar, rechtvaardig, schoon etc is naar wat efficiënt is: een technische ‘zet’ is ‘goed’ wanneer hij betere resultaten levert en/of minder kost dan een andere ‘zet’ (performativiteit). Om bewijzen te leveren is steeds meer apparatuur en dus geld nodig. Hiermee wordt de wetenschap een productiekracht – een moment in de omloop van het kapitaal, meer geleid door het verlangen naar verrijking dan door het verlangen naar weten. De inzet wordt niet de waarheid, maar de performativiteit, sc de macht. Ook hier blijkt volgens L weer de incommensurabiliteit tussen de verschillende taalspelen: het denotatieve (waar/onwaar), het prescriptieve (rechtvaardig/onrechtvaardig) en het performatieve (efficiënt/inefficiënt). Volgens L blijft de overmacht van het technische criterium niet zonder invloed op het waarheids-criterium evenmin als op het rechtvaardigheids-criterium (cf Luhmann): techniek versterkt de kans om rechtvaardig te zijn en gelijk te hebben - legitimatie door macht. (89-98)
Onderwijs van de vorming van een elite met Bildungs- of emancipatie-idealen naar vakmensen met competenties: de professionele en technische intelligentia. De databanken, die de capaciteiten van ieder mens te boven gaan, zijn de ‘natuur’ voor de postmoderne mens. Universiteiten worden vervolgens gekenmerkt door: interdisciplinariteit, team-work, uitsplitsing van enerzijds de productie van professioneel competenten (de massa) en anderzijds een kleine ruimte voor bevlogen geesten, er komt een einde aan het tijdperk van de professor die vervangen wordt door geheugennetwerken en interdisciplinaire teams. (99-108)
Het weten heeft het discours over de legitimering van uitspraken opgenomen in het wetenschappelijke discours. Het idee van de performativiteit impliceert een stabiel systeem (cf de fictie van de demon van Laplace, determinisme). Grotere beheersing verslechtert echter de performativiteit van het systeem (cf de zwakheid van bureaucratieën). Ook de fysische QT dwingt tot herziening van de idee van voorspelbaarheid. Op QT subatomaire schaal blijft de informatie incompleet. L verwijst in dit verband ook nog naar de fractalen van Mandelbrot en de chaostheorie van Thom: in een instabiel systeem is het gedrag van het systeem onvoorspelbaar omdat de continue variatie van bepaalde variabelen kan leiden tot een discontinue omslag van andere variabelen van het systeem. Er zijn dus slechts eilandjes van determinisme – het catastrofische antagonisme is de regel. Postmoderne wetenschap is dan ook: discontinu, catastrofisch, niet corrigeerbaar en paradoxaal. Zij produceert niet het bekende, maar het onbekende, en maakt de geleerde tot iemand die ‘verhalen vertelt’, die hij vervolgens eenvoudigweg moet verifiëren. (109-119)
De grote vertellingen (dialectiek van de Geest, emancipatie van de mensheid) kunnen de postmoderne wetenschap niet meer legitimeren. De ‘kleine vertelling’ blijft bij uitstek de vorm van de verbeeldingsvolle uitvinding. L ziet in het wetenschappelijk weten het accent verschuiven naar de dissensus waarvan de consensus de niet te bereiken horizon vormt. L keert zich tegen het paradigma van de systeemtheorie voor wetenschap of samenleving. Vergelijk Luhmann: alle informatie verwerken zou de beslissingen vertragen; ‘quasi-leren’ als sturen om [de leerlingen] compatibel te maken met de beslissingen van het systeem. Er is sprake van hoogmoed en verblinding van technocratische beslissers die ‘weten’ dat de samenleving haar ‘echte behoeften’ niet kan kennen. Dat leidt tot terreur: de eliminatie van een gesprekspartner uit het taalspel dat men met hem speelt, bv als/omdat hij de regels van het spel verandert. Wetenschap is echter op te vatten als antimodel van het stabiele systeem. Wetenschap is het model van een open systeem, waarin de relevantie van uitspraken (en daarmee ook de legitimatie) ligt in het opleveren van ideeën (nieuwe zetten en nieuwe regels). De denotatieve uitspraken van het wetenschappelijk weten vereisen regels, die metaprescriptief (vooronderstellingen) zijn. L kritiseert Habermas, wiens dialoog van de argumentaties berust op de geldigheid van de emancipatie-vertelling, universele geldigheid van de meaprescripties en consensus als doelstelling. De metaprescripties zijn echter heteromorf en de consensus is niet meer dan een [tijdelijke] toestand van discussies, niet hun doel. Consensus is dus in de ogen van L een verouderde, verdachte waarde. Rechtvaardigheid is dat niet. We moeten daarom tot een idee en praktijk van rechtvaardigheid komen, die niet verbonden is aan die van de consensus. Consensus en meta-argumentaties zijn niet enkelvoudig en universeel, maar meervoudig en lokaal. Om te voorkomen dat de informatisering omslaat in terreur, dient het publiek vrij toegang te hebben tot de geheugens en de databanken (..) zodat het verlangen naar rechtvaardigheid en naar het onbekende gelijkelijk gerespecteerd zal worden. (120-130)
 
 
Lyotard, J.F., Le Postmoderne expliqué aux enfants, 1986
NL Het postmodernisme uitgelegd aan onze kinderen, 1987
Taak: de mensheid in staat stellen zich aan te passen aan de sterk toegenomen complexiteit. Deze taak houdt in: verzet tegen simplisme, eisen van helderheid en het in ere herstellen van vaststaande waarden (96). [OBW hoe het werk van L zelf te beoordelen in het licht van deze door hem opgevoerde taakstelling?]
L’s filosofische aanvoerlijnen zijn met name Kant (kritische rationaliteit > L’s onherleidbare rationaliteiten van wat mooi, wat goed en wat waar is) en Wittgenstein (taalspelen > L’s onherleidbare discours-soorten en zins-orden).
L’s kritiek richt zich op de grote verhalen (meta-vertellingen), zowel die aangaande De Oorsprong (bv de oorsprongs-mythen van de nazi-ideologie) als die aangaande De Toekomst (bv communisme met de Idee van emancipatie) als die aangaande Het Heden (bv kapitalisme met de Idee van het verhandelen, hegemonie van de handel > vergeten van gevoelens ten gunste van strategieën > dreiging die door onze situatie drukt op het schrijven, op de liefde en op de individualiteit (107)).
Als grote vertellingen noemt L: christendom (verlossing van de zonde), verlichting (emancipatie uit de onwetendheid), speculatieve vertelling (verwezenlijking vd universele Idee), marxistische vertelling (emancipatie uit de uitbuiting en vervreemding), kapitalistische vertelling (emancipatie uit de armoede) (32,33). Al deze grote vertellingen volgens L zijn weerlegd door historische gebeurtenissen (37v). Daarmee is ook de universele horizon van de emancipatie verdwenen (45).
De Verlichting en het daaruit voortvloeiende Modernisme beloofde Vooruitgang: wetenschap zou tot meer rechtvaardigheid, welzijn en vrijheid leiden (76) en bevrijden van onwetendheid, armoede, onontwikkeldheid en despotisme (93). De 20e eeuw bracht echter misdaden (Auschwitz) en teleurstellingen (kloof rijkdom-armoede, werkeloosheid, crisis van de School, cultuurverlies (94), analfabetisme, opinie-despotisme van de media-democratie) > twijfel aan ‘de rede’, teloorgang van metafysica, positivistisch pragmatisme en dogmatisme (76,77). [OBW Waarom zou dat allemaal op het conto van het Verlichtings-verhaal zijn te schrijven? Is na te gaan hoe en in welke mate (ook) de andere grote verhalen debet zijn aan de genoemde ontwikkelingen?] De autonome ontwikkeling van de techno-wetenschappen beantwoordt niet aan de eisen die uit de behoeften van de mens ontstaan zijn (89), en gaat ten koste van onze behoeften aan veiligheid, identiteit en geluk, die uit onze onmiddelijke situatie van levende en zelfs sociale wezens voortkomen (90). [anthropocentrisch]
Het is de ontwikkeling zelf die het nakomen van de eerder genoemde beloften verbiedt (108). Taak van de filosofie is kennis verbinden met de doelen van de menselijke rede (116), terug naar de [ontvankelijkheid van de] kinderjaren van het denken (110, 117, cf L’s typering: het postmodernisme is het modernisme in de wieg (21)), respect voor de gebeurtenis (110), [her-denken en] her-schrijven (120).
Er is sprake van onbepaalde openheid van de relaties tussen de pluriforme, locale rationaliteiten (bv die van wat waar, wat goed, wat mooi is) – ruimte voor het modificeren van de regels door ‘nieuwe zetten’, waarbij het verlangen naar rechtvaardigheid en het onbekende gelijkelijk gerespecteerd wordt – zicht op wat de communicatie en de sociale harmonie veiligstelt (Dick Veerman, 131v).
VR OBW Hoe verhoudt zich Lyotard’s doorgevoerde kritisch rationalisme (verdenking van het bestaande) tot die kinderlijke ontvankelijkheid vd onbepaalde openheid? Spanning tussen wantrouwen en onschuld?
VR OBW L acht het ‘moderne project’ mislukt (90), gemeten aan anthropocentrische waarden. Zijn die waarden de beste (juiste) criteria? En is elke ‘setback’ een bewijs van mislukking of is er toch zoiets waar te nemen als een ‘overall’ tendens tot vooruitgang in termen van twee stappen vooruit en één stap achteruit (gezien binnen het tijdsframe van millennia), ook in rationaliteit en vrijheid (86v)?
VR OBW universaliteit als tendens tot eenheid, nooit bereikte limiet, omdat wel de rede universeel is te delen, maar niet het lichaam (als onoverdraagbaar geheim) (109)?
 
 
Lyotard, J.F., L’inhumain, causeries sure le temps, 1988 (NL Het onmenselijke. Causerieën over de tijd).
Metafysica van de [aardse] ontwikkeling geen finaliteit, alleen een eigen inwendige dynamiek, geen andere noodzaak dan een kosmologisch toeval en als limiet de levensverwachting van de zon. Daarbij het belang van de mensen ondergeschikt gemaakt aan het voortbestaan van de complexiteit als een soort Leibniziaanse monade die een bovenmenselijk informatie-netwerk omvat.
De techno-wetenschap leidt nog niet tot emancipatie (sc grotere kennis, gevoeligheid, tolerantie en vrijheid van geest, zoals de Verlichting hoopte), we zien ook tegenovergestelde tendenzen (nieuwe barbaarsheid, neo-analfabetisme en taal-verschraling, media-manipulatie, verarming van de geest en afsterven van de ziel, cf Walter Benjamin, Theodor Adorno).
Taalspelen > vertooggenres.
Kapitaal als opgeslagen en beschikbare tijd om wat gaat gebeuren voor te zijn. Het genot van mensen wordt opgeofferd aan de monade in expansie. Moderniteit als een poging tot tijdsbeheersing om zo een verhoogde hoeveelheid toeval aan te kunnen. Tegenover de grote verhalen (christendom, verlichting, romantiek, het Duitse speculatieve idealisme, het marxisme) het postmoderne als breuk/barst tussen het project en het programma: toeval en vrijheid en de onvoorziene gevolgen daarvan. (..) Hegemonie van het cognitieve vertoog, rationaliseringsdwang, gericht op tijdsbeheersing. (..) Het kapitaal beheerst niet de kennis van de realiteit, maar verschaft realiteit aan de kennis. L ziet de ‘ware complexiteit’ eerder in de passibilité (ontvankelijkheid) dan in het actief ‘ reduceren en construeren van de taal (cf Carnap, logisch positivisme). L meer in de lijn van Heidegger’s poëtische ontologie (taal niet uitputtend referentieel, maar ook vrije conversatie, reflexief, meditatief, vrij associatief, literair, muzikaal, (ver-)beeldend). L vs ongeduldige haast richting doelen, vgl de tegengestelde houding van de niet-westerse denktradities, vgl het joodse ‘studeren en leren’ (het onophoudelijk beluisteren en interpreteren van een stem). De openbare ruimte transformeert zich in een markt voor culturele [verkoopbare] goederen, waarbinnen het ‘nieuwe’ een extra bon van meerwaarde is geworden.
 
 
Lyotard, J.F., Moralités postmodernes, 1993 (NL vertaling: Postmoderne Fabels)
De golfcrisis (rond 1990) is de confrontatie van het westerse systeem met de directe en indirecte gevolgen van zijn imperialistische politiek. (..) Sadam Hoessein is het product van de westerse ambassades en multinationals [begin 2007 berecht en opgehangen] (..) de Iraakse dictatuur is ontstaan uit de export van de aporieën van het kapitalistische systeem naar de overwonnen landen, die minder ontwikkeld zijn of simpelweg minder weerstand bieden. (..) De economische en sociale ellende [daar] is vernederend en wekt een gevoel van verbittering, een stemming waar het merendeel van de westerse geesten nagenoeg geen voorstelling van hebben omdat ze die ervaring niet kennen. (..) Die volkeren weten dat de Arabisch-islamitische cultuur sinds eeuwen is onderworpen aan de vernederende overheersing van de westerse machten. (..) Het echte probleem op lange termijn is: kan de islam tegenover het volledig geseculariseerde leven dat in de westerse en geassimileerde maatschappijen de overhand heeft, de spiritualiteit of beter gezegd de symboliek handhaven waardoor elk detail van het dagelijkse leven is getekend en gesanctioneerd en die van de islam eerder een omvattende beschaving dan een bepaald religieus geloof maakt? (..) Autoriteit word in de wereldgodsdiensten gezien als als onherleidbare Alteriteit (de vader van het volk, de profeten, het boek en daarbij behorende interpretaties). Dat tegenover de (post-)moderne autoriteit als beslissing van de gemeenschap (democratie, en de daarbij behorende argumentaties). (..) Gesloten systemen worden uitgeschakeld door entropie (Breznjev had de thermodynamica beter moeten bestuderen.). (..) Deze logica is ook toe te passen op de islam. (..) Een systeem is succesvoller naarmate het ‘open’ is. (..) Het heeft geen metafysische legitimatie nodig, het vereist ruimte (..) voor kritiek en verbeeldingskracht. (..) De ontwikkeling van complexere systemen vindt plaats door de verbinding van regel en toeval, opeenvolging en discontinuïteit. (..) Wetenschap onderscheidt zich alleen van kunst door de eis van verificatie/falsificatie van de hypothese. (..) De grote verhalen worden gekenmerkt door teleologisch (doel: volmaaktheid) en eschatologisch (zonde, schuld, vergeving, verzoening) denken. (..) Historiciteit is het kenmerk van de moderne imaginatie. (..) De postmoderne fabel is niet doelgericht naar emancipatie of verlossing en biedt geen hoop [mens als doorgang naar meer complexiteit die uiteindelijk eindigt in entropie], wat als postmoderne stemming melancholie oproept. Deze fabel vraagt niet om geloof, slechts om overdenking.
L in debat met Richard Rorty. De rationalistische metafysica gaat uit van de aanname dat er een universele rationele taal bestaat. (..) Kant: drie procedures om tot overeenstemming te komen: cognitief, ethisch en esthetisch, waarmee de eenheid van de rede lijkt tenietgedaan – er bestaan meerdere soorten universaliteit. (..) Wittgenstein: veelheid van ‘taalspelen’ vs het beginsel van een homogene taal. (..) L Rationaliteit is alleen redelijk als ze erkent dat de rede meervoudig is. (..) De overtuigingsprocedure dat iets mooi is, kan niet vertaald worden in de overtuigingsprocedure dat iets waar is, (..) ook niet als je uitgaat van de welwillendheid/waarachtigheid van de comminucatoren. (..) De stelling dat er altijd discussie mogelijk is (Rorty, Davidson) stuit op het probleem van de onherleidbaarheid van het ene vertooggenre tot het andere. (..) De stelling dat wetenschappelijke paradigma’s incommensurabel zijn (Kuhn), is onaanvaardbaar, omdat elke theorie geheel en al tot het cognitieve genre behoort [en daarbinnen discussieerbaar is]. (..) John Rawls: rechtvaardigheid is verdelende gerechtigheid. Echter (Johnb Rajchman): het kan niet bewezen worden dat verdelende gelijkheid rechtvaardig is. (..) Kant: bepaal wat rechtvaardig is alsof deze beslissing door allen aanvaard kan worden als grondbeginsel van een wet. L: deze aanvaardbaarheid is niet de inhoud van het rechtvaardige, maar een procedure. (..) L gesprek meer gericht op convergentie, lezen/schrijven meer op divergentie. (..) Vertalen is wellicht het meest duistere taalspel. Maar de vertaling van het ‘gebruik’ van een zin met dit of dat doel in het gebruik van een zin met dit of dat andere doel is onmogelijk. Vergelijk de bewegingen met ballen als schaakstukken in het schaakspel met wat je doet met dezelfde ballen in het tennisspel. Als er een geschil is over wat het gespeelde spel is, zal er beslist moeten worden welk spel men wil spelen. Als de ander een onbekend spel speelt, is het redelijk om te proberen het spel van de ander te leren. (..) L: zowel het vermogen tot discussiëren als de ontvankelijkheid voor de gebeurtenis vergroten. (..) Eén ‘grote vasteland’ niet wenselijk – eilandenrijk omspoeld door de oceaan > vertooggenres omringd door de taal van de reflectie.
 
 
Roger Scruton, An intelligent Person’s Guide to Modern culture, 1998
Als de aannames (mogelijkheid om eerlijk te spreken en te redeneren van waarheid naar waarheid) niet houdbaar zijn, is discussie zinloos. Het deconstructivisme (Derrida) verliest zich dan ook in het stellen van vragen over vragen totdat de betekenis is weggeglipt. Het is een oefening in het ‘niets betekenen’. Volgens Derrida is filosofische argumentatie uiteindelijk afhankelijk van de metafoor, maar ‘beeldspraak draagt altijd haar dood in zich. En deze dood is ook de dood van de filosofie.’ (White Mythology, in: Margins of Philosophy, 1982, p 271). Dit ontwikkelt zich tot een cultuur van de negatie. Bestaande constructies legitimeren het overheersende machtssysteem.
 
 

Vroon, Pieter & Douwe Draaisma, De mens als metafoor: over vergelijkingen van mens en machine in filosofie en psychologie, 1986
Aristoteles (peri psychès): 3 aspecten van de psyche: stofwisseling (ook planten), gewaarwording (ook dieren) denken (alleen de mens). Ging A in Organon nog uit van de betrouwbaarheid van naïeve waarneming, Francis Bacon (1561-1626) wijst er in Novum Organon op dat de zintuigen vaak bedriegen en het verstand vaak door vooroordelen verduisterd wordt. Vroon typeert tegen deze achtergrond twee benaderingen:
presentationalisme representationalisme
wetenschappelijk denken als methode verbinding wetenschappelijk denken en technologisch handelen (experimenten), denkwerk en handwerk
waarneming/theorie directe afspiegeling realiteit waarneming/theorie indirecte afspiegeling realiteit
kosmos als organisme kosmos als machine
kosmos perfect en onveranderlijk buiten de sfeer van de maan kosmos in ontwikkeling (Tycho Brahe: nova 1572)
organicisme: alles hangt met alles samen;
teleologische verklaringen (doeloorzakelijkheid);
fysico-theologie (doelmatigheid van het goddelijk ontwerp)		 mechanicisme: op zoek naar de mechanische oorzaak ve verschijnsel;
determinisme (werkoorzakelijkheid);
evolutionaire processen
alles moet in beweging gehouden; overal materie (horror vacui) in beweging blijven is natuurlijk; vacuum bestaat > bv barometer
anthropocentrisch mens uit centrum kosmos (Copernicus), dierenrijk (Darwin), bewustzijn (Freud);
bête machine (Descartes, 1596-1650) > ‘l homme machine (La Mettrie, 1709-1751); materialisme)
monistisch dualistisch, bv Descartes, (1596-1650): res cogitans - res extensa; Kant: het fenomenale – het noumenale)
Aristoteles: accent sensibilia propria (geur, kleur, smaak) – kenmerken die de zintuigen van elkaar (onder-)scheiden empirisme: onderscheid primaire (massa, snelheid) en secundaire (reuk, smaak, kleur) eigenschappen
accent sensibilia communia (vorm, grootte, getal) – kenmerken die de zintuigen verbinden
nauwelijks technische metaforen voor de menselijke geest (bezielde kosmos: geest overal en in alles) veel technische metaforen voor de menselijke geest (klok, stoommachine, telefooncentrale, radio, radar, computer) – overigens even enthousiaste afwijzing van metaforen (Bacon: idola fori, logisch positivisten, behavioristen)
begrijpen van menselijk gedrag vanuit natuurverschijnselen, waarbij de natuur menselijke trekken heeft (bv geest) begrijpen van menselijk gedrag vanuit cultuurverschijnselen
mentalisme, introspectie, associatianisme, cognitivisme, functionalisme behaviorisme
mentale taken zijn immaterieel materiële constructies kunnen taken uitvoeren die voorheen als (exclusief) mentaal werden beschouwd
herleving in Romantiek (1780-1840)
vs dualisme: eenheid van geest (Hegel) of wil (Schopenhauer), organisme als vormende kracht met zelfherstellend vermogen (Kant)		 fysica: onderzoek naar vloeistofachtige verschijnselen; continue, verbonden, onvernietigbare naar ontwikkeling strevende krachten; 1840 wet van behoud van energie
ontwikkeling begrip onbewuste incl onbewuste processen (Carus 1789-1896) > Freud, Jung
persoonlijkheidsleer – eigenschappen afleiden uit handschrift (grafologie), gezichtsbouw (frenologie, wiskundeknobbel, talenknobbel), lichaamsbouw (fysionomie, flegmatisch, melancholisch, zwartgallig)		 aan de ruimtesymboliek in de psychologie, zoals uitgewerkt in allerlei morfologische kenmerk-studies, ontbreekt deels de experimentele controle, deels is ‘t weerlegd door experimentele controle en deels is ‘t (weer) uit de mode geraakt
vooral aandacht voor bouw van de natuur (structuren); directe waarneming met isomorfie natuur-waarneming vooral aandacht voor processen in de natuur; indirecte waarneming als voortvloeisel uit interne processen
Probleem van de begripsvorming: het bewustzijn van concepten en betekenissen [OBW vergelijkbaar met het probleem van het ontstaan van ‘leven’]
William James: evolutionair functionalisme – overlevingsfunctie van het bewustzijn (46).
Psychologische neigen tot verruimtelijking [OBW: cf Bergson’s spacializing] maakt objecten vergelijkbaar – dual coding (betekenis en visuele voorstelling) (82).
[OBW woorden en plaatjes als linguistische resp visuele abstracties, met beperkingen door transformaties in seriële resp. synchrone modaliteit >> eventity-dynamics (parallel en diachroon)]
The physicist uses metaphors for the questions, and mathematics for the answers, the psychologist uses metaphors for his questions and answers (87) [OBW Isn’t the use of mathematics for physical models metaphorical as well?]
Wat past in de theorie wordt vaak gezien – ook als ‘t er niet is. Wat niet past in de theorie, wordt meestal niet gezien – ook als ‘t er wel is. (94)
Kan een klok denken, of een computer? (97) [> cf diss Sybe Rispens, Machine Reason. A History of Clocks, Computers and Consciousness, 2005). Klok en computer zouden zelfstandig zijn en geen verlengstuk van (of prothese voor) menselijke spierkracht of zintuigen. OBW klok te zien als prothese voor tijdmeting – produceert tijdstippen en gelijktijdigheid voor timing, computer als verlengstuk van (prothese voor) denkprocessen].
Draaisma: klokmetafoor als gidsfossiel van een mechanistisch klimaat (98).
De klokmetafoor is evenzeer voor het verdedigen van mechanistische / materialistische (het mechaniek van de klok dat automatisch ‘doorloopt’ als mechanische keten) als voor immaterilistische (bv deïsme – god als klokkenmaker – de constructie van de klok verwijst naar een constructeur, intelligent ontwerp) stellingnames gebruikt. Deze dubbelzinnigheid [van constructie en mechaniek] is inherent aan alle machine-metaforen. Ook is er geen eenduidige volgorde te bepalen: omslag techniek > omslag denken of omslag denken > omslag techniek (119). De klokmetafoor verloor eind 18e eeuw aan populariteit, mee omdat deze door de context-onafhankelijkheid ervan geen ruimte bood voor zelfregulering, omgevingsaanpassing en interacties (122).
In de psychologie werden/worden verschillende metaforen tegelijkertijd gehanteerd voor verschillende deelgebieden: klok (tijdszin, psychologische ritmen), stoommachine (motivate en emotie), accu (mentale inspanning), boom (expressie van persoonlijkheid) (152), telefooncentrale (hersenfysiologie) (153) radio, radar (waarneming van objecten en booschappen) (154), (..).
De behaviorist Skinner (1985) beschuldigt de cognitieve psychologie van metaforische speculaties tav innerlijke processen (168).
Psychologie van de tijdsduurbeleving – vertraging of versnelling door chemische reactie-snelheden, arousal-niveau’s, temperatuur (koorts), medicijnen / drugs, meer prikkels (verlengt), maar meer prikkels + beslissingen nemen tav prikkels (verkort) R.E. Ornstein, On the experience of time, 1969, J.T. Fraser ea The study of time, 1972) [OBW de psychologische (biologische) klokken zijn zo variabel (relatief), dat kenmerken van de klokmetafoor zoals bv regelmatigheid en gelijktijdigheid hun betekenis verliezen].
computational metaphor: vergelijking mens en computer als informatie-verwerkende systemen (174).
functionalisme (Neisser (1967), Dennett (1978)): het gaat om de wisselwerking tussen functionele eenheden, niet om de verschillende fysische systemen waarin ze geïmplementeerd kunnen zijn (181).
Computerprogramma’s kunnen door hun complexiteit (vaak) meer / iets anders doen dan wat de programmeur opdraagt > omklappen van de metafoor: anthropomorfe termen voor materiële processen (190). We begrijpen niet alleen de mens niet, maar met de computer komen er ook machines die we niet meer begrijpen (195).
Hoe is het mogelijk dat we sneller kunnen zeggen dat we iets niet in het geheugen hebben (bv ‘moretta’) dan dat we kunnen opzoeken wat we wel in het geheugen hebben? (220)
Iets opzoeken in een geheugen zou een regressieprobleem met zich meebrengen (230) [OBW niet in een software-algorithme: het gezochte bevindt zich op een geheugenlocatie, de lijst waarin gezocht wordt bevindt zich op andere geheugenlocaties en de vergelijking van ‘t gezochte met de lijst vindt plaats middels operaties op een beperkt aantal geheugenlocaties.]
Dennett (1978) presenteert zich als een homunculair functionalist (225). De laagste functies zijn een ‘army of idiots’, maar de onverklaarbare intelligentie is homunculair (bv vooronderstellingen van representatie en interpretatie) (232).
Fodor (1983): een simulatie van X is nog geen verklaring van X (bv een motor nabouwen levert nog geen theorie die de werking van de motor verklaart) (236).
Draaisma: homunculi huizen in theorieën, niet in breinen of simulaties daarvan (237). Weten wat de computer / het brein doet is iets anders dan weten hoe de computer / het brein het doet (240). Het bewustzijn is eerder getuige dan verdachte van het denken. Computers kunnen denken (sc als onbewuste activiteit), zij het op andere manieren dan de mens. (250)
Vroon: psychologie-kritiek: niet een cumulatieve wetenschap; gebrek aan diachronische eenheid; tekort aan gemathematiseerde, abstracte theorievormng; te veel operationele definities gekoppeld aan meetinstrumenten (wat bestaat kan gemeten worden; kenmerk X laat zich in een meetinstrument vangen; dus kenmerk X bestaat); de aard van mentale processen blijft meestal buiten beeld; psychologische theorieën en bevindingen vaak (bijna) niet toepasbaar (niet ecologisch valide); teveel mini-theorieën over details, te weinig ‘omvattende’ theorie; richtingloos; veelheid van mensopvattingen > veelheid van vragen en antwoorden; probleem van de verdubbelde zelfbetrokkenheid (common sense zelfinterpretatie, onderzoeker deel sensus communis en wetenschappelijke gemeenschap). In vergelijking: fysica basiswetten die op sterk uiteenlopende gebieden van toepassing zijn; kennisaccumulatie (Newton > Einstein > ).
Volgens Vroon wijkt het bewustzijn terug in ‘eindeloze regressie’: iets in het systeem stapt uit het systeem om iets over het systeem te zeggen alsof het buiten het systeem staat. Is hier sprake van zoiets als een 'strange loop’?
Als voorbeeld van een ‘strange loop’ zie deze tekening van Escher waarbinnen de gezichtspunten steeds blijven wisselen:
 

 
Als een ander voorbeeld van een ‘strange loop’ hoor dit muziekfragment dat bij herhaald afspelen voor ‘t gehoor steeds hoger gaat (de grootte van de noten geven de aanslag-sterkte aan):
 

 
Onderzoekgebieden verbreden zich (van fysische kenmerken van prikkels naar betekenis en zingeving, van lab naar dagelijkse praktijk, van syntaxis naar semantiek, van woorden naar verhalen) (279). V blijft echter kritisch tav naïeve waarneming als uitgangspunt van onderzoek en complexe begrippen (of ‘t nu fysische of mentale begrippen zijn) (280,282).
Zijn Pepper’s wortelmetaforen (organicisme (bezielde wereld), mechanicisme (wereld als opeenvolgende stadia), realisme (wereld als verzameling patronen of formele systemen) en contextualisme (wereld als gebeurtenissen)) onherleidbaar, of zijn ze te schrijven als functies van elkaar, zodat kennis te bundelen is? In de fysica vind je alle vier terug: Platoonse traditie (realisme), Newtoniaanse traditie (mechanicisme), Quantummechanica(organicisme), bootstrap physics (contextualistisch – relaties tussen relaties) (278-285).
De rode draad door de betogen van Vroon en Draaisma is de dubbele kanteling in de mens-metaforen. In de oudheid was de mens vehicle ter verklaring van de natuur als tenor. Daarna worden in de loop van de (wetenschaps-)geschiedenis allerlei met name technische vindingen als vehicle gebruikt ter verklaring van gedrag en vermogens van de mens. In de recente geschiedenis worden de technische vindingen zo gecompliceerd dat het beeld weer terug lijkt te kantelen: een technische vinding als de computer wordt eerst als vehicle gebruikt voor de tenor mens, maar als hardware en software te complex worden [OBW kenmerken van irreducibility & unpredictability gaan vertonen], wordt de (nog steeds onbegrijpelijke) mens als vehicle gebruikt voor de nog onbegrijpelijker instrumenten [OBW universal systems, cf Stephen Wolfram’s A New Kind of Science].
 

Notes OBW
  
epiphor – change of meaning
diaphor – new meaning
metaphor – transfer of meaning (e.g. mind is machine, mind is clock, mind is computer)
 
Subtitle:
Is like is not is, or is it – in a way?
This does not excludingly suggest the comparative theoretical approach, as if all metaphors (which supposedly contain at least one ‘figurative’ term) can be analyzed by similarities or even can be reduced to similes (which supposedly contain only ‘literal’ terms). Quote: "Metaphors differ from similes in that the two terms are not compared, but treated as identical [? OBW], although some would argue that a simile is actually a specific type of metaphor.") The suggestion that the difference between ‘literal’ and ‘figurative’ can help in the identification of a metaphor runs into the problem that there is rarely a clear distinction of what ‘literal’ and what ‘figurative’ is (Barthes, 1974, 1979). So there have to be (added) other criteria. Factual or imposed resemblance (in terms of shared properties) is another characteristic of metaphor. Yet another characteristic could be categorial difference between the denotations/connotations of the vehicle and categorial transference from vehicle to tenor.
Compare the next expressions:
 
 
Logical operators:
= is
!= is not
logical operator for ‘is like’
=&!= contradictory instead of ‘partly different, partly the same’, unless it’s applied to sets sharing subsets (e.g. of properties), which implies that metaphors only work for manifolds (e.g. of properties).
=R!= how can the relation R be expressed logically, meaning ‘is like’?
 
Another complication is the fact that one meaning can be expressed by different metaphorical statements: ‘M(‘T1 is V1’, ‘T2 is V2’, …,‘Tn is Vn’).
 
Dimensions of a metaphor (relation tenor, vehicle, ground): concrete – abstract, fresh - trite/worn-out/hibernating, >> picture
Dynamics in this dimensional aray: positioning metaphors (e.g. bottleneck, neural network), the history of a metaphor (e.g. memory, Draaisma), (..)
Curtis & Reigeluth: of 82% of the investigated metaphors had an abstract tenor and a concrete vehicle (1984).
 
Postmodernism criticizes the metaphorical language-game as such (becoming game-improvers, spoil-sports or hooligans?).
 
Doubting all propositions of a language-game is leaving that game.
 
Our brain contains hard-wired and soft-wared algorithms handling external and internal streams of information. Our brain has its limitations in handling complex behavior of large systems and develops shortcut-algorithms in order to deal adequately with complicated problems. Part of its linguistic efficiency is e.g. using the same names for different but similar eventities (polysemy, homonymy). The visual system will show similar algorithms in which ‘comparing sub-algorithms’ will be encapsulated. Part of the metaphors activate linguistic and visual algorithms. (..) Efficiency of visual, linguistic and symbolic information-transfer. (..)
What we could transmit into the universe is algorithmic information – basic hardware containing the software that’s able to construct complex hardware given optimal conditions in specific contexts.
 
Metaphors as the layman’s comforter? Is it appropriate to explain the metaphor by metaphors?
At best metaphors are stepping-stones for knowledge towards the touchstones of science. At worst metaphors are stumbling-blocks for knowledge into the pitfalls of credulity.

Metaphors as birthplace of language (the creation of new concepts by the (re-)combination of old words or of new words and old words).
The fresh metaphor as a semantic innovation: from properties that are attributed to the tenor to the choice of the vehicle that matches these properties most adequately (prototypical – category-inclusion theory).
Metaphor as something literary leaning towards something literal.
Metaphor as ‘planned (or calculated) category mistake’ (Ricoeur, cf Gilbert Ryle)
Metaphor as unity of shifting poles (shift tenor-vehicle positions).
Metaphor as encapsulating at least two colliding networks of algorithms, causing an explosion of associations and dissociations.
Metaphor as curvature of semantic fields.
Metaphor as a (forced) complexity-reducing two-unity of conceptual networks.
(because this specific two-unity of T and V obscures the entailments of other possible two-unities of T and V1, T and V2, .., T and VN)
Metaphoricity as property of related eventities.
 
The heuristic value of using metaphors in research-proposals is finding research-funding more easily.
 
There is no absolute or (objectively) preferred system of reference, but could there be identified ‘axial’ systems of reference (cf LW, OC, 152)?
 
Using a language-game is like floe-jumping across a partly frozen river – one tries to avoid seemingly unreliable floes, but every now and then one gets a wet foot or a ducking.
(recombinant of ‘river’ (97) ‘hardened’ (96) and ‘fossilized’ (657) in LW’s On Certainty)
(Het gebruiken van een taalspel lijkt op het van schots naar schots springen om een deels bevroren rivier over te steken – je probeert onbetrouwbaar lijkende schotsen te vermijden, maar soms haal je een kletspoot of ga je kopje onder.)
 
What are the entailments of the metaphor ‘game’ as used in ‘language-game’? Different irreducible games, each organized by their own specific rules, can’t be played at the same time on the same field. But in reality this is most of the time what happens: a simultaneity of different (language-)games. Further the characteristic of a game is that the rules of the game do not change during playtime. But an important characteristic of particular languages is the fact that they change constantly both on semiotical as on semantical levels. What are the implications of these practices for the metaphor ‘game’?
 
Hersenonderzoeker Schwaab: de hersenen produceren geest zoals de nieren urine. Bert Keizer (Trouw, 17.6.2006) : Ik kom wel urine tegen buiten de nieren, maar geen geest buiten de hersenen. (..) Als een ervaring op te wekken is door neuronale prikkeling, maar niet aangetroffen wordt in de context, is de ervaring reduceerbaar tot de neuronale prikkeling (zoals bv dromen, in tegenstelling tot Bert Keizers Beatle-verering). [OBW References with or without referents within networks of eventities. A dream is an eventity, characterized by all modal aspects and in this sense a real experience. Which does not mean that all field-specific eventities of the dream (amongst which neurological processes in the brain) correlate with matching eventities outside the brain. Some do, some don’t. And some that don’t for now, could be realized outside the brain some time as well. Given a bit more sophisticated genetic engeneering it will be possible to generate a unicorn, making a dream come true.] [OBW The brain is a biological system with different functions, amongst which consciousness. Some forms of consciousness can be described as symbolic functions of the brain. Modality of systems and its functions. Contextuality of the primacy of specific modalities.]
 
We think that we know what we mean by using everyday language (the linguistic network of calculated category mistakes that works remarkably well most of the time).
 
It goes without saying: most of us live most of the time without consciously knowing (performance showing a competence for sophisticated automatic responses), some are looking for a know-how-for-all-key.
 
 
Examples of non-linguistic metaphors in cartoons
 

 

 
 
We hebben vanavond gezellig gefilosofeerd over metaforen, maar het is een discussie die hier en daar ook op het scherpst van de snede wordt gevoerd, waarbij je bv kunt denken aan de metaforische cartoons over de Islam.
Op 14 Januari 2007 kwam onze oudste zoon Matthijs terug van een verblijf van een half jaar in Doha, Qatar waar hij meewerkte aan de Asian Games. Tijdens dat verblijf heeft hij in augustus 2006 een moskee bezocht waar een rondleiding met toelichting werd gegeven en hij onder meer de Qur’an in het Arabisch met een Engelse (hier en daar commentariërende) vertaling ontving. Er was ook gelegenheid vragen te stellen en Matthijs vroeg onder meer hoe dat nu zit met de Jihad. De rondleider legde uit dat dit door de westerse mensen vaak letterlijk wordt uitgelegd als ‘heilige oorlog’ en dan met name tegen het westen, maar dat dit een niet juiste interpretatie is. Het betekent ‘het uitdragen van de Islam, op welke manier dan ook’. Ook kreeg Matthijs een paar toelichtende boekjes. De Qur’an is de 15e Revised Edition van 2000, uitgegeven door Darussalam Publishing House, de vertaling is vervaardigd door dr. Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilâli en dr. Muhammad Muhsin Khân.
Ik nam de Qur’an en de boekjes vandaag de 15e voorafgaande aan de dispuutsbijeenkomst ter hand om er eens wat doorheen te bladeren en vond in de inleiding op de Qur’an herhaalde malen de uitpraak dat de Qur’an "the literal word of God’ is.
Achterin deze Qur’an staan een paar toelichtende artikelen met nadere uitleg en samenvatting van de belangrijkste gedachten van de Qur’an. Het laatste artikel van de hand van Sheikh ‘Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid, Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia, heeft als titel ‘The call to Jihad (Holy Fighting for Allah’s Cause in the Qur’an), waarin een iets ander beeld gegeven wordt dan de rondleider, die deze Qur’an cadeau gaf, schetste. Sheikh Abdullah stelt onomwonden dat deze Jihad gebeurt ‘with the heart (intentions or feelings), with the tongue (speeches etc) and with the hand (weapons etc.) (p 885). Dat deze ‘weapons’ niet metaforisch bedoeld zijn, blijkt uit de passage op p. 897, waar staat ‘To get ready (for Jihad) includes various kinds of preparations and weapons (tanks, missiles, artillery, aeroplanes (air force), ships (navy), etc. and the training of the soldiers in this weapons.’ De Jihad is volgens de schrijver ‘obligatory’ en dient gevoerd te worden ‘with your wealth and your lives (Q 61:11 afkorting van Qur’an hoofdstuk (Surat) 61, vers 11, vergelijk ook Q 4:95, Q 9:20, Q 9:111). De actuele vraag is of oproepen in de Qur’an hoe deze strijd gevoerd dient te worden (en die uitgebreid door de Sheikh geciteerd worden), ‘metaforisch’ zijn te interpreteren en zo ja, hoe dan. Ik geef de volgende uitspraken met de uitnodiging om daar ‘metaforische interpretaties’ bij voor te stellen.
Q 2:104,105 specifieert de tegenstanders, for which is a painful torment: ‘the people of the Scriptures (Jews and Christians) and the Al Mushrikun (the idolaters, polytheists, disbelievers in the Oneness of Allah, pagans).
Q 3:139v Allah may take martyrs from among you (..) and Allah may test (or purify) the believers and destroy the disbelievers.
Q 3:169-172 Think not of those as dead who are killed in the way of Allah (..) Allah will not waste the reward of the believers.
Q 4:74 Let those (believers) who sell the life of this world for the Herafter, fight in the Cause of Allah, and who so fights in the Cause of Allah, and is killed or gets victory, We shall bestow on him a great reward.
Q 4:74,76,84, fight in the Cause of Allah
Q 9:5 Then when the Sacred Months have passed, then kill the Mushrikun where-ever you find them (..)
Q 47:4 So when you meet (in fight – Jihad in Allah’s Cause) those who disbelieve, smite (their) necks till when yhou have killed and wounded many of them (..)
En uit de overlevering van uitspraken van de Profeet:
Haidith 2790 Paradise has one hundred grades (..) reserved for the Hujahidun who fight in His Cause
Haidith 2797 I would love to be martyred in Allah’s Cause
En nog een paar citaten in het artikel van de Sheikh waarvan de bron mij in de tekst niet duidelijk werd:
pg 901 in the name of Allah (..) kill those who disbelieve in Allah (..) do not kill the children (..) do not kill the very old or a child or a woman (..)
De vraag is of voorgaande ‘utterances’, gedaan in de ‘literal Word of Allah’ metaforisch zijn te interpreteren. Zo ja, hoe dan? Zo niet, wat voor implicaties heeft dat dan?

 
Signs and Meaning
linguistic and non-linguistic signs (anything can be a sign, but something will only be used as a sign by relating it to something else – specific relation)
meaning (the signified of a signifier, the reference of and sense of a referent)
symbolic (conventional) or iconic (similarities) relation between signifier and signified (e.g. map (iconic) with country-names (conventional)) (Pierce).
Synonyms have the same referent but different meanings, e.g. ‘house’ and ‘home’ [OBW or could be argued that the referent in ‘house’ and ‘home’ aredifferent as well?]
Homonyms have different referents and different meanings in different contexts, e.g. ‘bank’.
Different ‘kinds of meaning’?
denotation – ‘literal’ meaning (Barthes, 1974: pretending to be the first meaning, but in fact the ‘concluding’ last connotation, the dominant connotation cf what is photographed, Fiske 1982), referential meaning (red heart), extension (the actual things the word describes, extensional definition: listing of set-members).
connotation – ‘figurative’ meaning, socio-cultural and personal associations, emotional suggestions (cf how it is photographed), connotation is very much a question of how language is used (pragmatics), symbolic meaning (symbol of love), intension (all possible things the word can describe, usefull for e.g. intensional definitions: bachelor = unmarried man – listing of necessary and sufficient properties).
Osgood, The measurement of meaning, 1957: located concepts in 'semantic space' in three dimensions: evaluation (e.g. good/bad); potency (e.g. strong/weak); and activity (e.g. active/passive).
Both connotations and denotations are subject not only to socio-cultural variability but also to historical factors: they change over time.
Voloshinov, 1973: "referential meaning is moulded by evaluation... meaning is always permeated with value judgement".
Barthes, 1979: "no longer easy to separate the signifier from the signified, the ideological from the 'literal' ".
Fiske, 1982: "it is often easy to read connotative values as denotative facts".
Signs are generated by myths (extended metaphors) (Barthes, 1978: "In passing from history to nature, myth acts economically: it abolishes the complexity of human acts, it gives them the simplicity of essences, it does away with all dialectics, with any going back beyond what is immediately visible, it organizes a world which is without contradictions... Things appear to mean something by themselves... " Myths "make dominant cultural and historical values, attitudes and beliefs seem entirely 'natural', 'normal', self-evident, timeless, obvious 'common-sense' - and thus objective and 'true' reflections of 'the way things are'.")
Mick & Politi, 1989: "choosing not to differentiate denotation and connotation is allied to regarding comprehension and interpretation as similarly inseparable".

Willemen, 1994: "a signified on one level can become a signifier on another level".
Barnard, 1996: "no inventory of the connotational meanings generated by any sign could ever be complete".
Three orders of signification:
1 denotative: representational and relatively self-contained
2 connotative: ‘expressive’ values, attached to the sign
3 ideological: major culturally-variable concepts underpinning a particular worldview - such as masculinity, femininity, freedom, individualism, objectivism etc.
See: Daniel Chandler, Semiotics for beginners , 2002
 
Theories of Meaning
reference (term Frege, others: referent): what the sign refers to, e.g. words making sense of our thoughts, our emotions, our sense impressions (but Frege: there can be a variability of meaning (sense) without difference in reference: morning-star and evening-star refer both to Venus, but with a difference in meaning (sense), only a reference can be true or false) (semantic externalism: social externalism – Burge, environmental externalism: Putnam, Kripke)
ideas (=reference by those who use the term referent for what the sign refers to): streams of ideas (thougths) transferred by language (Locke, Hume, Berkeley, semantic internalism)
stimulus-response: the meaning of a sign is its observable response
verifiability: meaning is what is verifiable or falsifiable (logical positivism, Dummett: comprehension in the ability to recognize the demonstration of the truth of the proposition)
propositional: propositions, conforming to assertions of facts (Frege) (but language not self-evident and unmetaphoric, role of assumptions and practices)
intension & extension: what is defined (intension) and what the defined refers to (extension)
intention: what the speaker’s utterance intends, indicative (belief what the utterer intends) or imperative (do what the utterer intends) (Grice, Austin, Searle) (but problems grounding meaning in non-semantic terms)
truth conditions: e.g. the meaning of The moon is round are the conditions that the sentence is true, namely that the moon is indeed round (Frege, Tarski, John Davidson) (but: translation from natural to logical metalanguages is never with mishap, and meaning is a holistic phenomena)
contextual:
use: meaning related to speech acts and particular utterances (Wittgenstein II, Strawson, Brandon)
pragmatist:meaning determined by the consequences of it’s application (Pierce)
communicative practice: by hearing, but also by watching and doing: speakers by speaking, painters by painting, musicians by music, lovers by lovemaking
http://www.textetc.com/theory/theories-of-meaning.html
http://russelldale.com/dissertation/
 
New Things, Old Words, New Meanings
Example
Lat. com + putare (count, sum up – add and subtract numbers [of things], orig. trim branches) (trim together – double reductive)
compute – carry out a (symbolic) calculation
computer
metaphors: ‘ the mind is a computer’ ‘the computer has a mind’
What are in these metaphor the (dis-)similarities and/or collisions and what new (or improved) properties are activated by it?
Even if a machine could be assigned to having a mind (e.g. like a ‘good actor’ by performing different kinds of intelligence or emotion), this does not imply that a (or any) mind is a machine. Compare the leg of a horse, the leg of a human and the leg of a robot: they share similarities (e.g. in fuctionality for walking and jumping), but there is a wide range of dissimilarities as well. Likewise the mind of a horse, the mind of a human and the mind of a robot. The profit of the mind-computer metahors could be improved insights in the ways how specific competence- and performance-potentials of both animals and computers are based on similar ‘hardwired and softwared algorithms’.
 
Network-prototypes: prototypes in a network of associated words
(A means B)NETWORK-PROTOTYPE
example:
(‘bank’ means ‘building’,’financial institution’)MONEY
(‘bank’ means ‘a long raised pile of earth’)SEA
(‘bank’ (in Dutch) means ‘furniture’)HOUSE
Does the context activate something like network-prototypes in order to find the appropriate meaning faster?
 
The map is not the territory. (Hayakawa)
There are different types of maps that don’t correlate mutually (e.g. a map of roads and a map of flora/fauna), although both correlate with what can be found in the territory. What makes a map a good map, depends on the kind of use one is supposed to make of it. What a musical score is for the performance, is a map for the travel. But a map that has to be used for the construction of a new road, asks for the representation of other details. Some maps (re-)create the territory. Some representations are creations.
 
The score and the performance
The information-technological revolution changes the classical relation between written score and life performance. Using keyboard, computer and sound module, writing the score blends with the performance. Listen to the soundfile ‘just a minute 01’ I constructed, playing around with the Roland JV1010 SR-JV80-02 Orchestral sound module. Or if you don’t have that much time, you could hear the soundfile ‘just_a_second_01’ I constructed with the Roland JV1010 GM sound module.
 
Questions to be discussed
0 What are the terms that are connected by a metaphor: things, feelings, associations, thoughts, ideas, words, concepts, …?
1 Works a metaphor (or: do we find metaphorical meaning) on the level of words, sentences, uttarances, or in a wider context (linguistic and/or non-linguistic)?
1a What is metaphorical in the expression ‘A means B’?
2 Do (literal) paraphrases of linguistic metaphors loose cognitive content?
3 Is the ambiguity of e.g. machine-metaphors (construction > constructor (immaterial interpretation) or mechanics of automatic operation (material interpretation)) a property of all metaphors? If so, a factual or potential property?
4 ‘Man is a domesticated predator’ How can this expression be handled as a metaphor and how does it organize our view of man?
5 Show metaphors the way language organizes itself and/or the way humans relate to reality and/or the way reality relates to (organizes) itself?