Metaphor

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

I argue that emojis are pictures, not a species of words, gestures, or expressives. ???? means that the world looks like that, from some viewpoint. I formalize this in terms of geometric projection with stylization. Since such a pictorial semantics delivers only very minimal contents I add an account of pragmatic enrichment, driven by coherence and metaphor. The apparent semantic distinction between emojis depicting entities and those depicting facial expressions I analyze as a difference between truth-conditional and use-conditional pictorial content: (...) ???? depicts what the world of evaluation looks like, while ???? depicts what the utterance context looks like. Combined with the idea that the speaker’s facial expressions thus depicted by face emojis are themselves expressive, I derive the intuition that face emojis can be used to express emotional states, while maintaining that they are pictures. (shrink)

What is the relationship between mental states and items of material culture, like notebooks, maps or lists? The extended mind thesis (ExM) offers an influential and controversial answer to this question. According to ExM, items of material culture can form part of the material basis for our mental states. Although ExM offers a radical view of the location of mental states, it fits comfortably with a traditional, representationalist account of the nature of those states. I argue that proponents of ExM (...) would do better to adopt a fictionalist approach to mental states. In so doing, I suggest, they could retain the important insights underlying the extended mind thesis, while avoiding its more problematic consequences. (shrink)

Philosophical analysis of metaphor in the non-linguistic arts has been biased towards what I call the ‘aesthetic metaphor’: metaphors in non-linguistic art are normally understood as being completely formed by the work's internal content, that is, by its perceptual and aesthetic properties such as its images. I aim to unearth and analyse a neglected type of metaphor also used by the non-linguistic arts: the ‘artistic metaphor’, as I call it. An artistic metaphor is composed by an artwork's internal content, but (...) also by its external content, which is provided by the work's artistic properties such as its history. The artistic metaphor has been gestured at but not afforded a considered analysis; I aim to do this. Identifying the artistic metaphor has at least two benefits. It shows how curation plays a role in generating metaphors in artworks, which has been overlooked, and it illuminates a potentially powerful tool to interpret and understand ‘conceptual’ art. (shrink)

Metaphor has been considered as a cognitive process, independent of the verbal versus visual mode, through which an unknown conceptual domain is understood in terms of another known conceptual domain. Metaphor might instead be viewed as a cognitive process, dependent on the mode, which leads to genuinely new knowledge via ignorance. First, I argue that there are two main senses of ignorance at stake when we understand a metaphor: we ignore some existing properties of the known domain in the sense (...) that we disregard or neglect them; we ignore some “non-existing” properties of the known domain in the sense that they are not a piece of information belonging to the known domain, but emerge in metaphor interpretation. Secondly, I consider a metaphor as a reasoning device, guiding the interpreters along a path of inferences to a conclusion, which attributes to the target some properties of the source. In this path, interpreters might discover the ignored existing properties of the known domain and/or recover the “non-existing” properties, inferring or imagining the missing piece of information. Finally, I argue that, especially in visual metaphors, this process is guided by a “sentiment of rationality”, tracking a disruption of existing familiar conceptualisations of objects and/or actions and a recovery of ignored properties. (shrink)

Metaphors play a crucial role in the understanding of science. Since antiquity, metaphors have been used in technical texts to describe structures unknown or unnamed; besides establishing a terminology of science, metaphors are also important for the expression of concepts. However, a concise terminology to classify metaphors in the language of science has not been established yet. But in the context of studying the history of a science and its concepts, a precise typology of metaphors can be helpful. Metaphors have (...) a lot in common with models in science, as has been observed already. In this paper, therefore, I suggest a typology of metaphor in ancient science to fill this terminological gap by using concepts applied to the classification of models in science, as coined by Rom Harré. I propose to differentiate between homeoconceptual metaphors and paraconceptual metaphors. Furthermore, functional and structural aspects of metaphors in ancient science are taken into account. Case studies from ancient texts displaying metaphors in ancient science are presented and classified following the outlined typology of metaphors. (shrink)

While the idea of art as self-expression can sound old-fashioned, it remains widespread—especially if the relevant ‘selves’ can be social collectives, not just individual artists. But self-expression can collapse into individualistic or anthropocentric self-involvement. And compelling successor ideals for artists are not obvious. In this light, I develop a counter-ideal of creative receptivity to basic features of the external world, or artistic objectivity. Objective artists are not trying to express themselves or reach collective self-knowledge. However, they are also not disinterested (...) or emotionless. They can be unmoved by personal feelings and human concerns, but they are still receptive—just attuned to the more elemental forces that creatively inspire them. I elaborate this ideal in dialogue with John Ruskin’s influential critique of the pathetic fallacy. By contextualizing Ruskin’s view vis-à-vis Romantic and Modernist poetics, post-Kantian aesthetics, modern environmental art, and contemporary theories of expressiveness, I show how it indirectly motivates my account. (shrink)

In the literature, the pragmatic dimension of metaphors has been clearly acknowledged. Metaphors are regarded as having different possible uses, and in particular, they are commonly viewed as instruments for pursuing persuasion. However, an analysis of the specific conversational purposes that they can be aimed at achieving in a dialogue and their adequacy thereto is still missing. In this paper, we will address this issue focusing on the distinction between the explanatory and persuasive goal. The difference between explanation and persuasion (...) is often blurred and controversial from a theoretical point of view. Building on the analysis of explanation in different theories and fields of study, we show how it can be conceived as characterized by a cognitive and a pragmatic dimension, where the transference of understanding is used pragmatically for different dialogical goals. This theoretical proposal will be applied to examples drawn from the medical context, to show how a pragmatic approach to explanation can account for the complexity of the cases that can be found in actual dialogical contexts. -/- . (shrink)

In this article, I carry out a critical analysis of the two predominant categories of metaphors used in Western media to report the 2008 economic crisis: the metaphors representing the crisis as a disease and the ones depicting it as a natural disaster. First, I argue that these metaphors implicitly portray the markets as natural organisms, governed by their own laws and spontaneously tending toward equilibrium. Second, through reference to the philosophical concept of alienation, I show how they can be (...) used to communicate an alienated view of the economy. Far from being innocent journalistic simplifications of complex issues, these metaphors can be very effective in ideologically presenting the neoliberal perspective and its account of the crisis as the only possible ones. By specifically examining the metaphors of the economic crisis as a disease and as a natural disaster, I also discuss how they convey a representation of the crisis which absolves some actors, blames others, and promotes as obvious the neoliberal account of the economy. (shrink)

There is a long philosophical tradition of skepticism about the possibility of adequate paraphrases for metaphorical utterances. And even among those who favor paraphrasability, there is a tendency to think that paraphrases of metaphorical utterances may themselves have to be non-literal. I argue that even the most evocative and open-ended metaphorical utterances can be literally and adequately paraphrased, once we recognize that they are actually indirect speech acts—specifically, indirect directives that command the hearer to engage in an open-ended comparison. This (...) leads to an overall picture in which trite, unevocative metaphorical utterances admit of just straightforward, usually non-directive literal paraphrases, while the most evocative metaphorical utterances admit of only indirect directive paraphrases, and metaphorical utterances in a third category admit of two literal paraphrases, one of which is straightforward and usually non-directive, and the other of which takes the indirect directive form. This argument for literal paraphrasability is intended to demystify metaphor, but not to undercut metaphor’s tremendous value as a communicative device. (shrink)

‘Live’, or novel, metaphors continue to occupy an interesting space in both the philosophical and cognitive sphere. One metaphorical theory, offered by French philosopher Paul Ricœur, is thoroughly fleshed out in relation to other dominant linguistic accounts of metaphor. Ricœur’s theory is underrepresented in much of contemporary neurolinguistic literature even though it bears great resemblance to many features of modern theories in cognitive science; as such, the current article attempts to establish a clear connection between Ricœur’s work and the cognitive (...) sciences without collapsing into ‘psychological associationism’. The present article offers this connection to re-establish the value of philosophy and hermeneutics to the scientific enterprise by embracing interdisciplinary study. (shrink)

This paper proposes to define metaphor as a visual-material structure, the sphere of which is ontological rather than cognitive or conceptual. It argues that the essence of metaphor, as either an aesthetic or a communicative unit or both, resides in the qualitative dimension and appearance, or even materiality, of the metaphorical medium and its form. The paper thus offers a new theory of metaphor, focusing on the medium of metaphor, which composes and transfigures or reconstructs its target anew: a composition (...) that is prior to understanding or conceptualizing the target. In doing so, the paper presents a formalist ontology of metaphors, established via an externalist account of metaphors, as opposed to the prevailing cognitivist-conceptualist account which I characterize as internalist. The various kinds of metaphor – linguistic, poetic, visual or material – are based on their external structure, rather than an internal-conceptual mechanism of understanding, as assumed by a significant segment of the literature. Visual metaphor, therefore, is the paradigmatic kind of metaphor, the analysis of which can be generalized to other kinds of metaphor. Furthermore, the paper tries to overcome the current discrepancy between the formalist character of the metaphorical medium and the dominance of cognitivist and conceptualist theories of metaphor. Challenging these, I claim that if the identity of metaphor is indeed based on its composition, then it is actually based on its aesthetic qualities. That is to say, not only are there autonomous visual or material metaphors, that are not based on linguistic or conceptual ones, but linguistic and conceptual metaphors are based on visuality: they are enabled by the structural possibilities offered by visual media. (shrink)

Conceptual Metaphor Theory, an approach to human thought and language that began with the work of Lakoff and Johnson, claims that metaphor is not merely a linguistic phenomenon, but is implicated in structuring human thought. On this view, that people use words like "attack" and "defend" to describe argumentative moves demonstrates that they think of argument as a kind of war. This is opposed to the view that some words like "attack" are polysemous, sometimes meaning to engage in physical warfare (...) and sometimes meaning to argue against a position. One implication of CMT is that nearly all human concepts are understood metaphorically, so that reasoning about argumentation turns out to involve concepts of... (shrink)

Metaphors are considered as instruments crucial for persuasion. However, while their emotive, communicative and persuasive effects are the focus of different studies and discussions, the core of their persuasive function, namely their argumentative dimension, is almost neglected. This paper addresses the problem of explaining how metaphors can communicate arguments, and how it is possible to reconstruct and justify them. To this purpose, a distinction is drawn between the arguments that are communicated metaphorically and reconstructed “top down,” namely based on relevance (...) considerations, and the ones that are triggered implicitly by the use of a metaphorical expression. In both cases, metaphorical arguments are reconstructed through different patterns of argument, called argumentation schemes (Walton, Reed & Macagno 2008). However, while the purpose of a metaphorical sequence of discourse (called metaphorical move) can guide and justify the reconstruction of the argument that can sufficiently support the intended conclusion in a persuasive move, a more complex analysis is needed for analyzing the inferences that a metaphorical move can trigger. These inferences are claimed to represent part of the connotation of the metaphorical expression and can be captured through its most frequent collocations, determinable using some tools of the corpus linguistics. (shrink)

This paper offers a brief survey of the philosophical literature on assertion, presenting each contribution to the RIFL special issue "Assertion and its social significance" within the context of the contemporary debate in which it intervenes. The discussion is organised into three thematic sections. The first one concerns the nature of assertion and its relation with assertoric commitment – the distinctive responsibility that the speaker undertakes in virtue of making a statement. The second section considers the epistemic significance of assertion, (...) exploring the role that assertion plays in the transmission of knowledge, the epistemic constraints that regulate it, and its relation with truth. The third section deals with communicative content that goes beyond what is literally asserted: implicatures, metaphors and expressive meaning. (shrink)

The present paper argues that the Venezuelan-Chilean philosopher Andrés Bello constitutes an important but heretofore neglected prefiguration of Richard Rorty. I argue for this thesis by articulating first an Inter-American philosophical narrative (based on previous work by Alex Stehn and Carlos Sanchez) that enables me to highlight certain common characteristics in philosophical projects that flourished across the Americas. Having done this, I show that Rorty’s anti-representationalism and anti-foundationalism are prefigured in Bello’s most important philosophical treatise, Filosofía del Entendimiento, to the (...) extent that Bello recognizes the problems posed by the ocular metaphors that are systematically used by Early modern philosophers such as Descartes or Locke, and suggests their elimination and replacement by other metaphors. Finally, I conclude that, if my arguments are correct, the intellectual geography of neo-pragmatism needs to be expanded beyond traditional geographies such as Europe and the US. (shrink)

This introduction brings to life the main themes in Indian philosophy of language by using an accessible translation of an Indian classical text to provide an entry into the world of Indian linguistic theories. -/- Malcolm Keating draws on Mukula's Fundamentals of the Communicative Function to show the ability of language to convey a wide range of meanings and introduce ideas about testimony, pragmatics, and religious implications. Along with a complete translation of this foundational text, Keating also provides: - Clear (...) explanations of themes such as reference, figuration and sentence meaning - Commentary illuminating connections between Mukula and contemporary philosophy - Romanized text of the Sanskrit - A glossary of terms and annotated bibliography - A chronology of important figures and dates -/- By complementing a historically-informed introduction with a focused study of an influential primary text, Keating responds to the need for a reliable guide to better understand theories of language and related issues in Indian philosophy. (shrink)

In this paper, I take a critical look at the Davidsonian argument that metaphorical sentences do not express propositions because of the phenomenological experience—seeing one thing as another thing—involved in understanding them as metaphors. According to Davidson, seeing-as is not seeing-that. This verdict is aimed at dislodging metaphor from the position of being assessed with the semantic notions of propositions, meaning, and truth. I will argue that the phenomenological or perceptual experience associated with metaphors does not determine the propositional contentfulness (...) or truth-evaluability of metaphors. Truth-evaluability is not inconsistent but compatible with a perceptual model for metaphors. I argue for this partly by showing that seeing-as does not constitute understanding of metaphors when understanding is appropriately construed in terms of being able to use an expression. (shrink)

Many scholars often use the terms “metaphors,” “analogies,” and “models” interchangeably and inadvertently overlook the uniqueness of each word. According to recent cognitive studies, the three terms involve distinct cognitive processes using features from a familiar concept and applying them to an abstract, complicated concept. In the field of science and religion, there have been various objects or ideas used as metaphors, analogies, or models to describe the science–religion relationship. Although these heuristic tools provided some understanding of the complex interaction, (...) they failed to address the broad nature of science and religion as well as the multifarious relationship between the two in a sociocultural context. Unlike the previous candidates, the concept of language, including the notions of linguistic worldview, linguistic identity, dialects, power, and bilingualism, offers a unique and comprehensive window through which science, religion, and the relationship between the two are seen with clarity. (shrink)

Metaphors can be used as crucial tools for reaching shared understanding, especially where an epistemic imbalance of knowledge is at stake. However, metaphors can also represent a risk in intercultural or cross-cultural interactions, namely in situations characterised by little or deficient common ground between interlocutors. In such cases, the use of metaphors can lead to misunderstandings and cause communicative breakdowns. The conditions defining when metaphors promote, and hinder understanding have not been analyzed in detail, especially in intracultural contexts. This study (...) proposes an analysis of metaphors identified within an Italian corpus of diabetes care interviews. Through a coding scheme capturing the types and the probative weights of the linguistic evidence that can be used to detect misunderstandings, the communicative effectiveness of metaphors is indirectly assessed. The quantitative and qualitative analyses show a positive correlation between metaphor use and problematic understanding. A more detailed scrutiny of the interlocutors’ roles and topics of the metaphors points out that most of the problematic metaphors are used by patients, while most of the problematic ones used by providers concern non-clinical matters. These results can be explained as resulting from incorrect presumptions of common ground between the interlocutors. (shrink)

This article surveys theories of metaphor in analytic philosophy and cognitive science. In particular, it focuses on contemporary semantic, pragmatic and non-cognitivist theories of linguistic metaphor and on the Conceptual Metaphor Theory advanced by George Lakoff and his school. Special attention is given to the mechanisms that are shared by nearly all these approaches, i.e. mechanisms of interaction and mapping between conceptual domains. Finally, the article discusses several recent attempts to combine these theories of linguistic and conceptual metaphor into a (...) unitary account. (shrink)

Öz:Bu yazıda Elisabeth Camp'in metafor kuramını eleştireceğim. Bu kurama göre metaforik anlam metaforik olarak kullanılan terimin işaret ettiği şeyin karakterizasyonunun bir başka şeyin karakterizasyonu ile etkileşimi yoluyla ortaya çıkar. Bu etkileşim beraberinde metaforun önemli bilişsel özelliklerinden biri olan olarak-görme etkisini zorunlu olarak getirir. Ben bu kuramın açıklamaya çalıştığı dilsel olguyu gereksiz yere karmaşıklaştırdığını savunacağım. Söz konusu olgu etkileşime gerek olmadan da açıklanabilir. Camp'in tersine, olarak-görme etkisinin metafor için özsel olmadığını savunacağım. Bunların yanı sıra Camp'in metafor kuramının kimi değillenmiş metafor kullanımlarını (...) açıklayamadığını göstermeye çalışacağım. Abstract:In this paper, I will criticise Elisabeth Camp's theory of metaphor. According tothis theory, the metaphorical meaning arises from the interaction of the characterization of the thing which the metaphorically used term indicates with the characterization of another thing. The interaction forces outone of the most important cognitive features of metaphor, the seeing-as effect. I will argue that this theory unnecessarily complicates the linguistic phenomenon it tries to explain, and that the phenomenon in question couldbe explained without the need for interaction. Contrary toCamp, I will try to show that the seeing-as effect is not essential for metaphor. I will also try to demonstratethat Camp's theory of metaphor fails to explain some uses of negated metaphors. (shrink)

Analogical reasoning is often employed in problem-solving and metaphor interpretation. This paper submits that, as a default, analogical reasoning addressing these different tasks employs different mapping strategies: In problem-solving, it employs analogy-maximising strategies (like structure mapping, Gentner & Markman 1997); in metaphor interpretation, analogy-minimising strategies (like ATT-Meta, Barnden 2015). The two strategies interact in analogical reasoning with conceptual metaphors. This interaction leads to predictable fallacies. The paper supports these hypotheses through case-studies on ‘mind’-metaphors from ordinary discourse, and abstract problem-solving in (...) the philosophy of mind, respectively: It shows that (1) default metaphorical interpretations for vision- and space-cognition metaphors can be derived with a variant of the analogy-minimising ATT-Meta approach, (2) philosophically influential introspective conceptions of the mind can be derived with conceptual metaphors only through an analogy-maximising strategy, and (3) the interaction of these strategies leads to hitherto unrecognised fallacies in analogical reasoning with metaphors. This yields a debunking explanation of introspective conceptions. (shrink)

Conversational exculpature is a pragmatic process whereby information is subtracted from, rather than added to, what the speaker literally says. This pragmatic content subtraction explains why we can say “Rob is six feet tall” without implying that Rob is between 5'0.99" and 6'0.01" tall, and why we can say “Ellen has a hat like the one Sherlock Holmes always wears” without implying Holmes exists or has a hat. This article presents a simple formalism for understanding this pragmatic mechanism, specifying how, (...) in context, the result of such subtractions is determined. And it shows how the resulting theory of conversational exculpature accounts for a varied range of linguistic phenomena. A distinctive feature of the approach is the crucial role played by the question under discussion in determining the result of a given exculpature. (shrink)

This book on the topic of ethics and poetry consists of contributions from different continents on the subject of applied ethics related to poetry. It should gather a favourable reception from philosophers, ethicists, theologians and anthropologists from Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America and allows for a comparison of the healing power of words from various religious, spiritual and philosophical traditions. The first part of this book presents original poems that express ethical emotions and aphorism related to a philosophical questioning (...) of the grounding of our values for life. The poems are written by twelve authors coming from four continents, for whom poetic emotions are sources of artistic inspiration and that can be used for conflict resolution. In the second part, which features short essays, nine authors tackle how poems, symbolic representations, metaphorical narratives and lies impact the space of possibilities, in which we are moved to action, knowledge formation, and how we imagine the world together. (shrink)

Aristotle and the classical rhetoricians conceived of metaphor as a figure of speech in which one thing is given a name or an attribute of another thing on the basis of some resemblance that exists between the two things. Wallace Stevens conceived of metaphor not as the production of pre-existing resemblances observed in nature but the “creation of resemblance by the imagination” (NA: 72). Resemblance, and not identity, according to Stevens, is the fundamental relation between the two terms of metaphor. (...) This is akin to contemporary accounts of metaphor in terms of the phenomenological or experiential seeing of one thing as another thing (Yoos 1971; Davidson 1979; Camp 2006a,b; Semino 2008; Ritchie 2013). Seeing one thing as another thing on the basis of resemblance or similarity implies that the one thing is not the other. I do two main things in this paper: one, I appraise the theoretical value of Wallace Stevens’ conception of metaphor as the creation of resemblance by the imagination; and two, I pose a challenge to the view that takes resemblance as fundamental to metaphor, arguing that in the cases I present, thinking of the relation as identity and not resemblance, concurs with our ontological commitments to the things compared in the metaphor. In the final analysis, I suggest that Stevens conception of metaphor as metamorphosis can meet the challenge: rather than thinking of the ‘is’ (identity) of metaphor as an ‘as’ (resemblance), for Stevens, the ‘as’ (resemblance) of metaphor metamorphosize into an ‘is’ (identity). (shrink)

Do metaphorical sentences express facts or represent states of affairs in the world? Can a metaphorical statement tell us ‘what there is’? These questions raise the issue of whether metaphors can be used to make truth-claims; that is, whether metaphors can be regarded as assertions that can be evaluated as true or false. Some theorists on metaphor have argued for a negative answer to the above-mentioned questions. They have claimed, among others, that metaphorical utterances are non-descriptive uses of language (Blackburn (...) 1998); truth is not the constitutive aim of metaphors (Lamarque and Olsen 1994); metaphorical sentences do not have propositional contents (Davidson 1979; Cooper 1986; Rorty 1987, 1989; Lepore and Stone 2010, 2015); metaphorical utterances are neither assertions nor expressions of beliefs (Loewenberg 1973, 1975; Davies 1982; Davies 1984; Blackburn, 1984). I discuss a particular view, Metaphorical Expressivism, which exploits the relationship between truth, belief and assertion, and argues for the irrelevancy of truth to metaphors on the premise that metaphorical utterances do not count as assertions and that they do not count as the expression of beliefs. The denial of the truth-evaluability of metaphors on this view, I argue, is a product of an unmotivated tendency to see truth and meaning in terms of the portrayal of facts and a commitment to two untenable principles: literalism and representationalism. (shrink)

Предметом розгляду в статті є жаргонізми, що функціювали в українському футбольному дискурсі першої половини ХХ ст. Проаналізовано семантику жаргонних лексичних одиниць та покласифіковано їх на групи за тематичним принципом. Детально зосереджено увагу на з’ясуванні особливостей жаргонізмів із тематичної групи назв футбольних дій та процесів, зокрема описано їхнє походження та способи їхнього творення.

The Yogacara school of Buddhist thought claims that all language-use is metaphorical. Exploring the profound implications of this assertion, Roy Tzhoar makes the case for viewing the Yogacara account as a full-fledged theory of meaning, one that is not merely linguistic, but also applicable both in the world and in texts.

This thesis develops a pragmatic theory of metaphors and slurs. In the pragmatic literature, theorists mostly hold the view that the framework developed by Grice is only applicable to the sentence-level pragmatic phenomena, whereas the subsentential pragmatic phenomena require a different approach. In this thesis, I argue against this view and claim that the Gricean framework, after some plausible revisions, can explain subsentential pragmatic phenomena, such as metaphors and slurs. In the first chapter, I introduce three basic theses I will (...) defend and give an outline of the argument I will develop. The second chapter discusses three claims on metaphor that are widely discussed in the literature. There I state my aim to present a theory of metaphor which can accommodate these three claims. Chapter 3 introduces the notion of "phrasal implicature", which will be used to explain phrase-level pragmatic phenomena with a Gricean approach. In Chapter 4, I present my theory of metaphor, which I call "phrasal implicature theory of metaphor" and discuss certain aspects of the theory. The notion of phrasal implicature enables a new conception of what-is-said and a different approach to the semantics-pragmatics distinction. Chapter 5 looks into these issues. In Chapter 6, I compare my theory of metaphor with three other theories. Finally, in Chapter 7, I develop a phrasal implicature theory of slurs, which I argue outperforms its rivals in explaining various uses of slurs. (shrink)

In this article, we set out, first, a general overview of metaphor and metaphorical thought research within cognitive psychology and developmental psychology. We claim that, although research efforts broadened perspectives that considered metaphors to be ornaments of poetic language, certain predominance of a linguistic point of view within investigations led to relatively little attention paid to (i) non-verbal and non-written metaphorical instantiations, and (ii) the pre-linguistic and cultural origins of metaphorical thought. Next, we attempt to delve into, and model, the (...) ontogenetic origins of metaphor, taking into consideration social and cultural elements. To that end, we consider the Vygotskian perspective and contemporary research from the pragmatics of the object. We propose that metaphorical thought is an emerging result of a complex web of dynamic relationships between pre-linguistic and socioculturally regulated semiotic systems. The analysis undertaken shows the need for a research programme with a developmental orientation that considers metaphor to be a product of the intertwining between the individual and social dimensions of cognitive development. We suggest this programme should find its roots in the analysis of the semiotic skills that precede the acquisition of metaphorical language. (shrink)

Conceptual metaphor theory showed, from embodiment, the importance of metaphor as a cognitive process. This influential theory assumes the existence of primitive but powerful mental structures called image schemas. In this paper, we conduct a critical inquiry about these structures from the developmental perspective of the pragmatics of the object and show they have serious problems. Taking the CONTAINER image schema as a case, we discuss the plausibility of image schemas in early childhood. We suggest that children do not interact (...) with objects as if a basic and generic CONTAINER cognitive structure preexisted. Instead, in everyday life, they use “container” objects to fulfill very different functions. As object function is construed by children's participation in triadic child-adult-object experiences through semiotic mediation, we propose image schemas are not natural or direct, do not exist in early childhood, and are a developmental, pragmatic, and cultural product. As empirical illustration, we analyze a child-mother-objects interaction at home. (shrink)

Recent philosophical analyses of the epistemic dimension of images in the sciences show a certain trend in acknowledging potential roles of these images beyond their merely decorative or pedagogical functions. We argue, however, that this new debate has yet paid little attention to a special type of pictures, we call ‘visual metaphor’, and its versatile heuristic potential in organizing data, supporting communication, and guiding research, modeling, and theory formation. Based on a case study of Conrad Hal Waddington’s epigenetic landscape images (...) in biology, we develop a descriptive framework applicable to heuristic roles of various visual metaphors in the sciences. (shrink)

I argue that figurative speech, and irony in particular, presents a deep challenge to the orthodox view about sentence content. The standard view is that sentence contents are, at their core, propositional contents: truth-conditional contents. Moreover, the only component of a sentence’s content that embeds in compound sentences, like belief reports or conditionals, is the propositional content. I argue that a careful analysis of irony shows this view cannot be maintained. Irony is a purely pragmatic form of content that embeds (...) in compound sentences. The standard view cannot account for this fact. I sketch out a speech-act theoretic framework that can. But in accepting this alternative framework we are giving up on the whole idea of an autonomous semantics. (shrink)

Metaphors are powerful communicative tools because they produce ”framing effects’. These effects are especially palpable when the metaphor is an insult that denigrates the hearer or someone he cares about. In such cases, just comprehending the metaphor produces a kind of ”complicity’ that cannot easily be undone by denying the speaker’s claim. Several theorists have taken this to show that metaphors are engaged in a different line of work from ordinary communication. Against this, I argue that metaphorical insults are rhetorically (...) powerful because they combine perspectives, presupposition, and pragmatics in the service of speech acts with assertoric force. (shrink)

Wenn Physiker davon sprechen, dass sich unsere Sonne eines entfernten Tages in einen roten Riesen und noch viel später in einen weißen Zwerg verwandeln wird, oder davon, dass sich Elementarteilchen auf allen möglichen Wegen gleichzeitig von einem Punkt A zu einem Punkt B bewegen, kommt man schwerlich umhin, nach der Quintessenz dieser und ähnlicher Aussagen zu fragen. Auch wenn Psychologen leger erklären, dass Erinnerungen im Gehirn gespeichert werden, so möchte man wissen, was gemeint ist. Eine erste und natürlich erscheinende Möglichkeit (...) bestünde darin, diese Aussagen wörtlich zu verstehen, womit sich eine ganze Reihe an weiterführenden Fragen ergeben würde: Wie kann es sein, dass sich bestimmte Gegenstände zur selben Zeit an zwei verschiedenen Orten aufhalten? Können Informationen auf biologischem Material gespeichert werden werden wie Mais in einem Speicher oder wie Daten auf einer Festplatte? Die zweite Möglichkeit, die mir viel mehr zu versprechen scheint, besteht darin, danach zu suchen, was Physiker oder Psychologen eigentlich sagen wollen, ihnen also gewissermaßen zu unterstellen, dass sie sich in vereinfachender und irreführender Weise ausdrücken. Damit entsteht konkret die Aufgabe, zu erklären, wie die zuvor genannten Sätze interpretiert werden können. Ich möchte vorschlagen, die genannten Aussagen metaphorisch zu verstehen. Physiker sprechen zwar nicht von der Schwarzes-Loch-Metapher und auch Chemiker sprechen nicht von der Kohlenwasserstoffketten-Metapher, doch immerhin sprechen Psychologen von der Computer-Metapher. Auch in der Wissenschaftstheorie wird die Auffassung vertreten, dass einige naturwissenschaftliche Beschreibungen metaphorisch zu verstehen sind. Diese Metaphern spielen sowohl bei der Entstehung von Theorien als auch bei ihrer Verbreitung eine wichtige Rolle. Ausgangspunkt einer Diskussion kann die Tatsache sein, dass natürliche Sprache mit metaphorischen Ausdrücken durchsetzt ist, eine ausschließlich wörtliche Redeweise wäre kaum vorstellbar; und wir verstehen die metaphorische Ausdrucksweise im Allgemeinen. Daran anknüpfen muss man sich die Frage stellen, warum wir Metaphern auch bei der Formulierung von wissenschaftlichen Theorien verwenden. Leistet die Metapher einen Beitrag zum Erkenntnisprozess, der durch eine vorwiegend wörtliche Ausdrucksweise nicht oder nur mit erheblich größerem Aufwand erreicht werden könnte? Warum nimmt die Metapher bei der Formulierung wissenschaftlicher Theorien eine zentrale Stellung ein? Ein zweiter Blick macht sichtbar, dass in wissenschaftlichen Theorien zwei Arten von Metaphern verwendet werden: theoriekonstituierenden Metaphern und nicht-theoriekonstituierenden Metaphern. Eine nicht-theoriekonstituierende Metapher kann vollständig eliminiert werden, d. h. das, was durch die Metapher zum Ausdruck gebracht wird, kann auch wörtlich gesagt werden. Wenn jemand von Kraftfeldern spricht, so denkt er dabei an Dinge, die mit Maisfeldern nur eine entfernte Ähnlichkeit aufweisen. Die Metapher dient dazu, die Theorie anschaulich vorstellbar zu machen. Auf eine theoriekonstituierende Metapher kann nicht verzichtet werden, sie ist ein integrativer Bestandteil einer wissenschaftlichen Theorie. Der Kerngedanke der Computer-Metapher, nämlich dass das menschliche Gehirn ein informationsverarbeitender Mechanismus ist, kann nicht in wörtlicher Weise formuliert werden. In beiden Fällen scheint es mir gerechtfertigt zu sein, von erkenntnisleitenden Metaphern zu sprechen. Nicht-theoriekonstituierende Metaphern sind erkenntnisleitend, da sie einen überblicksartigen und schnellen Zugang zu einem neuen Gegenstandsbereich bieten. Theoriekonstituierende Metaphern sind in einem viel stärkeren Sinn erkenntnisleitend, sie der Ausgangspunkt der wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnis. (shrink)

The study of metaphor is now firmly established as a central topic within cognitive science and the humanities. We marvel at the creative dexterity of gifted speakers and writers for their special talents in both thinking about certain ideas in new ways, and communicating these thoughts in vivid, poetic forms. Yet metaphors may not only be special communicative devices, but a fundamental part of everyday cognition in the form of 'conceptual metaphors'. An enormous body of empirical evidence from cognitive linguistics (...) and related disciplines has emerged detailing how conceptual metaphors underlie significant aspects of language, thought, cultural and expressive action. Despite its influence and popularity, there have been major criticisms of conceptual metaphor. This book offers an evaluation of the arguments and empirical evidence for and against conceptual metaphors, much of which scholars on both sides of the wars fail to properly acknowledge. (shrink)

Metaphorical utterances are construed as falling into two broad categories, in one of which are cases amenable to analysis in terms of semantic content, speaker meaning, and satisfaction conditions, and where image-construction is permissible but not mandatory. I call these image-permitting metaphors, and contrast them with image-demanding metaphors comprising a second category and whose understanding mandates the construction of a mental image. This construction, I suggest, is spontaneous, is not restricted to visual imagery, and its result is typically somatically marked (...) sensu Damasio. IDM’s are characteristically used in service of self-expression, and thereby in the elicitation of empathy. Even so, IDM’s may reasonably provoke banter over the aptness of the imagery they evoke. (shrink)

Metaphor theory has shifted from asking whether metaphor is 'conceptual' or 'linguistic' to debating whether it is 'embodied' or 'discursive'. Although recent work in the social and cognitive sciences has yielded clear opportunities to resolve that dispute, the divide between discourse- and cognition-oriented approaches has remained. To unite the field, this book brings together leading metaphor researchers from a number of disciplines. It collects major arguments and presents a wide variety of empirical evidence, placing special emphasis on the embodiment and (...) socio-cultural embeddedness of cognition, as well as the multi-modal and social-interactive nature of communication. It shows that metaphor theory can only profit from an approach that takes multiple perspectives into consideration and tries to account for findings yielded by multiple methodologies. By doing so, it works towards a dynamic, multi-dimensional, socio-cognitive model of metaphor that goes beyond what research traditions have separately achieved. (shrink)

We humans are remarkably interested in and skilled at games of make believe, games whose rules make what we are called on to imagine depend on what’s actually perceivably true about things and people that have what it takes to assume various fictional roles and that thereby function in the games as props. For the most part we play these games on an improvised pickup basis, working out the rules we play by in the very act of playing by them. (...) Part of what makes this coordinative feat possible are signals to the effect that as the speaker sees things, the rules and available props are such that this or that role is assumed by this or that prop, or props of this or that kind. Metaphors are make believe signals put to ambitious prop-characterizing use outside the game they serve to initiate, sustain, or otherwise regulate. Metaphoric competence is one manifestation of make believe competence. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine Kumārila Bha ṭṭ a's account of figurative language in Tantravārttika 1.4.11-17, arguing that, for him, both metonymy and metaphor crucially involve verbal postulation, a knowledge-conducive cognitive process which draws connections between concepts without appeal to speaker intention, but through compositional and contextual elements. It is with the help of this cognitive process that we can come to have knowledge of what is meant by a sentence in context. In addition, the paper explores the relationship between (...) metonymy and metaphor, the extent to which putatively literal language involves metonymy, and the objective constraints for metaphorical interpretation. (shrink)

In public political discourse, figurative expressions used by one participant are often followed up and ‘countered’ by other participants through ironical and/or sarcastic allusions or quotations, which are aimed at denouncing the preceding version and/or deriving a new, contrarian conclusion from it. What is the relationship between the figurative template expression and its ironical or sarcastic variants? Using data from a corpus documenting 25 years of debate in Britain about the nation's place at the heart of Europe, this paper investigates (...) the interplay of metaphor, irony and sarcasm in public discourse. We show that the ‘discourse career’ of this metaphorical slogan bifurcates into two strands, i.e. an affirmative, optimistic use vs deriding and ridiculing uses that depict the heart of Europe as diseased, dead, non-existent or rotten. It is argued that discourse participants need to retain the optimistic template version as a reference point in discourse memory to achieve the intended ironical and/or sarcastic effects, and that the latter are essential to keep the metaphoricity of the slogan ‘alive’. (shrink)

Compound figures are a rich, and under-explored area for tackling fundamental issues in philosophy of language. This paper explores new ideas about how to explain some features of such figures. We start with an observation from Stern that in ironic-metaphor, metaphor is logically prior to irony in the structure of what is communicated. Call this thesis Logical-MPT. We argue that a speech-act-based explanation of Logical-MPT is to be preferred to a content-based explanation. To create this explanation we draw on Barker’s (...) expressivist speech-act theory, in which speech-acts build on other speech-acts to achieve the desired communicative effects. In particular, we show how Barker’s general ideas explain metaphor as an assertive-act, and irony as a ridiculing-act. We use Barker’s notion of proto-illocutionary-acts to show how metaphorical-acts and ironic-acts can build one on the other. Finally, we show that while an ironic-act can build on a metaphorical-act, a metaphorical-act cannot build on an ironic-act. This restriction on how they can be composed establishes Logical-MPT via a different route. (shrink)

We think and speak in figures. This is key to our creativity. We re-imagine one thing as another, pretend ourself to be another, do one thing in order to achieve another, or say one thing to mean another. This comes easily because of our abilities both to work out meaning in context and re-purpose words. Figures of speech are tools for this re-purposing. Whether we use metaphor, simile, irony, hyperbole, and litotes individually, or as compound figures, the uses are all (...) rooted in literal meanings. These uses invite us to explore the context to find new meanings, new purposes, beyond the literal. -/- This special issue of Philosophical Studies brings together eight papers on various aspects and applications of figurative speech including: David Hills, Mitch Green, Liz Camp, Ofra Magidor, Larry Horn, Ken Walton, Stephen Barker, and Mihaela Popa-Wyatt. (shrink)

What is it to have and act on a personal ideal? Someone who aspires to be a philosopher might imaginatively think “I am a philosopher” by way of motivating herself to think hard about a philosophical question. But doing so seems to require her to act on an inaccurate self-description, given that she isn’t yet what she regards herself as being. J. David Velleman develops the thought that action-by-ideal involves a kind of fictional self-conception. My aim is to expand our (...) thinking about personal ideals by developing another way of understanding them. On this view action-by-ideal involves a kind of metaphorical self-conception. I investigate some salient differences between these views with the aim of understanding the different perspectives they take on the rationality of action-by-ideal. Where the fiction view runs into problems of literary coherence, the metaphor view exploits the richness of poetic invention. But action-by-ideal is a complex phenomenon about which there may be no tidy story to be told. This paper is an attempt to clarify and understand more of this messy terrain. (shrink)

Categorisation models of metaphor interpretation are based on the premiss that categorisation statements and comparison statements are fundamentally different types of assertion. Against this assumption, we argue that the difference is merely a quantitative one: ‘x is a y’ unilaterally entails ‘x is like a y’, and therefore the latter is merely weaker than the former. Moreover, if ‘x is like a y’ licenses the inference that x is not a y, then that inference is a scalar implicature. We defend (...) these claims partly on theoretical grounds and partly on the basis of experimental evidence. A suite of experiments indicates both that ‘x is a y’ unilaterally entails that x is like a y, and that in several respects the non-y inference behaves exactly as one should expect from a scalar implicature. We discuss the implications of our view of categorisation and comparison statements for categorisation models of metaphor interpretation. (shrink)