Ebook: Metaphors: Figures of the Mind

This book deals with various aspects of metaphorics and yet it is not only, or perhaps not even primarily, about metaphor itself. Rather it is concerned with the argument from metaphor. In other words, it is about what I think we can learn from metaphor and the possible consequences of this lesson for a more adequate understanding, for instance, of our mental processes, the possibilities and limitations of our reasoning, the strictures of propositionality, the cognitive effect of fictional projections and so on. In this sense it is not, strictly speaking, a contribution to metaphorology; instead, it is an attempt to define the place of metaphor in the world of overall human intellectual activity, exemplary thematized here in the span that ranges from problems relating to the articulation of meanings up to general issues of creativity. Most of the aspects discussed, therefore, are examined not so much for the sake of gaining some new knowledge about metaphor (work conducted in the »science of metaphor« is presently so huge that an extra attempt to spell out another theory of metaphor may have an infiatory effect); the basic strategy of this book is to view metaphor within the complex of language usage and language competence, in human thought and action, and, finally, to see in what philosophically relevant way it improves our knowledge of ourselves. Certainly, by adopting this basic strategy we also simultaneously increase our knowledge of metaphors, of their functions and importance.

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The basic theme of Metaphors: Figures of the Mind is contained in the formula that metaphoric language reflects the functioning of our thought processes. Thus, the author of this book uses language analysis as a medium through which we can perceive and analyze the way our mind functions. Results of the investigation point to the conclusion that the mind does not operate according to the representations of a logical-positivistically oriented theorist; the forms of language usage and mental mechanisms involved manifest ubiquitous nonliteralness. However, an overall metaphorical detour from the literal one-to-one correspondence is not for the sake of figurative fancy but is primarily for the purpose of achieving new significations. In such a context, that which is habitually considered to be ambiguous, vague and indeterminate, becomes a productive source of semantic creation which can often specify meaning in a more adequate way than literalness does. Metaphor emerges as a cognitive tool. It appears as an efficacious means of description and explanation, of heuristics and learning, and, as a final instance, an instrument of `worldmaking'.
Bearing in mind the profound significance of the `metaphorical turn', one can extend a conventional string of definitions with an additional characterization of a human being as a `metaphorical animal'.