[Xmca-l] Re: Solids and Liquids/Entities and dynamic flows

[Annalisa Aguilar]

Hi Larry,


Metaphors, as Lakoff and Johnson would have it, derive from embodied thinking. I recall in their book, Philosophy in the Flesh, the container metaphor is always in use, all the time. Even consider prepositions and how they function in language.  Consider what it means when I say "in language." Why do I say "in"?


The cup as a metaphor expresses a function we observe about cups.


The metaphor is exactly the means we use to form or convey an abstract concept, but not in its totality, and that is why metaphors fail if we take them too concretely, too literally.


Notice how much you use metaphor to discuss your thinking about this. Notice the title of the subject line. We are quite adeptly using metaphors (and throwing them away without a second thought) to consider concepts suggested by those metaphors, and we share them by invoking those metaphors.

Kind regards,

Annalisa