Metaphors and Action Schemes: Some Themes in Intellectual HistoryAll our abstract ideas are based on metaphors and action schemes. Jean Piaget did voluminous research on how thought develops in children through assimilation of action schemes. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson have done pioneering work on metaphors and action schemes in everyday thinking. This book builds on those foundations, looking at the role played by metaphors and action schemes in the history of ideas. The author begins his argument by taking a critical look at the philosophy of metaphor from Aristotle to the present. While he sees metaphor as simply conceiving one thing in terms of another, he points out that this is an inexhaustible process, because the context in which the process takes place is always changing. Change opens up new possibilities of similarity. Thus, the metaphor is an open door into a space of infinite possibilities. |
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Page 7
... . The Renaissance 133 7. The Enlightenment to 1900 154 8. The Twentieth Century 181 Glossary of Metaphors and Schemes 216 Notes 229 Bibliography 261 Index 278 Acknowledgments This book would probably not have seen the light.
... . The Renaissance 133 7. The Enlightenment to 1900 154 8. The Twentieth Century 181 Glossary of Metaphors and Schemes 216 Notes 229 Bibliography 261 Index 278 Acknowledgments This book would probably not have seen the light.
Page 14
... century . Notable within that school was Fritz Mauthner , who claimed that all thought is metaphorical . Weiler wrote that Mauthner's " thesis that language is merely a means of introducing order into the mass of sense - experience can ...
... century . Notable within that school was Fritz Mauthner , who claimed that all thought is metaphorical . Weiler wrote that Mauthner's " thesis that language is merely a means of introducing order into the mass of sense - experience can ...
Page 16
... centuries . It is a case study in how metaphors have shaped many of our most cherished notions , laying bare some of the historical dynamics of conceptual change . Some may find rather more history than unrelenting discussion of ...
... centuries . It is a case study in how metaphors have shaped many of our most cherished notions , laying bare some of the historical dynamics of conceptual change . Some may find rather more history than unrelenting discussion of ...
Page 21
... centuries . Cicero observed that a metaphor is a short form of simile . 1 In his Poetics , he averred that of all the ... century . Medieval theorists delighted in multiplying the figurae verborum with as much pettifoggery as modern ...
... centuries . Cicero observed that a metaphor is a short form of simile . 1 In his Poetics , he averred that of all the ... century . Medieval theorists delighted in multiplying the figurae verborum with as much pettifoggery as modern ...
Page 22
... century , analyzing imagination with an anatomical sense of structure . At the heart of imagination , the matrix of creativity , is the perception of similitude in dissimilitude , which is none other than metaphor . This power , first ...
... century , analyzing imagination with an anatomical sense of structure . At the heart of imagination , the matrix of creativity , is the perception of similitude in dissimilitude , which is none other than metaphor . This power , first ...
Contents
21 | |
43 | |
Action Schemes and Topological Transformations | 65 |
The Ancient World | 86 |
The Medieval Period | 117 |
The Renaissance | 133 |
The Enlightenment to 1900 | 154 |
The Twentieth Century | 181 |
Glossary of Metaphors and Schemes | 216 |
Notes | 229 |
Bibliography | 261 |
Index | 278 |
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Common terms and phrases
abstract action schemes analysis ancient Aristotle arts basic becomes behavior body Breath century Chicago classical cognitive complex conceived concept construed cosmic order culture defined depersonalized deployed discursive thought divine domain dream dynamics Einstein élan vital elements equations experience fifth element force geometry George Lakoff Greek human Ibid ideal ideas image schema indwelling agency intellectual history isomorphic logic manipulation Mark Johnson mathematical meaning Mechanism metaphor medieval mental meta metaphor deployment metaphorand mind Mirror metaphor move myths nature notion One/Many operations ousia particles Pattern metaphor perception Philosophy phor physical Plato Platonic ideals Plotinus Princeton principle properties prototype Psychology quantum theory reality reason relations Renaissance revolution Rhetoric of Science rhetorical Robert Maynard Hutchins root metaphors schemata scientific sense Silvano Arieti simple social space spatial structure symbolic things tion topological space topological transformations trans underlying University Press visual Western words York
Popular passages
Page 124 - Let every soul be in subjection to the higher powers: for there is no power but of God; and the powers that be are ordained of God.
Page 235 - We see that things which lack intelligence, such as natural bodies, act for an end, and this is evident from their acting always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result.
Page 235 - The words or the language, as they are written or spoken, do not seem to play any role in my mechanism of thought. The psychical entities which seem to serve as elements in thought are certain signs and more or less clear images which can be "voluntarily
Page 105 - The work of the creator, whenever he looks to the unchangeable and fashions the form and nature of his work after an unchangeable pattern, must necessarily be made fair and perfect; but when he looks to the created only, and uses a created pattern, it is not fair or perfect.
Page 22 - This power, first put in action by the will and understanding, and retained under their irremissive, though gentle and unnoticed, control (laxis effertur habenis} reveals itself in the balance or reconciliation of opposite or discordant qualities...
Page 22 - ... opposite or discordant qualities: of sameness, with difference; of the general, with the concrete; the idea, with the image; the individual, with the representative; the sense of novelty and freshness, with old and familiar objects; a more than usual state of emotion, with more than usual order...
Page 57 - To whom the patriarch of mankind replied : O favourable spirit, propitious guest, Well hast thou taught the way that might direct Our knowledge, and the scale of nature set From centre to circumference, whereon, In contemplation of created things, By steps we may ascend to God.
Page 78 - The utmost we say of them, even when they operate with greatest vigor, is, that they represent their object in so lively a manner, that we could almost .say we feel or see it : but, except the mind be disordered by disease or madness, they never can arrive at. such a pitch of vivacity, as to render these perceptions altogether undistinguishable. All the colors of poetry, however splendid, can never paint natural objects in such a manner as to make the description be taken for a real landscape. The...