No, "metaphor" isn't essential to anything, because the word has so many
disparate meanings, it's borderline useless.
By contrast, a can opener is empirically/functionally/mappingly well-defined.
Either a device opens cans or it doesn't. Well, at first blush, it seems
defined. But maybe not. E.g. a sledge hammer opens cans. Would sledge hammers
be essential if all your food was in cans? Sure, we all know what you meant.
And you shouldn't have to actually *say* what you meant. Right?
What set of functions well defines metaphor? There are candidates for such a set
{heuristic, catechresis, rhetoric, constitutive, didactic, exploration}, with varying
overlap. But those are all perfectly good words. Why not use them? At the very least,
prefix such to the "metaphor" token.
As usual, I don't ask questions for which I'm not prepared to hear the answers.
The reason people don't use their words is because they're lazy and sloppy.
They don't want the formality. They want the liberty to say things in sloppy
ways and elicit head nods from the choir. Careful language invites criticism
and agonism. Echo chambers and filter bubbles abound. Can't we all just get
along, gloss over the detail, signal the virtues? Pffft.
I don't enjoy being so dismissive. There is a fundamental problem with the super-sub
class hierarchy thing implied by lumping the 6 functions above into a category named
"metaphor". That's why I got the Quine atom tattoo. But Lilith save me, I get
so tired of people expecting agreement with their sloppy language. No wonder AI psychosis
is a thing.
On 3/17/26 5:19 AM, Prof David West wrote:
I certainly do not disagree with your main point: metaphor is a tool. However,
I might ask, if all your food is stored in metal cans, might a can opener, a
mere tool, be an important, even essential, tool? I think that this is Quine's
point re: the fringe of science.
davew
On Mon, Mar 16, 2026, at 6:57 PM, glen wrote:
I suppose it depends on the structure of the space. If all roads lead
to Rome, then it doesn't matter. Any set of lies will do just fine. But
if it's pathological, then hopping roads is a necessary skill. I make
no claims to that metaphysical knowledge. I'm only pointing out that
metaphor is a neutral tool, not something to be ogled in awe. Metaphor
is no more nor less fascinating than, say, a spatula. If I had a friend
who constantly yapped about how cool their spatula was ... and every
conversation wound down to spatula this and spatula that, I'd have to
push back a bit and say that not everything's about your spatula.
Please talk about something else.
Whether the spatula is used for ill or good depends on the wielder.
On 3/16/26 12:16 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
Different canals could be in frustration, so I suppose it isn’t quite as bad as
you say?
*From: *Friam <[email protected]> on behalf of glen
<[email protected]>
*Date: *Monday, March 16, 2026 at 11:45 AM
*To: *[email protected] <[email protected]>
*Subject: *Re: [FRIAM] A bold meteorological theory
I don't see how that could be true. At best, metaphor is a means to keep one in
a canal *and* a means of escaping a canal. And that it's both means neither
usage is a property of metaphor. I think it's better to state that metaphor is
a means of escaping *reality* ... to say things that are not true ... lying,
falsehood.
Of course, some lies/falsehoods can be good. When a science popularizer lies about, say,
entanglement in order to provide *some* type of intuition the laity demands ... maybe
that's a good thing. The liar may justify their lies in claiming that lie set A is
"better" than lie set B. (Or maybe it's a bad thing.) But metaphor is a liar's
tool. Attempts to rehabilitate it are the essence of postmodernism (at least as *that*
concept is bastardized by the laity).
Of course, those of us who are OK with being called a _liar_ have no problem
with this. But there are those amongst us who blanch at being called a liar
even as they lie, the epitome of Bad Faith, reflective or not.
On 3/16/26 11:04 AM, Prof David West wrote:
Metaphorically stated, unfortunately: a metaphor is just a means for escaping
local minima and channelization.
davew
On Mon, Mar 16, 2026, at 8:55 AM, glen wrote:
That's some good advice, there. Narratives like the naked Emperor are
crucial tools for posers and con men. Each and every metaphor you
identify in a missive is evidence of the authors' (plural possessive -
no such thing as a sole author) Bad Faith. And the number of metaphors
is directly correlated with the extent of the Bad Faith.
None of us are innocent. None of us are the child in the narrative.
It's a venomous fiction, injected by the fangs of the storyteller. Even
literal babies bring along their own "genetic memory", in utero
accretion, biases, and expertise. The story, that story and all others,
is there to persuade, to trick you, to canalize you into thinking in
some particular set of ways.
Now I'd like you to stop thinking about elephants.
On 3/15/26 10:17 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
Perhaps I should just drop the metaphor and speak to the beliefs the metaphor
represents to me. Expertise both sights and blinds us; great expertise sights
and blinds us greatly.
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