I use metaphors far too frequently in spoken conversations, and I have learned that it’s often more effective to cut bait (there’s one!) than to try to transition to a new metaphor mid stream of consciousness.
So they are useful, but I’ve noticed weakness in using them as well.
Sometimes a metaphor doesn’t make sense so you might abandon it for another rather than trying to stretch it.
Sometimes when fishing you catch something your rod or skill level is not capable of reeling in. So you are better to cut the line/bait rather than lose your whole rod.
Two distinct expressions that happen to share words. Is how I thought of it. Certainly in the context of the OP it seems he is not presenting an either or but a change course.
"Cut bait" isn't really a metaphor by this time; it's more an idiom that is based on a metaphor. It comes from "fish or cut bait", that is, either do one thing or the other. It means to stop being indecisive, to come to the point.
Yes.. I agree to the example and reasoning in the article, but on the other hand metaphors can simplify things too much, and even tell lies. E.g. politicians using them is the prime example. Thus, not convinced...
Having been terrible at communication (and continuing to be so), metaphors and analogies really are excellent tools.
The caveats first: Like with all communication, they should be understood by the audience, not offensive, not distracting.
A good analogy is like being able to share a scaled model with someone. It invites them to play with concepts and deduce things you haven’t conveyed yet.
That said, that level of fidelity is usually the result of thinking about a subject for a while, and handling the fall out of bad analogies for a while.
I try and remember the moments my mental image changes. Describing the inciting event, or the change that happened in your mental image, should lead to figuring out a good analogy.
At the very least, you will have a story to share, which is what human brains are very good at grasping, and using as models.
Metaphors or analogies not exactly fitting the pattern of facts under discussion is not a problem.
It provides a neutral framework to compare and contrast. How a metaphor or analogy breaks down under scrutiny refines the thought and provides a new opportunity for metaphors or analogies.
That's an interesting article, and I don't necessarily disagree with the thesis, but the article certainly doesn't argue well in support of its premise. It simply states it as fact, citing a book that apparently actually makes the case, but without citing anything near enough of it to actually make the case.
How could someone write a post like this and leave off the great book “Metaphors We Live By” by Lakoff and Johnson?
Is particularly found the part about how metaphors “hide and highlight” information. In other words the metaphor we use necessitates how we think. We often frame arguments using the metaphor of war and that frames how we think. The other party is an enemy that must be defeated, its bloody, and there is a loser. However we could frame it as a dance, in which case they are a partner, and for the outcome to succeed they must move together in harmony.
Lakoff has written other fascinating books like how metaphors are used in politics as well as math (“Where Mathematics Comes From”).
I view it as a side effect of linguistic evolution. Sure you could have a bunch of complex rules to strictly type your nouns and limit the type of verbs that validly relate things in one type to another, but if you simply relax the constraint (or just not bother in the first place) metaphors fall out as a natural consequence. See, I just did it. "fall out". Words don't physically fall, but because there's no constraint on using this physical verb to relate non-physical concepts, I can make metaphorical expressions at no additional cost to grammatical complexity.
We do this all the time. We might say a certain fact or circumstance "tells us" something to mean its presence let us make a deduction. Eg "this equation tells us the flow is laminar in this regime". Examples of this sort of thing are abundant.
The first part of Metaphors We Live By is fascinating. It describes how so much of language is made of dead metaphors. But then you get to stuff like:
> We often frame arguments using the metaphor of war and that frames how we think. The other party is an enemy that must be defeated, its bloody, and there is a loser. However we could frame it as a dance, in which case they are a partner, and for the outcome to succeed they must move together in harmony.
That's just silly. The reason arguments are described metaphorically as wars is because arguments and wars serve the same function: they occur when we disagree about something and are means of settling the disagreement. Dances, meanwhile, have nothing to do with disagreement and they don't settle anything.
No -- we have wars, arguments, and negotiations when individuals or groups disagree about things. All of these things are human activities that we use to settle a disagreement.
Dance, meanwhile, has nothing to do with disagreements or making a decision about how things will be. A dance resolves nothing; it's something people do for fun. It's silly to assert that we can simply "think of X as being like Y" and that will make it so. Sadly that is Lakoff's thesis.
The suggestion of using metaphors for existential framing is nonsensical when one thinks of the ends of the activities, but it makes plenty of sense when one applies it to the process instead.
In a negotiation, as long as I know my boundaries and my decision calculus, then approaching it playfully and in a way that brings the other person into the game is a very constructive (and frankly fun) route. This is what is meant by dance rather than fight.
That's an improvement but is it what Lakoff meant? I don't know -- I read the book years ago but I very much got the sense that his argument was "words have no inherent meaning, essentially all meaning is circular, and so we can think of X as being like Y just as easily as Z".
Imagine that you know you are the author of that, but also you just woke up with amnesia and are now trying to figure out why you wrote that book and what did you mean there.
A dance is a kind of negotiation. The "decision about how things will be" is what move should be performed next. Success is achieved by both parties, or neither - never just one or the other - and may even entail a "surrender" on the part of one of them.
The entire point is that metaphors can emphasize different aspects. This metaphor emphasizes ideas like:
-disagreements are not zero sum
-coming to a consensus is more important than getting your way
-we are ultimately all on the same side
-be graceful - carefully choose your moment to assert yourself
Its not silly at all. First, we're discussing metaphors, and it's certainly possible to use different metaphors to describe or model the same situation.
There are dances that decide disagreements.
Different cultures use dance for different purposes. What about dance contests? Break dancing? Krumping? People dance to attract partners, to establish social ranking, etc... all of which which are a forms of social contest.
I didn't say or, I think, even imply that "any metaphor will do". And I'm also not saying that war doesn't exist, or that dancing will somehow replace war.
I said "it's certainly possible to use different metaphors to describe or model the same situation." Then I described some situations where dance, not war or physical conflict, is used to settle disagreements.
I agree, it is not silly at all. It is worse, it is pandering. It is selling an agenda.
Conflicts are part of social interactions. The fact we use war metaphors doesn't mean we use violence, it is the opposite, we are replacing old-fashioned violence with social interactions.
I've unfortunately noticed that many people don't usually accept analogues or metaphors in arguments, unless they are trying to work with you. They either dismiss them outright or attack the analogue/metaphor without understanding it's an analogue/metaphor.
This is even worse when they don't like you personally.
I don't see which part of your original comment actually contains metaphors, which would seem to be a prerequisite for such an offense. Frankly, I don't even see which part of your original comment is an argument in the first place, as it isn't attempting to persuade.
The reply is where both of these begin: illustration as a metaphor for metaphor (how meta!), and persuading the reader to take on a belief.
You made an assumption that I don't know how an argument goes and/or that I don't know how to use an analogue/metaphor, and you attacked me saying people don't accept analogues/metaphors.
This is about the same fallacy people perform when they don't accept analogues/metaphors or attack them instead. They claim it doesn't relate or illustrate, when infact they just fail to understand.
So yeah, you ran into the same issue.
E: And yes you are another user account, but since you defend the OP I assume you also hold the same view she does.
"Because analogies and metaphors are not arguments. They are illustrations. In an argument, you need to show the link between cause and effect, a chain of reasoning."
Presents that I would use an analogue/metaphor as an argument and/or that I don't know what they are or how to use them, which is an attack on my integrity/character/skills/etc.
Sorry, I interpreted the term "accept" in your post to mean that you were attempting to use metaphors/analogies as your argument (the argument itself being the only thing that can be accepted/rejected).
I wrote about what I literally see, not about what I assume: I see a top-level comment which itself contains no metaphors and which itself is not an argument but a recounting. Therefore, it's a non sequitur to consider any reply as exemplifying the fallacy being discussed.
I'm able to defend the other user from nonsense regardless of whether I share their view (though I do, most likely).
My recounting informs of an issue, namely not accepting the argument (analogue illustrating the issue and argument), and then attacking the non-argument, ie the analogue instead of the argument.
The reply to my post has the same issue, though yes in a wider adaptation. Not accepting a logically sound situation is the same as dismissing an analogue just because it's an analogue ("analogues are not arguments therefore not relevant"), and then presenting that I don't know how to use an analogue is about the same as attacking the analogue.
Ah! I've got it now. Lotsofpulp didn't literally commit the atrocity of shooting down a metaphor/analogue presented to them (despite your characterizing their reply as having run into that exact issue, which I'll finally concede I did assume to be an accusation of committing said issue) but they did defend doing so. You recalled a thing you see as common, and they explained why it's common, so of course they ran into that common thing, but merely in the sense of defending it, not in the sense of doing it.
The meaning of language, English anyhow, does tend to be however it gets commonly interpreted. I think it's helpful to advocate for communication that achieves successful interpretation over that which doesn't, even if that which doesn't work ought to work. Many things are noble pursuits even if against the grain, but using language in unsuccessful ways isn't one of them due to its nature which favors agreeance of usage.
Indeed, an example I saw was comparing linux kernel to a car, the next poster doesn't like it and tries to refine it. The argument dissolves into a discussion of cars
I personally despise analogues. They are always leaky and people pick weak or emotional ones. Anything which can be explained with an analogy can be explained without it.
The problem is that for tacking double standards an analogue is kind of required, and analogues are good for trying to explain to a person who doesn't understand the matter but understands or is familair with another matter which can serve as an analogue.
> Particularly when I talk to a non-techie about some complex technical issues
One time when talking with my brother (who isn't super technical), we were discussing hardware for gaming, and I was explaining to him about how some processors might show up as having twice as many cores as they're described due to hyperthreading. I was having trouble finding a good way to explain to him that each "virtual core" wasn't fully equivalent to a traditional core but still helped provide additional throughput, and after a moment he quipped "oh, so it's like two-ply toilet paper, you don't want to separate a sheet into each part but it's still better than one-ply". I'd never have been able to come up with as relatable an analogy as that, but I've used it on more than one occasion since to help explain to other people.
There is a famous story where he helped a cancer patient with severe pain by telling him a story about a plant.
It is not so easy to find a good link unfortunately because the SERPs are dominated by NLP shysters and people who want to sell a $1200 course (funny when I mirror the way those people talk and use their tricks I sometimes get a copy of the course for free but use those tricks on normal people and you don’t get such good results…)
There are situations where indirect communication works best and it is good to have a library of stories that fit common situations that you can adapt. Some of you might be tired of hearing about my cat “Bob B” while other ones of you will be curious of about him and search for “Bob B cat” on Google and be like my son and wonder why I could be so hung up on an animal who doesn’t love me back but I can say he’s a very good source of material for working with wary people.
I would watch out for the technique of picking out words to emphasize. It impresses NLP trainers (necessary if you want to get the $1200 course for free) but makes you come across like a bad pickup artist.
Ericsson had a really strange voice and also had the social advantage of being presented as a miracle worker. As I see it, hypnosis is the applied placebo effect, and the social position of the participants, be it stage hypnosis or therapy, is a big part in how well it works.
Analogies and metaphors might be usable in conflicts, but I think they are overused in the internet.
They can help explain things. It is sometimes the case that two people disagree because each doesn’t understand what the other is saying. They are misinterpreting each other, and a better explanation can clear that up.
But more often people just disagree. They understand each other, but disagree. Because the problem isn’t understanding, analogies and metaphors don’t help. Best case people just end up arguing about the analogy, as the best thing it could be is a good proxy for the actual thing, which is what they actually disagree about.
Worst case, the analogy or metaphor is constructed to cast one side of the argument as obviously evil or disgusting. This is really just an ad-hom with extra steps, and it just ruins all hope of further conversation
Making an analogy or metaphor in this manner is essentially taking a new topic, murdering it, and dressing up the old topic in a crude skin-suit impersonation of it. It never quite fits, different aspects end up strangely twisted and stretched, and it all ends up haphazardly stitched together. Of course this is an obviously evil thing to do, on top of not really being all that convincing.
Don’t be a topic-murderer. Don’t “Buffalo Bill” the conversation. Don’t make metaphors and analogies where they aren’t useful.
I have found a lot of people I know (who have excellent English, but aren't native English speakers) despise metaphors.
This is purely anecdotal, but I am married to a woman from Eastern Europe and I grew up in a schooling system that was primarily Cantonese and Mandarin speaking immigrants. All of these people had trouble speaking English in their formative years and became professionals with excellent English.
I will often use metaphors to describe things. For instance, when talking about a "stack" in computer programming, I go, "think of the plates in your dish cupboard". This works great with, say, my mother, who is an English speaker, she likes metaphor and simile. My friends and wife, they all go, "here you go again, stop using metaphors! Just tell me what's happening inside the computer. A computer is NOT a bunch of plates!"
This is a trivial example, but it actually happened! They did not want to discuss it with analogies or metaphorical connections!
This piqued my curiosity, I asked, "why don't you like metaphors?" and most of them responded, "it feels like you're talking down to me" or "I'm not a child you can use playthings to explain the world to, treat me like an adult or don't bother explaining it".
I asked them, "did any of my other behaviour make you feel like I thought you were a child?" and they responded, "no, not really, but once you started comparing things to other things, I got uncomfortable."
When we really got down to it, they all admitted the truth to me. Using the somewhat complex language of comparisons, metaphors, simile... it reminded them of how they used to not understand English very well. These comparisons would confuse them when they were younger. Other kids would make fun of them for not "getting it" quickly enough.
This remembered emotion made them hate my present-day metaphors and analogies. Explanations in what a native speaker would consider "clear and concise" were frustrating and uncomfortable for them.
Just a reminder to all of us, not everyone thinks in the way this article preaches. Some folks would prefer a more direct linguistic approach and find it more respectful, approachable, etc. As our populations become more diverse, it is more and more important to meet people where they are and where it best respects their lived experience.
I am left wondering how you're meant to explain a memory stack - or indeed a great deal of computing - without metaphor though since most of the events of computing aren't directly explainable since they're very different to any common human experience.
I draw it on a pad of paper instead. I don't analogize it to plates or envelopes on a shelf.
Simply saying, "there is memory in the computer, it's like this..." and draw rectangles of memory on a piece of paper.
Then I demonstrate the push and pop actions as they pertain to items in memory.
You're not wrong, you need a metaphor. Heck, even "items" in "memory" is a metaphor. It's all just digital circuitry, there are no real "items" or "memory", those are analogous, made up words.
But it helps. It helps because it's considered respectful to them in that particular scenario. Something about taking the time to grab that pad of paper, using the technical computer sounding words, etc. All of that demonstrates respect for their intelligence. That's what they want to see and it opens them up to wanting to listen to me explain it.
Ultimately, people want to be seen and respected for who they are and their preferences. Communicating is often more about that than getting the point across.
One of the main things I discovered when learning new languages is that popular expressions, often rooted in metaphors deeply embedded in the collective consciousness of a group, are the hardest part.
Consider pancakes for example. It's a simple word for americans. I think it brings the idea of breakfast, syrup, sweetness. Maybe it brings a different feeling depending whether you're an adult or not. Health might be something in mind. That's all in a single word that can mean a lot of things when used in metaphors.
Now, let's look at what pancakes in Brazil mean, or "panquecas". It's a savory dish, for lunch or dinner. It brings the idea of meat, and tomato sauce. It's not an everyday dish. It's related to family meals, special occasions. The brazillian panqueca is more like a creppe, but not like american-made creppes, and it definitely does not bring the same associations to mind.
Both dishes seems to come from an earlier, much older tradition that most north americans and brazillians alike probably don't remember or understand. If they do, it's not the first thing that comes to either. So the difference is interesting, maybe funny, maybe a good topic for conversation.
That's a single word. We can expand that sort of comparison to broader stuff.
What happens when it's not funny or interesting? When something is fine in one culture but brings bad memories to another culture?
What about across time? Even within a singular culture, for how long does a metaphor hold? What happens if someone learns english from old movies and try to use those metaphors today? Will all of them hold the same meaning or some of them be offensive nowadays?
I certainly notice some difference between how americans and british use of figures of speech. That should be obvious for native english speakers of either of those countries, much more than it is to me. Imagine those differences amplified by a lot, and the gap that this could potentially cause.
Naively, doesn’t it seem likely that pancakes and panquecas are unrelated “false friends”?
Pancakes are “cakes” made in a pan. It’s not a Latin-derived word, so the only way they could be related is if panquecas is a loan word that took on a life if its own.
The simpler explanation is that pan means bread, -quecas definitely doesn’t mean cakes, and the foods are so different because the words are unrelated coincidental soundalikes.
The brazillian probably borrowed from the american. I don't know how.
We don't have anything similar to american pancakes in our culture. There is no such thing. So, if anyone needs to say "pancake" in brazil, refering to american pancakes, they'll use the term "panqueca". Movies do this, Google Translate does it and most bi-lingual en-us+pt-BR people will recognize this.
There's a well-estabilished linguistic relation between the two, despite any etymological root differences and despite the dishes being so different.
Our word for cake is "bolo", and our word for pan is "panela", but "panela" means one specific kind of pan here. Thin pans (like the sort of pan you'd use to cook an egg) are often called "frigideiras" (there's a relation to frying there somewhere, not fridge). I guess "bolo de frigideira" just didn't made any sense to whomever popularized the translation over here (it really sounds weird, I totally understand why).
Paying too much attention to words and meanings is one of the most unhealthy things in today's society. It erodes culture, obscures what we are as humans. The sooner we'll overcome this situation, the better.
Culture enriches the nuance of words' meanings, and nuanced language facilitates our ability to relate to one another, thereby improving culture, society, and "what we are as humans."
Any obsession can be unhealthy, but if the worst problem of society ever comes to be too much attention to words and meanings, I think we'll be ok.
I agree with everything you said. My point was that today's culture is unhealthily obsessed with words and meanings, to the point of destroying any nuance or understanding that might have been. I see it as one of the main problems of today's society, that will have long lasting consequences. People can't express themselves freely, can't discuss many complicated topics without fear of being torn up by a crowd. This is not a situation that promotes understanding, reflection or leads to civilized solutions; this is a boiling pressure cooker with blocked safety valve.
Today's people, in my experience, more often than not default to using the inverted Hanlon's razor in their judgement — trying to find enemies everywhere, instead of taking it easy and accepting human imperfection. This is not something new of course, but today's technology and lifestyle accelerates this to levels where any genuine dialogue between people of different world views is highly unlikely. In today's society people are more likely to just claim someone they disagree with as an enemy, rather than try to understand why they're using the words they don't like. In my opinion this... psychosis will not end well, and I could only hope that we'll take that hit and be better for it in a long run.
If people were able to express themselves without being judged as, for example, psychotic, then the world would be a better place. It makes a lot of sense.
One thing I love about metaphors is that you can tell the general interests of the person making the comparison. Someone who uses football metaphors to explain everything is really saying that all they truly understand is football. Someone who makes everything into a software metaphor only understands coding.
I once worked on simulation systems alongside (UK) military users and was fascinated by the metaphors they used when discussing projects. 'Crocodile closest to the canoe' or 'Wolf closest to the sledge' meant some sort of urgent deadline or serious challenge to a project. 'Left and right of arc' meant how far you could get from sort of middle-ground solution. 'Don't fight the white' meant that you should address a question / requirement, not complain about it (this apparently referred to the colour of paper used in staff college exams). 'Reversing out of a rabbit hole' was fairly intuitive.
Really fun times, that shed a lot of light on their culture.
Having worked within military and intelligence communities in the US, I'd say those metaphors demonstrate far greater clarity of thought than milspeak acronym-soup:
"SOF units in the AO must integrate C4ISR assets in CONOPs, synchronize with JOC and fuse MASINT into the COP, while EOD teams update TTPs for C-IED ops per JIEDDO, factoring IED TTPs observed in TICs, and G2 perform BDA utilizing IMINT to refine HVT targeting packages."
Area of operations
Concept of operations
Joint operational command
Measurement intelligence
common operational picture
Explosive ordnance disposal
Techniques tactics and processes
Battle damage assessment
Translation: "Intelligence teams should search for bad guys planting bombs in the road. Then special forces should work with other units to destroy them."
Metaphores are really nice to use but... where I work, i have a lot of colleagues of different nationalities. Very often I need to explain in detail what I mean by them and that tends to defeat their purpose. Sometimes using very explicit or correct terminology sticks better. As always YMMV
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[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 142 ms ] threadSo they are useful, but I’ve noticed weakness in using them as well.
I have no idea what you mean by this, I can't even figure out roughly what you mean from context, so I guess that's a weakness of them for a start.
Sometimes when fishing you catch something your rod or skill level is not capable of reeling in. So you are better to cut the line/bait rather than lose your whole rod.
- fish, or
- cut bait (slice baitfish into bait-sized pieces)
Of course, the latter activity is not fishing, merely fishing-adjacent.
The prevailing interpretation is a directive to make a decision rather than dally:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fish_or_cut_bait
That's why it's not recommended to use them in prose. But they get buried (!) anyway.
The caveats first: Like with all communication, they should be understood by the audience, not offensive, not distracting.
A good analogy is like being able to share a scaled model with someone. It invites them to play with concepts and deduce things you haven’t conveyed yet.
That said, that level of fidelity is usually the result of thinking about a subject for a while, and handling the fall out of bad analogies for a while.
I try and remember the moments my mental image changes. Describing the inciting event, or the change that happened in your mental image, should lead to figuring out a good analogy.
At the very least, you will have a story to share, which is what human brains are very good at grasping, and using as models.
It provides a neutral framework to compare and contrast. How a metaphor or analogy breaks down under scrutiny refines the thought and provides a new opportunity for metaphors or analogies.
Is particularly found the part about how metaphors “hide and highlight” information. In other words the metaphor we use necessitates how we think. We often frame arguments using the metaphor of war and that frames how we think. The other party is an enemy that must be defeated, its bloody, and there is a loser. However we could frame it as a dance, in which case they are a partner, and for the outcome to succeed they must move together in harmony.
Lakoff has written other fascinating books like how metaphors are used in politics as well as math (“Where Mathematics Comes From”).
Favorite fascinating George Lakoff book: Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal About the Mind
We do this all the time. We might say a certain fact or circumstance "tells us" something to mean its presence let us make a deduction. Eg "this equation tells us the flow is laminar in this regime". Examples of this sort of thing are abundant.
> We often frame arguments using the metaphor of war and that frames how we think. The other party is an enemy that must be defeated, its bloody, and there is a loser. However we could frame it as a dance, in which case they are a partner, and for the outcome to succeed they must move together in harmony.
That's just silly. The reason arguments are described metaphorically as wars is because arguments and wars serve the same function: they occur when we disagree about something and are means of settling the disagreement. Dances, meanwhile, have nothing to do with disagreement and they don't settle anything.
Dance, meanwhile, has nothing to do with disagreements or making a decision about how things will be. A dance resolves nothing; it's something people do for fun. It's silly to assert that we can simply "think of X as being like Y" and that will make it so. Sadly that is Lakoff's thesis.
In a negotiation, as long as I know my boundaries and my decision calculus, then approaching it playfully and in a way that brings the other person into the game is a very constructive (and frankly fun) route. This is what is meant by dance rather than fight.
Which explanation would you lean on?
The entire point is that metaphors can emphasize different aspects. This metaphor emphasizes ideas like:
-disagreements are not zero sum
-coming to a consensus is more important than getting your way
-we are ultimately all on the same side
-be graceful - carefully choose your moment to assert yourself
There are dances that decide disagreements. Different cultures use dance for different purposes. What about dance contests? Break dancing? Krumping? People dance to attract partners, to establish social ranking, etc... all of which which are a forms of social contest.
It's by no means obvious that "any metaphor will do," which seems to be your point.
And all cultures have war. There are zero cultures that have replaced war with dancing and there's no reason to think this is possible.
I said "it's certainly possible to use different metaphors to describe or model the same situation." Then I described some situations where dance, not war or physical conflict, is used to settle disagreements.
Conflicts are part of social interactions. The fact we use war metaphors doesn't mean we use violence, it is the opposite, we are replacing old-fashioned violence with social interactions.
This is even worse when they don't like you personally.
In an argument, you need to show the link between cause and effect, a chain of reasoning.
The reply is where both of these begin: illustration as a metaphor for metaphor (how meta!), and persuading the reader to take on a belief.
You made an assumption that I don't know how an argument goes and/or that I don't know how to use an analogue/metaphor, and you attacked me saying people don't accept analogues/metaphors.
This is about the same fallacy people perform when they don't accept analogues/metaphors or attack them instead. They claim it doesn't relate or illustrate, when infact they just fail to understand.
So yeah, you ran into the same issue.
E: And yes you are another user account, but since you defend the OP I assume you also hold the same view she does.
Presents that I would use an analogue/metaphor as an argument and/or that I don't know what they are or how to use them, which is an attack on my integrity/character/skills/etc.
By not accepting I meant they might say "what does that have to do with this?", "that's not related" or "that has nothing to do with this".
Ie. they completely skip over and don't accept the fact that it's an analogue and dismiss it or attack the analogue itself after.
I'm able to defend the other user from nonsense regardless of whether I share their view (though I do, most likely).
The reply to my post has the same issue, though yes in a wider adaptation. Not accepting a logically sound situation is the same as dismissing an analogue just because it's an analogue ("analogues are not arguments therefore not relevant"), and then presenting that I don't know how to use an analogue is about the same as attacking the analogue.
If there's nonsense it's from you.
The meaning of language, English anyhow, does tend to be however it gets commonly interpreted. I think it's helpful to advocate for communication that achieves successful interpretation over that which doesn't, even if that which doesn't work ought to work. Many things are noble pursuits even if against the grain, but using language in unsuccessful ways isn't one of them due to its nature which favors agreeance of usage.
I personally despise analogues. They are always leaky and people pick weak or emotional ones. Anything which can be explained with an analogy can be explained without it.
The problem is that for tacking double standards an analogue is kind of required, and analogues are good for trying to explain to a person who doesn't understand the matter but understands or is familair with another matter which can serve as an analogue.
Particularly when I talk to a non-techie about some complex technical issues.
I find it’s my responsibility to find the bridge that brings us together rather than assuming my listener can’t or won’t understand.
One time when talking with my brother (who isn't super technical), we were discussing hardware for gaming, and I was explaining to him about how some processors might show up as having twice as many cores as they're described due to hyperthreading. I was having trouble finding a good way to explain to him that each "virtual core" wasn't fully equivalent to a traditional core but still helped provide additional throughput, and after a moment he quipped "oh, so it's like two-ply toilet paper, you don't want to separate a sheet into each part but it's still better than one-ply". I'd never have been able to come up with as relatable an analogy as that, but I've used it on more than one occasion since to help explain to other people.
That was what I was thinking, too, reading the link.
https://ahsm.org.uk/the-magic-of-metaphors/
There is a famous story where he helped a cancer patient with severe pain by telling him a story about a plant.
It is not so easy to find a good link unfortunately because the SERPs are dominated by NLP shysters and people who want to sell a $1200 course (funny when I mirror the way those people talk and use their tricks I sometimes get a copy of the course for free but use those tricks on normal people and you don’t get such good results…)
There are situations where indirect communication works best and it is good to have a library of stories that fit common situations that you can adapt. Some of you might be tired of hearing about my cat “Bob B” while other ones of you will be curious of about him and search for “Bob B cat” on Google and be like my son and wonder why I could be so hung up on an animal who doesn’t love me back but I can say he’s a very good source of material for working with wary people.
https://www.ericksoninstitute.it/en/38/palliative-care/one-d...
Edit: Using your link I found the same story elsewhere with emphasis added https://www.noigroup.com/noijam/hypnotic-anaesthesia/
Ericsson had a really strange voice and also had the social advantage of being presented as a miracle worker. As I see it, hypnosis is the applied placebo effect, and the social position of the participants, be it stage hypnosis or therapy, is a big part in how well it works.
They can help explain things. It is sometimes the case that two people disagree because each doesn’t understand what the other is saying. They are misinterpreting each other, and a better explanation can clear that up.
But more often people just disagree. They understand each other, but disagree. Because the problem isn’t understanding, analogies and metaphors don’t help. Best case people just end up arguing about the analogy, as the best thing it could be is a good proxy for the actual thing, which is what they actually disagree about.
Worst case, the analogy or metaphor is constructed to cast one side of the argument as obviously evil or disgusting. This is really just an ad-hom with extra steps, and it just ruins all hope of further conversation
Making an analogy or metaphor in this manner is essentially taking a new topic, murdering it, and dressing up the old topic in a crude skin-suit impersonation of it. It never quite fits, different aspects end up strangely twisted and stretched, and it all ends up haphazardly stitched together. Of course this is an obviously evil thing to do, on top of not really being all that convincing.
Don’t be a topic-murderer. Don’t “Buffalo Bill” the conversation. Don’t make metaphors and analogies where they aren’t useful.
This is purely anecdotal, but I am married to a woman from Eastern Europe and I grew up in a schooling system that was primarily Cantonese and Mandarin speaking immigrants. All of these people had trouble speaking English in their formative years and became professionals with excellent English.
I will often use metaphors to describe things. For instance, when talking about a "stack" in computer programming, I go, "think of the plates in your dish cupboard". This works great with, say, my mother, who is an English speaker, she likes metaphor and simile. My friends and wife, they all go, "here you go again, stop using metaphors! Just tell me what's happening inside the computer. A computer is NOT a bunch of plates!"
This is a trivial example, but it actually happened! They did not want to discuss it with analogies or metaphorical connections!
This piqued my curiosity, I asked, "why don't you like metaphors?" and most of them responded, "it feels like you're talking down to me" or "I'm not a child you can use playthings to explain the world to, treat me like an adult or don't bother explaining it".
I asked them, "did any of my other behaviour make you feel like I thought you were a child?" and they responded, "no, not really, but once you started comparing things to other things, I got uncomfortable."
When we really got down to it, they all admitted the truth to me. Using the somewhat complex language of comparisons, metaphors, simile... it reminded them of how they used to not understand English very well. These comparisons would confuse them when they were younger. Other kids would make fun of them for not "getting it" quickly enough.
This remembered emotion made them hate my present-day metaphors and analogies. Explanations in what a native speaker would consider "clear and concise" were frustrating and uncomfortable for them.
Just a reminder to all of us, not everyone thinks in the way this article preaches. Some folks would prefer a more direct linguistic approach and find it more respectful, approachable, etc. As our populations become more diverse, it is more and more important to meet people where they are and where it best respects their lived experience.
Simply saying, "there is memory in the computer, it's like this..." and draw rectangles of memory on a piece of paper.
Then I demonstrate the push and pop actions as they pertain to items in memory.
You're not wrong, you need a metaphor. Heck, even "items" in "memory" is a metaphor. It's all just digital circuitry, there are no real "items" or "memory", those are analogous, made up words.
But it helps. It helps because it's considered respectful to them in that particular scenario. Something about taking the time to grab that pad of paper, using the technical computer sounding words, etc. All of that demonstrates respect for their intelligence. That's what they want to see and it opens them up to wanting to listen to me explain it.
Ultimately, people want to be seen and respected for who they are and their preferences. Communicating is often more about that than getting the point across.
Language is impossible without metaphor. You might suggest this to your acquaintances.
Consider pancakes for example. It's a simple word for americans. I think it brings the idea of breakfast, syrup, sweetness. Maybe it brings a different feeling depending whether you're an adult or not. Health might be something in mind. That's all in a single word that can mean a lot of things when used in metaphors.
Now, let's look at what pancakes in Brazil mean, or "panquecas". It's a savory dish, for lunch or dinner. It brings the idea of meat, and tomato sauce. It's not an everyday dish. It's related to family meals, special occasions. The brazillian panqueca is more like a creppe, but not like american-made creppes, and it definitely does not bring the same associations to mind.
Both dishes seems to come from an earlier, much older tradition that most north americans and brazillians alike probably don't remember or understand. If they do, it's not the first thing that comes to either. So the difference is interesting, maybe funny, maybe a good topic for conversation.
That's a single word. We can expand that sort of comparison to broader stuff.
What happens when it's not funny or interesting? When something is fine in one culture but brings bad memories to another culture?
What about across time? Even within a singular culture, for how long does a metaphor hold? What happens if someone learns english from old movies and try to use those metaphors today? Will all of them hold the same meaning or some of them be offensive nowadays?
I certainly notice some difference between how americans and british use of figures of speech. That should be obvious for native english speakers of either of those countries, much more than it is to me. Imagine those differences amplified by a lot, and the gap that this could potentially cause.
Pancakes are “cakes” made in a pan. It’s not a Latin-derived word, so the only way they could be related is if panquecas is a loan word that took on a life if its own.
The simpler explanation is that pan means bread, -quecas definitely doesn’t mean cakes, and the foods are so different because the words are unrelated coincidental soundalikes.
We don't have anything similar to american pancakes in our culture. There is no such thing. So, if anyone needs to say "pancake" in brazil, refering to american pancakes, they'll use the term "panqueca". Movies do this, Google Translate does it and most bi-lingual en-us+pt-BR people will recognize this.
There's a well-estabilished linguistic relation between the two, despite any etymological root differences and despite the dishes being so different.
Our word for cake is "bolo", and our word for pan is "panela", but "panela" means one specific kind of pan here. Thin pans (like the sort of pan you'd use to cook an egg) are often called "frigideiras" (there's a relation to frying there somewhere, not fridge). I guess "bolo de frigideira" just didn't made any sense to whomever popularized the translation over here (it really sounds weird, I totally understand why).
Which happens constantly.
> -quecas definitely doesn’t mean cakes
Queques does.
> The simpler explanation
I think them coming from the same word is simpler.
Any obsession can be unhealthy, but if the worst problem of society ever comes to be too much attention to words and meanings, I think we'll be ok.
Today's people, in my experience, more often than not default to using the inverted Hanlon's razor in their judgement — trying to find enemies everywhere, instead of taking it easy and accepting human imperfection. This is not something new of course, but today's technology and lifestyle accelerates this to levels where any genuine dialogue between people of different world views is highly unlikely. In today's society people are more likely to just claim someone they disagree with as an enemy, rather than try to understand why they're using the words they don't like. In my opinion this... psychosis will not end well, and I could only hope that we'll take that hit and be better for it in a long run.
If people were able to express themselves without being judged as, for example, psychotic, then the world would be a better place. It makes a lot of sense.
Really fun times, that shed a lot of light on their culture.
"SOF units in the AO must integrate C4ISR assets in CONOPs, synchronize with JOC and fuse MASINT into the COP, while EOD teams update TTPs for C-IED ops per JIEDDO, factoring IED TTPs observed in TICs, and G2 perform BDA utilizing IMINT to refine HVT targeting packages."
Area of operations Concept of operations Joint operational command Measurement intelligence common operational picture Explosive ordnance disposal Techniques tactics and processes Battle damage assessment
Etc etc
When someone starts using metaphors, you know you are getting taken for a ride.