The value of analogy

Opening Gambit:

"... but how can we grasp all of this? ... What is this complex (concept / situation / process) like ? ... Can we compare it to anything ? ... And if so, how does that help ? "

• All perception of truth is the detection of an analogy.  Thoreau Journal (1851)
• Though analogy is often misleading, it is the least misleading thing we have. Samuel Butler Notebooks (1912)
• Analogies, it is true, decide nothing, but they can make one feel more at home. Sigmund Freud New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis (1933)

Intriguing quotations, but can we relate them to the definition I devised in On manipulating structure ? ...

Analogy ... to construct conceptual similarity, perceived through extended comparison of structure or process (abstract > concrete, abstract > abstract)

I would argue that we can, not least because all four sentences say something rather different. My definition simply describes the process of analogy, whereas the other three all comment on the value of analogy. They come to rather different conclusions, don't they? Freud, interestingly, doesn't think that they mean anything (scientifically, I presume), but ... what? ... they help us accept the strange and bizarre. Butler distrusts analogies too, although he thinks they are less "misleading" than anything else - but what 'else' is he referring to? Scientific data? Religious dogma? Ideology? Thoreau's remark is pretty sweeping, but I find it the most intriguing - and the most relevant to my approach to analogy.

The key to the quote lies in what Thoreau means by "perception". I believe that he is not talking about truth itself, but rather how we grasp and understand truth. We deal with the unknown by trying to relate it to the known, and that is how analogy works. We struggle to find a pattern in the chaos of what we don't understand ... and when we do identify a pattern, it is probably a pattern drawn from what we know anyway, from the stock of conceptual patterns that form our knowledge. Rather like trying to come to grips with an unfamiliar language - to propose an analogy!

Now, here are some exercises that you can practise with the students in order to develop their grasp of analogy. Try projecting them, using Presentation mode, in order to have Heads-up whole-class discussions; or you can use the handout provided at the bottom of the page.

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Exercising analogy

Detecting similar patterns

Analogies don't necessarily come easily - identifying and grasping useful patterns may take concentrated effort. So the following is a simple exercise which is not so simple.

TASK > Aim to express each of the ideas in the first list by chosing a different word/phrase from the second list - and then explain why. For example: "Democracy is like an elephant because ...

... the brain ... learning a language ... democracy ...

... a revolution ... writing an essay ... doing the IB ...

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elephant ... eating a plate of spaghetti ... tree

making a snowball ... avalanche ... climbing a mountain

(Notice that it is simplest to connect noun to noun and verb to verb - but not necessarily the most interesting or thought-provoking.)

Selecting appropriate analogies

Civilisation

"A good civilisation spreads over us freely like a tree,varying and yielding because it is alive. A bad civilisation stands up and sticks out above us like an umbrella - artificial, mathematical in shape; not merely universal, but uniform." G.K. Chesterton (1908)

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coral reef ... ant nest ... cathedral ... computer game

building site ... airport ... fancy-dress party ... spaceship

iceberg ... hospital ... erratic computer ... human body

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? What do each of the images above have to say about how civilisations work ?

? Which best fits what you personally believe about civilisation ?

? Which image best fits the model of the culture / society in which you live ?

Imposing unusual analogies

There are analogies which appear 'natural', and comparisons which just don't seem to fit. You can't necessarily compare everything to everything else - and quite right too, or analogy would have no value. We do indeed tend to choose analgies based on what we know - which is, of course, Thoreau's point, above. However ... one of Edward de Bono's 'lateral thinking' tricks is to stimulate creativity by deliberately striving to make unusual analogies work - in the process, he claims, we are forced to see the familiar from an unusual and possibly revealing angle. So, look at the list below, and consider what the words involve :-

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... umbrella ... cooking ... mobile phone ...

... butterfly ... volcano ... the Olympics ...

... civil war ... public transport ... a day's work ...

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? How could these be used to express and/or explain the idea of ‘Saturday night’ ? Try putting them into the sentence “Saturday night is like ... because ... ”

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