26 - Learning without metaphor

Summary

In his chapter in the first edition of this collection, Petrie wishes to establish the claim that metaphor is “epistemologically necessary” for “learning something that is radically new.” I believe that his attempt is unsuccessful. Seeing that it fails, however, is neither as difficult nor as interesting as seeing why. To discover the sources of his failure, we may begin with the following, rather complex, conditional. If one holds to a very narrow and limited conception of the reach of reason and inference in ordinary life, and if one is captured by the paradox of the Meno into believing that there is a particular mystery in understanding how anyone can learn something radically new, and if, finally, one discovers that metaphor is often pedagogically helpful in leading a student to bridge the gap between the known and the unknown, then one is likely to conclude that metaphor is “epistemologically necessary” to learning something radically new.

It seems to me that this sequence of thinking sets forth pretty well the path that Petrie follows. I wish to propose a counterpath, one that might reveal the reasons why Petrie believes that metaphor is epistemologically necessary and why we may believe that it is not. That path begins with a reconsideration of how large and inclusive is the role of reason in ordinary life. But more of that in a moment. We must first consider what it is that Petrie means by “learning something radically new.”