May 08 2017 55 mins
In this second episode in a two-part spiel on creativity and the logic of novelty, I take a look at the way that analogy helps us to understand cognition. When we understand how we think — that is, how ideas are formed and how concepts are expanded through analogy — we start to get a better sense of how to escalate and build on that process to form new ideas. One book that I found particularly illuminating on the subject of analogy and cognition is Douglas Hofstadter's and Emmanuel Sander's "Surfaces and Essences" — it's a mindblowing book for anyone who is interested in philosophical speculation. I also deal a bit with the theological implications of analogy in my book "Seeing Things as They Are: GK Chesterton and the Drama of Meaning."