Ken,
Welcome back. Your deep erudition is needed. In fact I was thinking as I read the last few posts on this subject: Where is Ken, we need him!
Yes, Polyani is so important. I have found his work so useful in helping distinguish between different types of knowing. In particular the distinction between knowing about something and knowing how to do something. I cannot remember whether that is a quote or my rewording of what he wrote. It is so relevant in many areas of design.
On the issue of metaphors, information and communication, which are causing some confusion, three important works are:
Lakoff, George & Mark Johnson (1980) Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, George (1987) Women, Fire and Dangerous Things. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Reddy, M. J. (1979). The conduit metaphor: A case of frame conflict in our language about language. In A. Ortony (Ed.), Metaphor and Thought (pp. 284–310). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (actually the whole of this volume is worth reading)
One of the many things these works do is sensitise us to the ubiquity of metaphor in ordinary language.
Using a contemporary analogy (a sort of metaphor/simile :) Metaphors are to language are as gravitational waves are to astronomy. Once you know they are there and you can see them, they open up a universe of possibilities and insights.
As I said at the end of my last post
"You pays your money, and you takes your chance.”
But, metaphors (I keep telling people as we move into the local racing season) are much more rewarding than horses.
Yet another metaphor!
David
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