Metaphors in Modern and Contemporary Philosophy

The essays in this collection focus on the way philosophers use concrete and specific metaphors in their discourse as instruments of philosophical thought. The philosophical involvement with metaphor has its ambiguities: on the one hand, philosophers seek the clear and unequivocal presentation of ideas and argumentations; on the other hand, philosophers do not seem able to do without metaphors and figurative language. The present collection of articles is intended to illustrate the idea that metaphors have their own irreplaceable role to play in philosophy, as the expression of the finite, provisional, and contingent character of our thinking. In the first, systematic part of the book, different approaches to the role of philosophical metaphors in general are proposed from different angles. In the second and third parts, some selected metaphors in the history of modern and contemporary philosophy are discussed.

Arthur Cools is an associate professor in contemporary philosophy and aesthetics at the University of Antwerp. Walter Van Herck is an associate professor of philosophy of religion at the University of Antwerp. He is editor in chief of the International Journal of Philosophy and Theology. Koenraad Verrycken is a full professor of philosophy at the University of Antwerp.

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