‘Thinking More’ as a Function of Metaphors in Philosophy

Résumé

Philosophy makes us think – this is certainly not a new finding. Also, many readers are familiar with Kant’s claim that in artworks, representations of the imagination – among which are metaphors - force our minds to ‘think more’. In this article, I borrow Kant’s ‘thinking more’ notion which he confines to the realm of art, and argue that metaphors in philosophy sometimes force our minds to ‘think more’ than they would without these metaphors. However, the application of this notion to the realm of philosophy will not correspond exactly to the Kantian ‘prompt to thought’, for reasons that have to do with the nature and purpose of philosophy as this article attempts to demonstrate.