metaphorbased

Metaphorbased is a coined term describing a theoretical and methodological approach that centers metaphor as the primary mechanism for representing knowledge and guiding reasoning in fields such as cognitive science, linguistics, and artificial intelligence. The core idea is that many human concepts are understood through systematic metaphorical mappings, and that these mappings can serve as reusable building blocks for understanding, explanation, and planning.

In a metaphorbased framework, concepts are organized into metaphor networks. Nodes represent conceptual domains (such as time, emotion, or social interaction), while edges encode cross-domain mappings (for example, time as a moving object, argument as war). These networks can be learned from data or crafted by experts, and they support operations such as inference, analogy, and natural language generation by propagating across metaphorical schemas.

Applications include improving interpretability in AI by exposing metaphor-guided reasoning paths, enabling more natural explanations; facilitating language understanding of figurative language, satire, or poetry; and supporting educational tools that teach abstract concepts through concrete metaphors.

Challenges involve variability across languages and cultures in metaphor use, potential brittleness when metaphors do not align with user expectations, and difficulties in evaluating metaphor coverage and correctness. Integration with non-metaphor-based representations remains an active area of research.

Metaphorbased shares affinities with conceptual metaphor theory and embodied cognition, but emphasizes a pragmatic, systems-oriented use of metaphor as a computational primitive rather than a purely theoretical lens. Related concepts include conceptual metaphor theory and metaphor-based reasoning in AI.