Mathematics and Metaphor

A conceptual metaphor framework for the teaching of mathematics

Word problems in mathematics seem to constantly pose learning difficulties for all kinds of students. Recent work in math education (for example, [Lakoff, G. & Nuñez, R. E. (2000). Where mathematics comes from: How the embodied mind brings mathematics into being. New York: Basic Books]) suggests that the difficulties stem from an inability on the part of students to decipher the metaphorical pr...

Enculturation the Neglected Learning Metaphor in Mathematics Education

Conceptual Metaphor and the Cognitive Foundations of Mathematics: Actual Infinity and Human Imagination*

The Infinite is one of the most intriguing ideas in which the human mind has ever engaged. Full of paradoxes and controversies, it has raised fundamental issues in domains as diverse and profound as theology, physics, and philosophy. The infinite, an elusive and counterintuitive idea, has even played a central role in defining mathematics, a fundamental field of human intellectual inquiry chara...

Pain as metaphor: metaphor and medicine.

Like many other disciplines, medicine often resorts to metaphor in order to explain complicated concepts that are imperfectly understood. But what happens when medicine's metaphors close off thinking, restricting interpretations and opinions to those of the negative kind? This paper considers the deleterious effects of destructive metaphors that cluster around pain. First, the metaphoric basis ...

An Application of Reciprocally induced co-evolution: A computational metaphor in Mathematics

Natural phenomenon of coevolution is the reciprocally induced evolutionary change between two or more species or population. Though this biological occurrence is a natural fact, there are only few attempts to use this as a simile in computation. This chapter is an attempt to introduce reciprocally induced coevolution as a mechanism to counter problems faced by a typical genetic algorithm applie...