Analogy as Exploration

Theorists have often emphasized the role of analogy in creativity, particular in scientific or intellectual contexts. But in Boden’s model, creative processes are assumed to be mediated by acts of exploration and transformation. There is a need to understand how these two perspectives fit together and to clarify whether analogy is mediated by transformation, exploration, or both of those processes. Analogy is often viewed as a form of transformation. But the demonstration that transformation can be understood as meta-level exploration calls that view into question. The present paper shows that analogy can in fact be mediated by exploration alone. A task analysis is used to delineate the prototypical strategies of concept construction. It is then shown that analogical functionality can emerge as a natural result of conceptual-space exploration.