Analogical Thinking

Origin. Gentner's structure-mapping theory; Hofstadter's analogy-as-cognition.

Mechanism. Transfers relational structure, not surface features, from a source domain to a target. The transfer is valid to the extent that the two domains instantiate the same relations among their parts.

Procedure. State the target's relational skeleton without its nouns. Find a domain that has the same skeleton. Map the source's known solutions back along the correspondence. Check each transferred inference in the target directly.

Applies to. Problems whose obstacle is representational rather than informational.

Limitations. Surface resemblance mistaken for structural correspondence. A shared word, count, or shape between domains licenses nothing; without a named mechanism instantiated on both sides and a fact that transfers, the analogy is decoration.