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Coherent and Creative Conceptual Combinations.

Thagard, Paul. (1997) Coherent and Creative Conceptual Combinations. [Book Chapter]

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Abstract

Conceptual combinations range from the utterly mundane to the sublimely creative. Mundane combinations include a myriad of adjective-noun and noun-noun juxtapositions that crop up in everyday speaking and writing, such as blue car, cooked carrots, and radio phone. Creative combinations include some of the most important theoretical constructions in science, such as sound wave, bacterial infection, and natural selection. Both mundane and creative conceptual combinations are essential to our attempts to make sense of the world and people's utterances about it. This paper will show how the various aspects of conceptual combination discussed by Hampton (this volume), Shoben and Gagné (this volume) and Wisniewski (this volume) can be unified by seeing them as parts of a general coherence mechanism that people use to make sense of what they see and hear.

Item Type:Book Chapter
Subjects:Psychology > Cognitive Psychology
Computer Science > Artificial Intelligence
Philosophy > Philosophy of Science
ID Code:667
Deposited By: Thagard, Paul
Deposited On:06 Jun 1998
Last Modified:11 Mar 2011 08:54

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