The Intuitive Edge

There is a subtle idea that permeates science, rarely if ever mentioned in textbooks, but widely used by all world-class thinkers like Faraday, Newton, Einstein, etc. It is the concept of the metaphor. The sooner you become aware of metaphors in science, the sooner you will be on the road to creative understanding of electricity and electronics.

What is a metaphor? Whenever you are dealing with new ideas, it may be difficult or impossible to understand them without equating them to things you already know. Throughout the history of science, the creative thinkers have used the metaphor to help them understand new theories, discoveries, etc. A metaphor is an equivalence between two different things that exhibit the same behavior in their own system of reality. In science, metaphors are often used to relate the visible and the invisible. For instance, Faraday used lines of force as a metaphor for the magnetic field. The use of rubber bands to capture the meaning of Lenz' law is another example of using a metaphor to visualize an invisible force. The ability to think in metaphors and even create your own metaphors is the key to almost all inventions. Metaphors allow you to see and understand and create. Even Aristotle recognized the importance of the metaphor thousands of years ago when he said,

"The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor."

It comes down to this. You can't play the game of science well unless you know the rules. One of rules is to think in metaphors. Once this idea sinks in, you will make much better progress in understanding science.