I am such an idiot sometimes. I must have read your middle paragraph 10 times trying to understand your point, but only now did it click.
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply at all that the visualizations of the ad were metaphors. Like you, I would call it hyperbole. I meant only that the visual hyperbole was revealing of the literal metaphor that followed it.
Here's another thing I LOVE about the Ad and HATE about Apple's website:
Apple actually posts benchmarks to supposedly support their claim that the G5 is the fastest computer in the world. What a crock! All benchmarks produce are collections of FACTS. They don't produce metaphors. You can multiply that collection a billion fold, showing the G5 is in fact faster here and there at this or that or every task, but add all those facts together and you could never derive the claim "The G5 is the fastest PC." That would be an impossible leap across the fact/metaphor gap, a violation of the naturalistic fallacy.
The Ad, to its credit, makes no mention of benchmarking in support of the claim (if I remember correctly). Just as Shakespeare, to his credit, doesn't have Romeo listing numerous attributes of Juliet to support the claim that she is the sun. Arg! Makes me gag to even think about it!
Also, not being critical here at all, but you and I, Sycraft-fu, do speak slightly different languages. My principle linguistic interest for over twenty years now has been semantic drift, and I use the word metaphor for various and sundry words that have gone though periods of semantic change created through the unintentional misinterpretion of speech. I don't have any good reason for using the word the way I do; it's a habit I fell into years ago when I got tired of typing "metaphors and ellipses and the like" and just settled on the world "metaphor." Since many of these metaphors and ellipses and the like DO, in fact, become fully literalized over time, (we usually call them abstractions at their end stage), I frequently talk and write about such beasts as "literal metaphors".
In your language, which I think is more conventional, the phrase "literal metaphors" is a contradiction in terms. Sorry if I misled you on that one.
Also, and this may or may not be important, I do NOT think any words "are" metaphors. I have no qualms about saying that they are, but that pesky linking verb "is", when placed between two noun phrases, is itself one of those metaphors, ellipses, and the like that have undergone a complete semantic transformation due to unintentional literalization. In fact, I think all statements of the form Noun Phrase - Linking Verb - Noun Phrase are false (literally products of an historical semantic deception), and I would like some publisher to give me a big contract to prove it! Ha Ha. (Not my discovery, of course. I think I got from General Semantics.)
I think you're right about everything here. I think Steve Jobs and Apple Computer DID mean it literally, that they WERE claiming that it is a literal truth, and that they are utterly mistaken about it. I hold no love at all for idiots (Steve Jobs or anyone else) who come out and state, in unambiguous, direct, literal terms, a completely fact-free metaphor on the pretense that they are making a factual claim.
My love is for the TV commercial and the advertising firm that made it. With their visuals, they effectively reminded their viewers (subconsciously if not consciously) that anytime you use the words fast and powerful and are NOT talking about velocity and ability to accellerate objects of mass, you are speaking metaphorically. That by itself is a beautiful achievement!
I hereby award that agency with The Frogknoll Honesty In Advertising Award. Congrats, Fellas. You deserve it!
You make several excellent points, and I find myself mostly in agreement. You say that Apple's statement is false, not provably true, and that it makes a statement unqualified on its own. I agree. I'm a little distressed, however, to hear a fellow linguist say "I fail to see any metaphorical meaning". Metaphor blindness is a serious condition. I think you need to have it checked out at once!
Seriously, though, I think you probably do "see the metaphor", in the sense that I would mean it, but you don't acknowledge that awareness with the same language I use. No big quarrel here, I hope, but let me explain.
Suppose a school principal were to ask a teacher, "Who's the fastest student in your class?" The teacher might respond, "That would be Alicia. You should see her on the playground. I think that girl has wings on her feet!" When we don't "see the metaphor" (as, for instance, when there is none), our responses tend to be immediate, absolute, and certain: It's Alicia.
Suppose the principal meant the word "fastest" in its extended, drifted, (and I would say) metaphorical sense (which is to say, NOT meaning physical velocity)? He might say, "No, you misunderstood me. I mean, who's the fastest student in the classroom?" The teacher might pause a bit, being tugged in her mind by various interpretations of "fastest". Well, John is the fastest reader . . . Amy is the fastest writer . . . Erica is the fastest talker . ..Anika is the fastest story-problem-solver . . . Come to think of it, every student in my class is the fastest in my class!"
When we are blessed with the gift of metaphor-sightedness, we feel a polysemantic tug in their presence. I think you felt it, too, when you heard the line "fastest, most powerful computer." This Slashdot board is filled to the brim with posters both blind and sighted. They are easy to tell apart. The (metaphor-) sighted posters are easy-going about the claim. They pepper their language with phrases like "depends on what you mean", "ambiguous", "faster at this, not faster at that", and "What's all the fuss about?" The blind posters, poor things, are all in a huff about the literal (!) truthfulness or untruthfulness of Apple's claims. Blind people assume from the outset that one computer is simply faster or not faster than another (literally!) and so Apple is either lying or truth-telling. "What a bald-faced lie", they might exclaim, with great indignation. A blind person might become so enraged by his blindness that he'll complain to the ITC to have the commercial BANNED! (Yes, now I'm outraged.)
Another wonderful point you made, prescient, even, is that I could tell a story about how the rest of the commercial justifies the telling of the metaphor. HOW DID YOU KNOW?
Consider the most famous metaphor in the English language, "Juliet is the sun." Taken out of context, this is one crummy metaphor, aesthetically speaking, and it is also, in any context, as you say, false, unqualified, and not provably true. But look at Shakespeare's glorious build-up before the metaphor: "But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!" Words can not express the beauty and eloquence of this metaphor in its context. The interrogative mention of the light breaking through a window, in particular, serves as a dagger into the reader's mind: Look out! Here comes a metaphor! Get ready! Juliet is the sun!
When I first saw Apples BANNED commercial, I felt a similar dagger thrust into my mind. The sight of a grown man being blasted through the walls of his house at tremendous speed (literally) by some powerful (literally) force shouted: Look out! Get ready! Here comes a metaphor! Introducing the world's fastest and (slight pause) most powerful personal computer (if memory serves). I LOVE THIS COMMERCIAL! It is a work of art of Shakespearean proportions! Even better, it is -- as far as I know -- the first computer advertisement ever to address the speed issue honestly and openly; that is, it is the first to
Here's my take on where the lines are drawn. Consider 4 kinds of statements:
1. Verifiably true factual statements. (The G5 is 64 bit)
2. False or unverified factual statements. (The G5 outperforms its competition on all tasks.)
3. Noncomparative metaphors. (The G5 is a sweet and wonderful computer.)
4. Comparative metaphors. (The G5 is faster, more powerful, sexier, better, and superior to Windows PCs.)
The USA generally disallows only statements of kind 2 (factual falsehoods), whereas the UK also prohibits statements of kind 4 (comparative metaphors.) Notice that both the USA and the UK allow false and deceptive statements in advertising -- they are those cute, harmless, noninsulting metaphors (3).
I'm afraid I'm completely with the USA on this issue, though. It seems the UK is trading openness and educational opportunities for politeness and decorum.
It is interesting that the regime that outlawed Apple's comparative metaphor had no apparent awareness of its metaphorical nature. I assume that's because they grew up in a society that didn't allow comparative metaphors in advertising, and so deprived the language teachers an opportunity to discuss them in the schools.
For more on Apples' metaphors, do check out the thread "Don't literalize Metaphors!" It's easily the most informative and underated thread in SlashDot history.:)
Actually, I meant to be more critical of the ITC and their fascist supporters than of Slashdot readers. Look at what the ITC did:
After Apple made the statement "introducing the world's fastest, most powerful personal computer", and eight viewer complaints were lodged, the ITC referred the complaints to the BCC's IT expert. An IT expert! Did they even think of contacting a language expert? If they had, they might have gotten a response like,
"In its advertisement, Apple Computer used the metaphor 'fastest' to analogically compare its computer to objects traveling through space at a higher velocity than other objects. And they used the metaphor 'powerful' to analogically compare their computer to forces able to accelerate massive objects. The metaphors are living, the compact structure of the statement is itself a metaphorical feature, and so the statement is judged to be 100% devoid of any factual content or claim. Because it is metaphorical (obviously to some, not obviously to others), it is misleading, deceptive, and false (in its original sense - deceptive), as all metaphors are."
After receiving the (language!) expert's evaluation of Apple's claim, the ITC, if it had any sense at all, would issue a terse statement:
"We regulate statements of fact. We don't regulate metaphors."
Just imagine (if you can!) a world where metaphors are outlawed. Tony Blair could not claim that the war in Iraq was 'justified'. His critics could not claim it was 'wrong'. Shakespeare would be edited to have Romeo claiming that "Juliet is kinda like the sun!" And above all, we critics of metaphor-blindness could not have fun ridiculing people who are taken in by them.
It seems ever so possible to me now that computer experts, IT people, and Slashdot readers are the most easily duped people on the planet. Read these posts. You have people who actually believe that one computer can be "faster" than another. Others who believe that a given computer "is" or "isn't" a workstation or PC. Others who think Apple's claim is or isn't "true"!
This was first posted elsewhere. My apologies if the ideas have already been expressed here:
What seems to be missing from this discussion is a single word at the heart of the issue: metaphor.
The expression "the world's fastest, most powerful personal computer" contains two living, breathing metaphors:fastest and powerful. It is the nature and charm and power of metaphors that they are deceptive, and that no enumeration of facts (time to complete certain tasks, or whatever) can prove them. (There is, after all, the fact/metaphor gap to consider.)
No, "fastest" is not a quantitative claim when applied to stationary objects. Neither is "powerful", "higher", or "stronger" when applied to computers. No, Apple did not present their metaphors as fact; no, such obvious evaluative metaphors are never "objective statements".
Not since a jury ruled against Papa John's for its slogan "better ingredients, better pizza", have so many people been duped by metaphor in advertising. Please, people, get over it! If you think that the G5 really is the fastest personal computer, you are deceived by language. If you think that it really isn't the fastest, you, too, are deceived by language. Use metaphors, by all means, but don't believe them!
And please: if you live in the U.K., call off the metaphor police!
Slashdot Mirror
I am such an idiot sometimes. I must have read your middle paragraph 10 times trying to understand your point, but only now did it click.
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply at all that the visualizations of the ad were metaphors. Like you, I would call it hyperbole. I meant only that the visual hyperbole was revealing of the literal metaphor that followed it.
I hope this clears up our misunderstanding.
Wait, just one more thing . . .
Here's another thing I LOVE about the Ad and HATE about Apple's website:
Apple actually posts benchmarks to supposedly support their claim that the G5 is the fastest computer in the world. What a crock! All benchmarks produce are collections of FACTS. They don't produce metaphors. You can multiply that collection a billion fold, showing the G5 is in fact faster here and there at this or that or every task, but add all those facts together and you could never derive the claim "The G5 is the fastest PC." That would be an impossible leap across the fact/metaphor gap, a violation of the naturalistic fallacy.
The Ad, to its credit, makes no mention of benchmarking in support of the claim (if I remember correctly). Just as Shakespeare, to his credit, doesn't have Romeo listing numerous attributes of Juliet to support the claim that she is the sun. Arg! Makes me gag to even think about it!
Also, not being critical here at all, but you and I, Sycraft-fu, do speak slightly different languages. My principle linguistic interest for over twenty years now has been semantic drift, and I use the word metaphor for various and sundry words that have gone though periods of semantic change created through the unintentional misinterpretion of speech. I don't have any good reason for using the word the way I do; it's a habit I fell into years ago when I got tired of typing "metaphors and ellipses and the like" and just settled on the world "metaphor." Since many of these metaphors and ellipses and the like DO, in fact, become fully literalized over time, (we usually call them abstractions at their end stage), I frequently talk and write about such beasts as "literal metaphors".
In your language, which I think is more conventional, the phrase "literal metaphors" is a contradiction in terms. Sorry if I misled you on that one.
Also, and this may or may not be important, I do NOT think any words "are" metaphors. I have no qualms about saying that they are, but that pesky linking verb "is", when placed between two noun phrases, is itself one of those metaphors, ellipses, and the like that have undergone a complete semantic transformation due to unintentional literalization. In fact, I think all statements of the form Noun Phrase - Linking Verb - Noun Phrase are false (literally products of an historical semantic deception), and I would like some publisher to give me a big contract to prove it! Ha Ha. (Not my discovery, of course. I think I got from General Semantics.)
I've had a lot of fun talking with you.
I think you're right about everything here. I think Steve Jobs and Apple Computer DID mean it literally, that they WERE claiming that it is a literal truth, and that they are utterly mistaken about it. I hold no love at all for idiots (Steve Jobs or anyone else) who come out and state, in unambiguous, direct, literal terms, a completely fact-free metaphor on the pretense that they are making a factual claim.
My love is for the TV commercial and the advertising firm that made it. With their visuals, they effectively reminded their viewers (subconsciously if not consciously) that anytime you use the words fast and powerful and are NOT talking about velocity and ability to accellerate objects of mass, you are speaking metaphorically. That by itself is a beautiful achievement!
I hereby award that agency with The Frogknoll Honesty In Advertising Award. Congrats, Fellas. You deserve it!
You make several excellent points, and I find myself mostly in agreement. You say that Apple's statement is false, not provably true, and that it makes a statement unqualified on its own. I agree. I'm a little distressed, however, to hear a fellow linguist say "I fail to see any metaphorical meaning". Metaphor blindness is a serious condition. I think you need to have it checked out at once!
.Anika is the fastest story-problem-solver . . . Come to think of it, every student in my class is the fastest in my class!"
Seriously, though, I think you probably do "see the metaphor", in the sense that I would mean it, but you don't acknowledge that awareness with the same language I use. No big quarrel here, I hope, but let me explain.
Suppose a school principal were to ask a teacher, "Who's the fastest student in your class?" The teacher might respond, "That would be Alicia. You should see her on the playground. I think that girl has wings on her feet!" When we don't "see the metaphor" (as, for instance, when there is none), our responses tend to be immediate, absolute, and certain: It's Alicia.
Suppose the principal meant the word "fastest" in its extended, drifted, (and I would say) metaphorical sense (which is to say, NOT meaning physical velocity)? He might say, "No, you misunderstood me. I mean, who's the fastest student in the classroom?" The teacher might pause a bit, being tugged in her mind by various interpretations of "fastest". Well, John is the fastest reader . . . Amy is the fastest writer . . . Erica is the fastest talker . .
When we are blessed with the gift of metaphor-sightedness, we feel a polysemantic tug in their presence. I think you felt it, too, when you heard the line "fastest, most powerful computer." This Slashdot board is filled to the brim with posters both blind and sighted. They are easy to tell apart. The (metaphor-) sighted posters are easy-going about the claim. They pepper their language with phrases like "depends on what you mean", "ambiguous", "faster at this, not faster at that", and "What's all the fuss about?" The blind posters, poor things, are all in a huff about the literal (!) truthfulness or untruthfulness of Apple's claims. Blind people assume from the outset that one computer is simply faster or not faster than another (literally!) and so Apple is either lying or truth-telling. "What a bald-faced lie", they might exclaim, with great indignation. A blind person might become so enraged by his blindness that he'll complain to the ITC to have the commercial BANNED! (Yes, now I'm outraged.)
Another wonderful point you made, prescient, even, is that I could tell a story about how the rest of the commercial justifies the telling of the metaphor. HOW DID YOU KNOW?
Consider the most famous metaphor in the English language, "Juliet is the sun." Taken out of context, this is one crummy metaphor, aesthetically speaking, and it is also, in any context, as you say, false, unqualified, and not provably true. But look at Shakespeare's glorious build-up before the metaphor: "But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!" Words can not express the beauty and eloquence of this metaphor in its context. The interrogative mention of the light breaking through a window, in particular, serves as a dagger into the reader's mind: Look out! Here comes a metaphor! Get ready! Juliet is the sun!
When I first saw Apples BANNED commercial, I felt a similar dagger thrust into my mind. The sight of a grown man being blasted through the walls of his house at tremendous speed (literally) by some powerful (literally) force shouted: Look out! Get ready! Here comes a metaphor! Introducing the world's fastest and (slight pause) most powerful personal computer (if memory serves). I LOVE THIS COMMERCIAL! It is a work of art of Shakespearean proportions! Even better, it is -- as far as I know -- the first computer advertisement ever to address the speed issue honestly and openly; that is, it is the first to
Here's my take on where the lines are drawn. Consider 4 kinds of statements:
:)
4 40 222
1. Verifiably true factual statements. (The G5 is 64 bit)
2. False or unverified factual statements. (The G5 outperforms its competition on all tasks.)
3. Noncomparative metaphors. (The G5 is a sweet and wonderful computer.)
4. Comparative metaphors. (The G5 is faster, more powerful, sexier, better, and superior to Windows PCs.)
The USA generally disallows only statements of kind 2 (factual falsehoods), whereas the UK also prohibits statements of kind 4 (comparative metaphors.) Notice that both the USA and the UK allow false and deceptive statements in advertising -- they are those cute, harmless, noninsulting metaphors (3).
I'm afraid I'm completely with the USA on this issue, though. It seems the UK is trading openness and educational opportunities for politeness and decorum.
It is interesting that the regime that outlawed Apple's comparative metaphor had no apparent awareness of its metaphorical nature. I assume that's because they grew up in a society that didn't allow comparative metaphors in advertising, and so deprived the language teachers an opportunity to discuss them in the schools.
For more on Apples' metaphors, do check out the thread "Don't literalize Metaphors!" It's easily the most informative and underated thread in SlashDot history.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=85357&cid=7
Actually, I meant to be more critical of the ITC and their fascist supporters than of Slashdot readers. Look at what the ITC did:
After Apple made the statement "introducing the world's fastest, most powerful personal computer", and eight viewer complaints were lodged, the ITC referred the complaints to the BCC's IT expert. An IT expert! Did they even think of contacting a language expert? If they had, they might have gotten a response like,
"In its advertisement, Apple Computer used the metaphor 'fastest' to analogically compare its computer to objects traveling through space at a higher velocity than other objects. And they used the metaphor 'powerful' to analogically compare their computer to forces able to accelerate massive objects. The metaphors are living, the compact structure of the statement is itself a metaphorical feature, and so the statement is judged to be 100% devoid of any factual content or claim. Because it is metaphorical (obviously to some, not obviously to others), it is misleading, deceptive, and false (in its original sense - deceptive), as all metaphors are."
After receiving the (language!) expert's evaluation of Apple's claim, the ITC, if it had any sense at all, would issue a terse statement:
"We regulate statements of fact. We don't regulate metaphors."
Just imagine (if you can!) a world where metaphors are outlawed. Tony Blair could not claim that the war in Iraq was 'justified'. His critics could not claim it was 'wrong'. Shakespeare would be edited to have Romeo claiming that "Juliet is kinda like the sun!" And above all, we critics of metaphor-blindness could not have fun ridiculing people who are taken in by them.
It seems ever so possible to me now that computer experts, IT people, and Slashdot readers are the most easily duped people on the planet. Read these posts. You have people who actually believe that one computer can be "faster" than another. Others who believe that a given computer "is" or "isn't" a workstation or PC. Others who think Apple's claim is or isn't "true"!
Metaphors, all.
Fools, all.
This was first posted elsewhere. My apologies if the ideas have already been expressed here:
What seems to be missing from this discussion is a single word at the heart of the issue: metaphor.
The expression "the world's fastest, most powerful personal computer" contains two living, breathing metaphors:fastest and powerful. It is the nature and charm and power of metaphors that they are deceptive, and that no enumeration of facts (time to complete certain tasks, or whatever) can prove them. (There is, after all, the fact/metaphor gap to consider.)
No, "fastest" is not a quantitative claim when applied to stationary objects. Neither is "powerful", "higher", or "stronger" when applied to computers. No, Apple did not present their metaphors as fact; no, such obvious evaluative metaphors are never "objective statements".
Not since a jury ruled against Papa John's for its slogan "better ingredients, better pizza", have so many people been duped by metaphor in advertising. Please, people, get over it! If you think that the G5 really is the fastest personal computer, you are deceived by language. If you think that it really isn't the fastest, you, too, are deceived by language. Use metaphors, by all means, but don't believe them!
And please: if you live in the U.K., call off the metaphor police!