>Instead of creating models and metaphors to explain the process of the
>inherently confusing metaphor of a learning organization, why not focus
>on structured means for creating learning.
All my mind wants to say, "Amen, brother!" and get on with it.
But I also reflect, Glen, that without someone having used the metaphor
"learning organization" there might not have been the motivation, nor the
effort (nor this list, nor this dialogue) to focus on creating (or,
better, enhancing) learning in organizations.
While I can also catalogue the intellectual pitfalls of using metaphors, I
also recognize their power -- to focus the mind, to bring the unfamiliar
closer to the familiar so it may be thought about (and so we may discover
how the unfamiliar is both the same and different from the familiar), to
motivate.
I believe that, in most scientific discourse at least, metaphors begin as
shorthand notation -- a more convenient way to refer to what otherwise
would take long explanation. To use the metaphor properly requires
understanding the long explanation. However, since languages are such
useful and pliable tools, it soon happens that other characteristics are
attached to the implicit meaning (or meaning in use) of the metaphor; or,
worse, the metaphor becomes reified as an "object" when it was supposed to
be a process; or, etc.
I don't know how to save the usefulness of metaphor and analogy in our
thinking (but I believe we must not abandon this method -- it may even be
necessary to allow us to think new things at all!) while preventing the
subsequent abuse and distortion. Part of the discipline that underlies
(or is supposed to underlie) academic "disciplines" is the careful
handling of words used, and the alertness to catch distortions and
reifications. Outside of academic disciplines, I fear, it is almost
hopeless to expect language discipline.
--"John Gunkler" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>