Question

condition for good analogy

Answer 1

Analogies help a person visualize a concept or event in a way that doesn’t require critical thinking.

A good analogy is a compromise between two conflicting goals: familiarity and representativeness.

Good analogies are familiar. They express an abstract idea in terms of a familiar one. The odometer and speedometer on a car are a good analogy for a function and its derivative, because we all understand how speedometers work, but maybe not calculus.

Concrete experiences are good breeding grounds for analogies because they can be appreciated by anyone. When I say voltage is to the electric force what height is to the gravitational force, that is helpful because height is more concrete than electric potential.

But a good analogy doesn’t need to be concrete, it only needs to be expressed in terms of an idea you already know deeply. One of my favorites was from an MIT ecology class which expressed the idea of biological niche as a section of an n-dimensional feature space. If you didn’t study linear algebra, that may not make any sense, but it was widely appreciated by the audience who had a stronger math background.

That latter fact is important when creating analogies for yourself. Concreteness is good, but as long as you understand the analogous domain well, anything works.

Good analogies are also representative. They match at least some of the features of the idea you’re trying to explain. More matches means the analogy has more intuitive power. Fewer means you need to be careful about applying the analogy to understand new situations

Answer 2

Answer:

• A successful analogy strikes a balance between two opposing objectives: recognizability and representativeness. The best analogies are well known.
• They use a well-known concept to describe an abstract thought.

Explanation:

• A good analogy just needs to be described in terms of the concept you are already quite familiar with; it need not be concrete.
• Although concreteness is preferred, anything can be used as long as you are knowledgeable about the analogous area.
• Good comparisons are also illustrative. They at least somewhat reflect the characteristics of the concept you're attempting to express.
• The analogy has greater intuitive force when there are more matches.
• Fewer indicates that you should exercise caution when using the analogy to comprehend novel situations.

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