Abstract
Metaphors are crucial to research as they provide alternative perspectives of seeing and understanding the world; indeed, they have been the basis of many scientific and technological creations. In this paper, we argue that progress in parallel problem solving research could be invaluably enhanced if metaphors that exhibit parallelism, in terms of their underlying structure and the ways they work, are studied. Using biological examples, we demonstrate how nature furnishes us with numerous metaphors. An attempt is made to show how an understanding of the way such metaphors work can help us manage our conceptualisation of complex problems as well as reveal new directions towards parallel problem applications.
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Paton, R.C., Nwana, H.S., Shave, M.J.R., Bench-Capon, T.J.M., Hughes, S. (1991). Transfer of natural metaphors to parallel problem solving applications. In: Schwefel, HP., Männer, R. (eds) Parallel Problem Solving from Nature. PPSN 1990. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 496. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0029777
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0029777
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