1

In The Rule of Metaphor, Paul Ricoeur develops his innovative doctrine of metaphorical
reference, in which he attempts to show how metaphors can be truth conducive. Building on Aristotles
Poetics, Ricoeur emphasizes the sentence-level structure of metaphor as opposed to its word-level
structure. This in turn allows him to appropriate Gottlob Freges distinction between sense and
reference in non-assertoric, metaphorical languagea context in which Frege himself never would
have allowed such a distinction. According to Ricoeur, metaphorical reference is a second-level
reference involving a correspondence not to some discrete object among others in a discovered
reality characterized first and foremost by an assumed distinction between subject and object, but
rather a process of unconcealment in which the deep structures of a reality in which we are related
as mortals who are born into this world and who dwell in it for a while are made manifest.
i
Whereas
Fregean first-level reference accounts for a correspondence relation to an object, Ricoeurs second-
order, metaphorical reference accounts for a correspondence relation to a mode of being-as. Put
simply, the process of metaphorical reference is what truth looks like beyond the subject-object relation
that is a necessary condition for Freges doctrine of the truth values of propositions.
Curiously, though, Ricoeur seems to have repudiated his doctrine of metaphorical reference
later on in the third and final volume of Time and Narrative. Against the conclusions reached in his
earlier work, Ricoeur says that his account of metaphor must free itself, once and for all, from the
vocabulary of reference.
ii
Of course, this seems to undermine his previous project at the most
fundamental of levels. To my knowledge, an extended treatment of this apparent change of mind has
not yet appeared in the secondary literature on Ricoeur. This paper attempts to do just that. The thesis
is twofold: (1) to sketch the impressive synthesis that is Ricoeurs doctrine of metaphorical reference;
and (2) to account for the reasons for its eventual repudiation. There is much to be learned from this
ambitious project.
2

The argument proceeds first with an account of metaphorical reference, which is subdivided
into engagements with the three most important influences on the doctrine: namely, Aristotle, Frege
and Martin Heidegger. Once a satisfactory grasp of the position is obtained, I give an account of the
philosophical reasons for Ricoeurs apparent change of mind in Time and Narrative.
Going beyond Aristotle
Aristotles definition of metaphor in his Poetics shows up in the context of his analysis of what
we might call diction (lexis)specifically regarding parts of speech such as the noun and the
verb, among others.
iii
According to Aristotle, metaphor is one of eight modes of possibility
characteristic of the noun, and it consists in giving the thing a name that belongs to something else; the
transference being either from genus to species, or from species to genus, or from species to species, or
on grounds of analogy.
iv
Since a genus is a class of species, and species a kind falling under a genus, we
can understand what Aristotle means by these different kinds of metaphor with some examples:
1. From genus to species: The poem speaks.
2. From species to genus: Ive told you a million times!
3. From species to species: Shes a machine!
In (1), even though we use the verb speaks, what is important in metaphor is the implicit
acknowledgement of a genus: namely, the genus of things that speak. Now, since poems are not the
kinds of things that speakat least not in a literalsense, what we have is an improper transference
of meaning from a genus (things that speak) to a species (a poem). In (2), there is an opposite
movement: a species (the number one million) replaces an implicit genus (many or more than usual)
in an improper manner, since the speaker has not literally told her opposite anything a million times.
Finally, in (3), we replace one species (a machine) with another implicit species (a person who
publishes a lot). Of course, once again, we do not mean to imply that she is a machine in any literal
sense.
3

But there is also a fourth and perhaps the most powerful kind of metaphor in the Poetics:
4. By analogy: I am the good shepherd.
In this case, the substance of the metaphor has to do not with the named things, but with the implicit
relationship between those things. The relationship of the shepherd to the sheep is analogous to the
relationship of God to human beingsperhaps in the sense that the former is the beneficent, faithful
leader of the latter, who would be hopeless on its own.
Aristotle goes on to make further distinctions between more kinds of metaphor, but the above
suffices for our purposes, which are limited to the development of Ricoeurs alternative. Most
importantly, for Ricoeur, all four of these Aristotelian metaphors share one fundamental commitment:
namely, that they are grounded in a theory of substitution.
v
In order to understand the substance of
Ricoeurs project of metaphorical reference, first we have to grasp the difference between the
Aristotelian substitution theory and Ricoeurs position.
It is telling that Aristotle understands metaphor as a rhetorical possibility of the composition of
nouns. As Ricoeur remarks, in the Poetics:
The metaphorical word takes the place of a non-metaphorical word that one could have used
(on condition that it exists); so it is doubly alien, as a present but borrowed word and as
substitute for an absent word. Although distinct, these two significations appear in constant
association in rhetorical theory and in Aristotle himself [italics mine].
vi

Crucially, on Ricoeurs reading, Aristotles theory of metaphor is a theory about words rather than
sentences.
vii
As our aforementioned examples help to indicate, the rhetorical uniqueness of metaphor is
its substitution of one word for another. This is true regardless of whether this substitutionary
transference moves from genus to species, species to genus, species to species or by analogy. After all,
metaphor is a rhetorical possibility of nouns, and nouns are words.
4

But assuming this is an accurate reading of Aristotles position, why does Ricoeur need to go
beyond it in order to have metaphorical reference? He answers, If the metaphorical term is really a
substituted term, it carries no new information, since the absent term (if one exists) can be brought
back in; and if there is no information conveyed, then metaphor has only an ornamental, decorative
value.
viii
This is really the crux of Ricoeurs problem with Aristotles substitutionary theory: namely, that
metaphor is nothing more than ornamental dress on a preexisting, real meaning that could, if
necessary, be expressed without metaphor. If metaphorical reference were possible, it would be
because there is a way in which metaphor designates reality that is irreducible to non-metaphorical
expression. Put simply, there would have to be such a thing as properly metaphorical truth.
Ricoeurs task of going beyond Aristotle, then, can be summed up as the task of developing a non-
substitutionary theory of metaphor.
Freges sense-reference distinction
Perhaps the most interesting appropriation in Ricoeurs project of metaphorical reference is that
of Gottlob Freges distinction between sense and reference, which comes through most clearly in an
article of the same name.
ix
Roughly put, this distinction differentiates the properly linguistic content of
a sentence (the sense) and the non-linguistic reality (the reference) that the sentence designates.
Frege is important for Ricoeur because, unlike Aristotle, the Austrian logicians philosophy of language is
concerned primarily with sentences rather than words. If Ricoeur can show that metaphors have both
sense and reference, then he will have overcome the Aristotelian ornamental account of metaphor
with his concept of an irreducibly metaphorical truth. In order to understand this part of the project,
though, it is important to clarify some things about Freges distinction.
It is well known that Frege was a mathematician and logician before he was a philosopher in any
proper sense. It should come as no surprise, then, that in On Sense and Reference he is concerned
first and foremost with a logical puzzle: namely, how are the statements a = a and a = b both similar
5

and different? They are both statements of identity, and they are both statements of identity involving
the same variable a. Thus, in an obvious way, the two statements refer to the same non-linguistic
reality.
x
However, as Frege remarks in his essay, the two statements are obviously statements of
differing cognitive value; a = a holds a priori and, according to Kant, is to be labelled analytic, while
statements of the form a = b often contain very valuable extensions of our knowledge and cannot
always be established a priori.
xi
The task at hand for Frege, then, is providing a linguistic ontology that
can account for this differing cognitive value between these two identity statements without
retreating into the shaky confines of psychologistic subjectivism. That is to say, the differences between
a = a and a = b have to include something that is more than just the convention of individual minds.
Freges solution to this puzzle is expressed well in his analogy of a lunar telescope aimed at the
moon. In this analogy, there are three relevant objects that correspond to the Freges linguistic
ontology.
1. Reference is the moon itself: because it is the object of the telescopes gaze, the moon is
analogous to the reference of a proper name.
2. Sense is the real image in the interior of the telescope: although the language of image might
suggest that it is subjective, Frege means to say that this real image is analogous to the
objective sense of a sentence. The point is that, like the sense of a sentence, the real image
would be there regardless of whether someone were actually there to see it.
3. Idea is the impressed image in the mind of the observer: because this image resides in the
imagination of the human observer, it is analogous to what Frege calls the idea of the
sentence. It is subjective.
xii

Two of these three components of sentences are objective in the sense that they do not depend on the
individual minds thinking them. The reference, which is the object that the sentence picks out, is
6

obviously objective. This is because the alternativethat the moon disappears when we look away from
it or stop thinking about itis untenable.
The real innovation in Freges linguistic ontology, however, is the objectivity of sense. To extend
the moon analogy further, it is perfectly sensible to think that there can be more than one real image
of the same moon in different telescopes. These real images exist apart from those observing them, yet
they still point beyond themselves to their objective references. Crucially, the sense of a sentence is its
well-formed logical structure. This logical structure is a necessary condition for the sentences truth
value. It is that which allows for a successful correspondence between a linguistic sentence and a non-
linguistic object. Thus, in a logically perfect language, all linguistic senses would have truth valuewhich
means they would all refer to non-linguistic objects. This logically perfect language is Freges project of
Begriffschrift.
xiii
Frege accomplishes his initial task by saying that a = a and a = b are different in their
objective senses, but identical in their equally objective references.
It is clear, then, that Ricoeurs interest in Freges distinction between sense and reference has to
do with the possibility of metaphorical referencethat is, the capacity of metaphors to designate non-
linguistic reality. There is an immediate problem to be overcome, however, when we examine Frege
further. Because only well-formed sentences can refer,
xiv
all poetic language is mere colouring and
shading that is not objective.
xv
Simply put, metaphors do not refer because they deviate from the
literal meaning that is a necessary condition for the well-formed structure of propositions. So, even
though his linguistic ontology is concerned with sentences rather than words, Frege is still committed to
the Aristotelian ornamental view of metaphorical language. In order to sketch a theory of metaphorical
reference, then, Ricoeur must go beyond both Aristotle and Frege.
Heidegger and a-letheia
Although Ricoeurs particular project of metaphorical reference brings him to appropriate the
work of Aristotle and Frege, the French hermeneut is indebted most to Martin Heidegger. Indeed, it is
7

Heidegger who proves to be most important for going beyond the substitutionary theories of metaphor
in both Aristotle and Frege. For our purposes, it is Heideggers innovative understanding of truth as a-
letheia that propels Ricoeurs project of metaphorical reference beyond the substitutionary theory. But
what is Heideggers understanding of truth as a-letheia? It is probably the most important and difficult
single innovation in Heideggers oeuvre,
xvi
but perhaps the easiest way to understand it is to compare it
with a more standard correspondence theory of truth. Although not an advocate of correspondence
theory, Freges sense-reference distinction does assume a split between linguistic (sense) and non-
linguistic reality (reference)precisely the kind of split that Heidegger wants to overcome with
a-letheia.
Heidegger reads Thomas Aquinas familiar formulation of truthadaequatio rei et intellectus
as the paradigmatic statement of truth as the agreement of the judgment with its object.
xvii
That is to
say, the word truth simply refers to a harmonious relationship of agreement with an object in the
world. According to Heidegger, this formulation is the most articulate expression of the philosophical
foundations of what would eventually become the modern correspondence theory of truth.
The question Heidegger wants to ask is as follows: namely, With respect to what do intellectus
and res agree? In their kind of being and essential content do they supply anything at all with respect to
which they can agree?
xviii
These questionsquestions about the ontological condition of possibility for
the agreement of intellect and thingclear the ground for Heideggers investigation of truth as a-
letheia. Whatever this more primordial meaning of truth is, it has to provide intelligibility for the
adaequatio relation.
For Heidegger, this primordial meaning of truth is grounded phenomenologically, which is
simply to say thatprior to the mode of abstraction characteristic of the subject-object relationthings
are revealed to human Dasein in a pre-theoretical mode of what Heidegger calls being-in-the-world.
This mode of being is characterized by the fundamental unity of this all-too-common experience. In the
8

pre-theoretical mode of being-in-the-world, things are not isolatable objects for analysis in the field of
vision of an individual subject who resembles a disinterested observer. Instead, things always reveal
themselves in the midst of a unified nexus of past conditions and future possibilities.
Heideggers phenomenological account of a-letheia could be understood as a reversal of Frege,
who conceives of truth solely as the reference of well-formed sentences that can be abstracted from
what is otherwise unintelligible language. Conversely, for Heidegger, being-in-the-world embodies
precisely the sort of unity that is needed to form the ground in which the terms of the adaequatio
relation share their revelatory origin.
xix
This processthe revelation of beings to Dasein in the mode of
being-in-the-worldis what Heidegger means by a-letheia. Thus, being-true as being-revealed is only
possible in the ground of being-in-the-world. This phenomenon, in which we recognized a basic
constitution of Dasein, is the fundamental element of the primordial phenomenon of truth.
xx
As he says
elsewhere, things are revealed to Dasein in different ways within the pre-theoretical mode of being-in-
the-world. It is precisely the process of how things are revealed in the mode of being-in-the-world that is
Heideggers a-letheia.
xxi
This definition of truth as a-letheia is not a mere explanation of words *a la
Frege]; rather, it grows out of the analysis of the relations of Dasein which we are initially accustomed to
call true.
xxii
These relations of Dasein, which together form a unified experience in which truth and
being are indistinguishable as transcendentals.
xxiii
They are the elusive but ubiquitous conditions of
possibility for any other kind of truth.
Returning to Ricoeur, then, perhaps it is possible to see why Heideggers project of a-letheia is
so important for a potential doctrine of metaphorical reference. Since the unity of being qua being and
truth qua truth are only available in pre-theoretical experience, any theoretical account that attempts to
map them in a univocal way is doomed from the outset. It is the task of metaphoror, for Heidegger,
the poetic
xxiv
to give shape to truth as a-letheia. On this account, it is quite clear why any
substitutionary account of metaphor will fail. Since metaphor is tasked with giving a unique shape to a-
9

letheia, it is by nature irreducible to non-metaphorical language. Not only is metaphorical truth a
possibility, it is actually a condition of possibility for any truth at all.
Thus, before any talk of transference (Aristotle) or reference (Frege) can take place, there is
always a-letheia. To substitute the former for the latter is to suffer from what Heidegger calls
Seinsvergessenheit, the forgetfulness of being.
xxv

Metaphorical Reference in The Rule of Metaphor
Before examining Study 7 of The Rule of Metaphor, it is worth recapping what we have already
seen in Ricoeurs use of Aristotle, Frege and Heidegger. In Aristotle, we see an impressive division of
kinds of metaphor, all of which a transference of meaning from one noun to another. Despite his
indebtedness to Aristotles development of the idea in the first place, Ricoeur finds that an account of
metaphor that remains at the level of transference between words will not get him what he wants in
metaphorical reference. In Frege, we see a movement from words to sentences, which is precisely what
Ricoeur needs in order to develop metaphorical reference. However, on Freges terms alone, the
distinction between sense and reference is only useful for analyzing literal, logically well-formed
sentencesthereby excluding the possibility of truthful metaphorical or poetic language altogether.
Finally, Heidegger breaks fresh ground with his account of truth as a-letheia, which seems finally to open
up possibilities for truthful metaphor. So, although Heideggers account seems the most promising for
Ricoeurs project, it is yet unclear how a synthesis of all three is possible. This synthesis is the central
task of a doctrine of metaphorical reference.
Ricoeurs strategy for such a synthesis involves a crucial distinction between what he calls first-
level and second-level reference.
xxvi
By first-level reference, Ricoeur means nothing more than what
Frege has already developed with his analogy of the lunar telescope. It is the process by which an
objective sense picks out an objective referent, as a label marks what it labels.
xxvii
The French
hermeneuts innovation, though, is the concept of second-level reference, which involves the
10

metaphors destruction of literal meaning in order to exemplify a deeper, more appropriate
meaning.
xxviii
This exemplification is not mere sentimentality (as opposed to reality); on the contrary, its
objects are the various contours of an unquantifiable reality that Heidegger calls being-in-the-world.
But this remains vague. In order to grasp what is going on in Ricoeurs concept of second-level
reference, we have to give an account of metaphorical meaningthat is, we have to pay close attention
to the way successful metaphors work. In order to do this, we need a good example, which Ricoeur
gives with a comparison of two sentences about a painting:
1. The painting is grey.
2. The painting is sad.
Ricoeur wants to say that both of these sentences are trueeven that both of these sentences have real
truth-makers.
xxix
However, they are true in different ways. (1) is a case of first-level or literal reference.
It is a logically well-formed sentence with two proper names that refer to two objectspainting and
grey. Translated into Freges Begriffschrift, sentence (1) might run as follows: There is one and only
one thing that is both a painting and grey (x){(Px & Gx) & [(y)(Py & Gy) (y = x)]}. In this sentence,
there are no signs that fail to map onto their respective discrete, quantifiable objects. Even the sentence
as a whole has such an object: namely, a positive truth value.
But if we apply the same sort of analysis to sentence (2), we are doomed to failure. In the words
of Gilbert Ryle, we commit a category mistake if we say that paintings are the kinds of things that can
be happy or sad.
xxx
Ricoeur does not contest this conclusion. Indeed, to attribute emotions to an
inanimate object is to commit a category mistakeat the level of literal predication, of course. But this
latter qualification is crucial. Since the concept of reference is not exhausted by Fregean literal
denotation, Ricoeur is committed to saying that some category mistakes still refer appropriately to
another, second level of reality:
11

Ryles idea of category-mistake is retained as well, which moreover was also referential; I say
that the painting is sad rather than gay, even though only sentient beings are gay or sad.
Nevertheless, there is a metaphorical truth here, for the mistake in label application is
equivalent to the reassignment of a label, such that sad is more appropriate than gay. The
literal falsity, through misassignment of a label, is transformed into metaphorical truth through
reassignment of the label.
xxxi

In the destruction of the literal, first-level denotation, metaphor successfully produces a new referent:
namely, the grey paintings sadness. This new metaphorical reference is unlike the referent of first-level
denotation in at least three important ways:
1. Its object is not discrete or isolatable in the sense that it can be numerically quantified as one
or more among others; rather, it is a seeing-as that is irreducibly qualitative.
xxxii

2. It does not achieve its end only via discovery; instead, in the destruction of first-level
denotation, any distinction between invention and discovery is blurred to the point of its
disappearance altogether. In other words, it is not incoherent to say that its referent is both
invented and discovered.
xxxiii

3. It refers not by denotation, but by exemplification.
xxxiv

It is difficult to give a systematic account of this phenomenon of metaphorical reference if for no other
reason than the fact that, for Ricoeur, it is the process from which (rather than to which) we reason.
There are false metaphors, but it is difficult to describe them in any more compelling way than that
their destruction fails to yield an appropriate exemplification. If we say that our grey painting is happy,
for instance, we know that this is not quite right. In the words of Heidegger, perhaps it is correct to say
that this false metaphor initiates a process of concealment rather than revelation. As Wittgenstein
once said, we bump up against the limits of our language if we try to describe this process with some
sort of enclosed system.
xxxv
Indeed, sometimes we have to show rather than say.
12

In sum, then, Ricoeurs doctrine of metaphorical reference hinges upon his distinction between
first and second-level reference. The latter implies a special kind of destruction of the formerone that
involves a new kind of appropriateness that is just as real (perhaps even more so) as the first. With
this, it seems that Ricoeur has done his best to achieve the aforementioned synthesis of Aristotle, Frege
and Heidegger. Indeed, Aristotles account of transference has been retained; for metaphorical
reference requires exactly this kind of movement from first-level to second-level reference. Frege has
been retained as well; for the distinction between sense and reference is the guiding framework for the
entire investigation. Finally, Heidegger too has been retained, since the referent of second-level
reference is a being-as that is proper to Heideggers concept of truth as a-letheia.
Of course, it is also easy to see why Ricoeurs doctrine of metaphorical reference eliminates any
substitutionary account of metaphor. Since second-level reference is an irreducibly metaphorical
process whose referent is a mode of being-as, it is impossible to replace any true metaphor with a first-
level denotation, whose object is a quantifiable object. Thus, it would appear that the task of
metaphorical reference has been met.
From reference to application: The case of Time and Narrative
Ten years after the original publication of The Rule of Metaphor, Ricoeur published the third
volume of Time and Narrative. Although the latter text shares some fundamental similarities with the
former, the latters repudiation of metaphorical reference makes for at least an equally significant
departure from the former. In order to account for this departure, we have to grasp an important shift in
Ricoeurs thinking: namely, the shift from reference to application as a paradigm for understanding
the relationship between poetic language and reality:
In moving away from the vocabulary of reference, I am adopting instead that of "application,"
handed down by the hermeneutical tradition and awarded a new place of honor by Hans-Georg
13

Gadamer in his Truth and Method. . . . Indeed, it is only through the mediation of reading that
the literary work attains complete significance.
xxxvi

The substance of this shift is nothing less than Ricoeurs revision of what he means by reality and
unreality.
xxxvii
As we have seen, in The Rule of Metaphor Ricoeur follows Frege in making a distinction
between linguistic sense and non-linguistic reference, and extending the range of that distinction to
include metaphorical language. Indeed, it is precisely this distinction that marks what he means by
poetic discourse that is not simply self-referential. In Time and Narrative, by contrast, the question is
about the nature of mediation between the world of poetic language and the readers inhabited world.
This question, according to Ricoeur, reveals some fundamental problems for the distinction between
linguistic sense and non-linguistic reference. By adopting Gadamers hermeneutical paradigm of
application, Ricoeur thinks that these problems can be overcome in the act of reading, which is unified
to such an extent that the distinction between sense and reference cannot yet arise. Rather than
understanding reality as one side of the bridge connecting sense and reference, it becomes instead a
hermeneutical circle whose center is the convergence of the world of the text and the readers
inhabited world.
The question remains, though: why adopt the paradigm of application as opposed to reference?
Ricoeur answers just a couple of paragraphs later: *I+n the previous work, I thought I could retain the
vocabulary of reference, characterized as the redescription of the poetic work at the heart of everyday
experience.
xxxviii
This seems fair enough. The vocabulary of reference, as we have seen, emphasizes the
transcendent quality of the text (i.e. the process of going-beyond-itself) by joining the process of
invention and discovery in metaphorical language. It is Ricoeurs next point, however, that seems to be
problematic from the paradigm of application: *in The Rule of Metaphor] I also ascribed to the poem
itself the power of transforming life by means of a kind of short-circuit operating between the seeing-
as, characteristic of the metaphorical utterance, and being-as, as its ontological correlate.
xxxix

14

It is this metaphorthe metaphor of a short-circuit between metaphorical sense and
referencethat is the issue here. Even though Ricoeur admits that his doctrine of metaphorical
reference rightly breaks down a clean distinction between linguistic sense and non-linguistic reference
via the unique phenomenon of exemplification (as opposed to denotation), how this happens is better
explained with the paradigm of application as opposed to reference. Instead of relying too heavily on
the written metaphor, Ricoeur is convinced that the truth-conducivity of metaphorical language is, most
importantly, the confrontation between two worlds, the fictive world of the text and the real world of
the reader. With this, the phenomenon of reading became the necessary mediator of refiguration.
xl
Put
simply, it is the encounter in the act of readingnot the written metaphor itselffrom which the true
meaning of the metaphor springs.
To anticipate an objection, though, this does not abolish the integrity of the text itself or its
author. It simply refuses to subsume other factors under them: namely, factors that concern the sort of
communication that finds its starting point in the author, crosses through the work, and finds its end-
point in the reader.
xli
This three-part process must be understood as a whole and in dialectical tension,
without reducing one or more of the parts to another. Thus, insofar as the hermeneutical paradigm of
application attempts to understand the text simply as the encounter between the world of the author
and that of the reader, it is better suited to the task of understanding metaphorical language than is the
paradigm of reference. The latter paradigm cannot perform this function because it inevitably makes
literal, first-level language the primary analogate to which all metaphorical language is merely a
derivation. As Ricoeur himself notes, this derivative nature of metaphorical language is evidenced in the
dubious split between seeing-as and being-as, which represent the respective sense and reference
unique to metaphor.
xlii
The simple fact is that this kind of distinction is an obstacle to be overcome if we
are to retain what Ricoeur elsewhere calls the ontological testimony of Heideggers being-in-the-
world.
xliii

15

Indeed, it is fitting to conclude with Heidegger; for it seems clear that it is the German who wins
the day in Time and Narrative. Although he does not mention it explicitly, perhaps the deepest problem
with his doctrine of metaphorical reference is that it reverses the innovation of the aforementioned
Heideggerian insight of a-letheia. We have already seen how Ricoeur attempts to retain Heideggers a-
letheia in the form of second-level reference. That is, in the destruction of first-level, literal meaning, a
new appropriateness is exemplified rather than denoted. Our example was the metaphorical sentence,
The painting is sad, which is true in the sense that it accomplishes an exemplification characteristic of
a-letheia.
But there is a problem here that becomes clear in the context of Ricoeurs concerns in Time and
Narrative. In fact, the problem is rooted into the very name of second-level reference itself: namely, the
secondary status of metaphorical reference. If indeed a necessary condition of metaphorical reference is
the breakdown of literal, first-level denotation, then it is a-letheia that is derivative of the
correspondence relation between sense and reference. Yet, as we have seen, for the Heideggerian, this
is backwards. It is the correspondence relation between sense and reference that is the derivation of a
more primordial a-letheia; for human Dasein is always-already inhabiting a reality that is characterized
by the unity of subject and object that is unique to the mode of being-in-the-world.
When Ricoeur advocates his return to the act of reading as the locus from which metaphorical
meaning springs, he is simultaneously advocating a return to a-letheia as the primordial meaning of
truth itself. Thus, when Ricoeur admits of his over-reliance upon the text itself in The Rule of Metaphor,
he is admitting that he has not done justice to the phenomenological ontology he was trying to preserve
all along. The world simply is not revealed to us pre-packaged in the form of sense and reference.
Indeed, to come full-circle, it is a different Aristotle who propels this Heideggerian move in Ricoeurthe
Aristotle who says that all knowledge begins in the senses.
xliv
Of course, the real Aristotelian insight
here is not some kind nave empiricist reductionism. On the contrary, the insight is captured in the
16

phenomenological motto, To the things themselves!
xlv
as opposed to the abstractions characteristic
of modern isms such as modern realism and idealism. It just so happens that, for Ricoeur, the
metaphor of reading is the best way to capture the concreteness of this encounter with things as they
are given in the mode of being-in-the-world. Only here, in the nexus relationships and meanings joined
in the act of reading, can we begin to appreciate the world-shaping power of metaphor.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that Ricoeurs project of metaphorical reference remains an impressive
philosophical project just in terms of its sheer scope. This attempted synthesis of Aristotelian
transference, the Fregean sense-reference distinction and Heideggerian fundamental ontology testifies
to Ricoeurs versatility and creativity as a philosopher. Nevertheless, as he admits himself in Time and
Narrative, the project is ultimately unsuccessful as a theory that purports to explain the truch-telling
capacities of metaphor.
While it is certainly possible to synthesize the projects of either Aristotle and Frege or Aristotle
and Heidegger, it turns out to be quite impossible to synthesize all three. The development of the
positions of Frege and Heidegger are just too different. This is not to say that the project of
metaphorical reference was ultimately some kind of waste of time. On the contrary, the project has its
own truth-telling capacities insofar as it reveals some core commitments of three great thinkers that
would not have been revealed otherwise. At least one of these truths seems to be the divergence of two
Aristotelian traditions: namely, the logico-mathematical tradition in Frege, and the phenomenological
tradition in Heidegger. If not diametrically opposed, these two traditions are at least opposed to the
extent that each seeks to subsume the others core commitments under its own core commitments. This
is evidenced in Freges reduction of poetic language and Heideggers reduction of correspondence,
respectively.
17

At the end of the day, despite his venerable willingness to engage analytic philosophy on its own
terms, Ricoeur is a Heideggerian. He wants to affirm the truth-telling capacities of metaphor by
emphasizing the mystery of beingnot the analytic precision of a logical atomism. The repudiation of
one of his most innovative theories, I submit, ultimately owes itself to this fundamental commitment.




















18









i
Paul Ricoeur, The Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination and Feeling, Critical Inquiry 5.1 (1978), 153.
ii
Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative Vol. 3 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), 158.
iii
Aristotle, Poetics in The Basic Works of Aristotle edited by Richard McKeon (New York: Random House, 1941),
1456b.
iv
Ibid., 1457b.
v
Paul Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor (London: Routledge, 2003), 1.
vi
Ibid., 20.
vii
Ibid., 15.
viii
Ibid., 21.
ix
See Gottlob Frege, On Sense and Reference in Translations from the Philosophical Writings of Gottlob Frege,
3rd edition edited and translated by Peter Geach and Max Black (Oxford: Blackwell, 1980), 36-56.
x
According to the later developments of Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein, we could say that the two
statements refer to the same factalthough this specific language was not yet available to Frege. See Ludwig
Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus translated by C.K. Ogden (London: Kegan Paul, 1922), 1-2.011.
xi
Frege, On Sense and Reference, 36.
xii
Ibid., 39-40.
xiii
Ibid., 48.
xiv
By well-formed, Frege means those sentences for which a truth value is the referent. See Ibid.
xv
Ibid., 40.
xvi
In Wissenschaft und Besinnung, Heidegger lists nine independent texts in which he discusses his concept of truth
as a-letheia at length. This does not even include another extended treatment in his masterwork, Being and Time.
See Martin Heidegger, Wissenschaft und Besinnung in Martin Heidegger Gesamtausgabe 66 (Frankfurt am Main:
Vittorio Klostermann Verlag, 1997), 107.
xvii
Martin Heidegger, Being and Time (New York: State University of New York Press, 2010), 214.
xviii
Ibid., 216.
xix
Martin Heidegger, The Origin of the Work of Art in Basic Writings (New York: Harper Perennial, 2008).
xx
Heidegger, Being and Time, 219.
xxi
Ibid., 218.
xxii
Ibid., 220.
xxiii
This is an ancient commitment going back to the Pre-Socratics. As Heidegger remarks, In ontological
problematics, being and truth have been brought together since ancient times, if not even identified. Heidegger,
Being and Time, 183.
xxiv
Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor, 271.
xxv
Heidegger, Being and Time, 2.
xxvi
Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor, 261.
xxvii
Ibid., 275.
19


xxviii
Ibid., 276.
xxix
As the name suggests, truth-makers are the kinds of things that make things (e.g. propositions) true.
xxx
For this concept in its original context, see Gilbert Ryle, The Concept of Mind (London: Hutchinson House, 1951),
16.
xxxi
Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor, 278.
xxxii
Ibid., 272.
xxxiii
Ibid., 283.
xxxiv
Ibid., 272.
xxxv
See Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, translated by Charles Kay Ogden (London: Kegan Paul,
1922), 9 (preface).
xxxvi
Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 158.
xxxvii
Ibid., 157-8.
xxxviii
Ibid., 159.
xxxix
Ibid.
xl
Ibid.
xli
Ibid.
xlii
See Ibid.
xliii
See Paul Ricoeur, On Interpretation in From Text to Action II, translated by Kathleen Blamey and John B.
Thompson (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1991), 20.
xliv
Aristotle, Metaphysics in The Basic Works of Aristotle edited by Richard McKeon (New York: Random House,
1941), 980a.
xlv
Martin Heidegger, Zur Sache des Denkens (Tubingen: M. Niemeyer, 1988), 87.