Computational Models of Analogy-Making

Analogy-making is crucial for human cognition. Many cognitive processes involve analogymaking in one way or another: perceiving a stone as a human face, solving a problem in a way similar to another problem previously solved, arguing in court for a case based on its common structure with another case, understanding metaphors, communicating emotions, learning, translating poetry from one language to another (Gentner, Holyoak, & Kokinov, 2001). All these cases require an abstract mapping to be established between two cases or domains based on their common structure (common systems of relations). This may require re-representation of one (or both) of the domains in terms of the other one (or in terms of a third domain). The first domain is called the base (or source), and the second is referred to as the target.