Metaphors Create Theories For Users

The notion of a spatial information theory is often understood in the sense of a theory underlying the design and implementation of geographic information systems (GIS). This paper offers a different perspective on spatial information theories, taking the point of view of people trying to solve spatial problems by using a GIS. It discerns a need for user level theories about spatial information and describes requirements for them. These requirements are then compared with various views on metaphors held in computer science and cognitive linguistics. It is concluded that a cognitive linguistics perspective on metaphors best matches the requirements for user level theories. Therefore, the user's needs for theories of spatial information should be dealt with by explicitly crafting metaphors to handle spatial information by human beings. The paper discusses traditional and possible future metaphor sources for spatial information handling tasks.

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