The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast Ep. 384: Graham Harman's Object-Oriented Ontology (Part Three)
Feb 9, 2026
A lively dive into aesthetics as a route to hidden reality. They unpack how metaphor might create new objects and whether art gives indirect access to things-in-themselves. Theatricality comes up: viewers standing in for objects. Debates probe if metaphors yield cognition or only feeling and whether inwardness implies isolated noumena.
AI Snips
Chapters
Books
Transcript
Episode notes
Metaphor As Indirect Access To Reality
- Harmon argues indirect, metaphorical cognition gives access to aspects of reality literal description misses.
- Metaphor and aesthetics create new objects that reveal inwardness without providing propositional knowledge.
Objects Have A Receding 'I'-Like Inwardness
- Harman borrows Kant's idea that things-in-themselves remain inaccessible and calls their perspective a "zero-person" aspect.
- He likens objects' inwardness to an 'I' that always recedes from both first- and third-person description.
Metaphor Creates New Experiential Objects
- Ortega's metaphor example (cypress as a dead flame) shows metaphor creates a new object by fusing feelings.
- Harmon rejects model-based metaphor theories and stresses metaphor's role in producing experiential unity, not literal isomorphism.
