Die Blitzartigkeit der kleinen Form. Gedanken über die Metapher im Bezug auf die Wissenslehre bei Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

Many of the aphorisms that Georg Christoph Lichtenberg collected in his notebooks, the "Sudelbüchern", are devoted to discoveries in the field of electricity and light phenomena. They prove to be a favourable occasion to highight the non-deductive and anti-causalistic mindset of this ingenious thinker, who suitably deploys metaphors to draw attention to the need for establishing a relationship between sensible experience and imagination. Metaphors encompassing scientific knowledge and wit turn out to be a critical picklock used by Lichtenberg to debunk ignorance and superstition.