nature plays her symphony of meaning on a clavier of environments

An example of an extended metaphor and personification of nature in a scientist's writing,

"There are not only the manifolds of space and time in which things can be spread out. There is also the manifold of environments, in which things repeat themselves in always new forms. All these countless environments provide, in the third manifold, the clavier on which Nature plays her symphony of meaning beyond time and space.

In our lifetime, the task is given to us to form with our environment a key in the gigantic clavier over which an invisible hand glides, playing."

Uexküll, J. v. (2010). A Foray into the Worlds of Animals; with, A Theory of Meaning (Joseph D. O'Neil, Trans.). University of Minnesota Press.

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Author: Keith

Former school and college science teacher, teacher educator, research supervisor, and research methods lecturer. Emeritus Professor of Science Education at the University of Cambridge.