The human nervous system evolved for the control of complex physical actions - but we are far from understanding our capacity for complex abstract thought.

This exciting journey into the evolutionary processes that allowed humans to deal with abstract phenomena by putting them in concrete terms has been initiated by a question posed by psychologist Daniel Casasanto: „Are abstract concepts are like dinosaur feathers?”

Can abstract and concrete thinking both be based on a single perceptual mechanism grounded in physical experience? Could that mechanism be conceptual metaphorisation?

The author of this book proposes a new perspective on the conceptual role of metaphors. Filled with theoretical analyses and empirical research on the speech and gesture of seeing, blind and visually impaired children, this book demonstrates that the basis for abstract thought may well lie in physical experience.