Imagine trying to describe the vast emptiness of space without leaning on metaphors from Earth. Pretty hard, right? When we talk about the universe, whether it’s in science fiction or everyday conversations, we almost can’t help but picture it through the only lens we truly know: life here at home. That’s exactly what linguist Kajsa Törmä, freshly minted PhD in English linguistics at Umeå University, has been studying. And her research suggests we may never be able to escape those earthly comparisons.
Funerals in Space, with a Touch of the Sea
Take this scene you’ve probably watched in space operas: someone dies in space and their body is placed in an airlock, then released into the stars. It’s moving, dramatic—and deeply familiar. In reality, it’s just a sea burial transposed to the cosmos. Instead of waves and a horizon, there’s silence and infinite black sky.
Törmä points out that this is what we do—when faced with something unimaginable, like death in orbit, we reach for metaphors rooted in the rituals of Earth. Even among the stars, our language is anchored to the shore.
The Strange Case of “Beaming”
Movement in space gets the same treatment. Words like flying, floating, and traveling are our go‑tos for describing journeys across the universe. But what about the most fantastical of them all—teleportation?
Here, our words bump into the limits of reality. Technically speaking, nobody’s flying anywhere. The body is dismantled in one location and reconstructed somewhere else. Yet the language we use—“beam up,” “beam over,” “beam between”—all assumes a path, a direction, a road from A to B. It’s a perfect example, says Törmä, of how deeply tied we are to the idea of movement as a journey. Even when there’s no road, we imagine one.
Why Metaphors Work (and Why They Mislead)
Metaphors are tricky little things. They illuminate some truths while hiding others. When we call space an “ocean,” we capture the sense of mystery, danger, and vastness. But at the same time, we oversimplify—because space is nothing like water.
As astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has noted through his own vivid comparisons, metaphors don’t deliver equations or measurements, but rather a perspective. You feel the smallness of human understanding. That’s the power of metaphor: it doesn’t give you numbers, it gives you perspective.
The Beautiful Cage of Language
At the end of the day, Törmä’s work is a reminder that language is both a tool and a trap. It lets us make sense of alien worlds, but it’s built entirely on Earthbound experience. Roads, seas, burials, journeys—these are the building blocks we always return to.
So maybe we’ll never escape our human perspective completely. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Those “slanted” metaphors, as imperfect as they are, might be the very thing that allows us to edge closer to the incomprehensible. Without them, the universe wouldn’t just feel unknowable—it might feel unapproachable.
What to Remember
- Kajsa Törmä, PhD in English linguistics at Umeå University, studies metaphors in science fiction, popular science, and space narratives.
- We often imagine space through earthly metaphors: seas, paths, burials.
- Even teleportation, which technically has no movement, is described as if it does.
- Metaphors simplify reality but also make it emotionally graspable.
- Cosmic “ocean” imagery captures the limits of our understanding in a way numbers alone cannot.
✨ A question for you:
If you had to describe something unimaginably vast—like the universe, time, or even love—what metaphor would you choose?