Conceptual Blending Theory

Conceptual Blending Theory explains how our minds combine different ideas or mental spaces to create new, meaningful concepts. When we encounter two separate ideas—like "a spaceship" and "a whale"—our brain can blend aspects of both to imagine things like a "whale-shaped spaceship." This blending process helps us understand new possibilities, solve problems, and create stories by integrating familiar concepts in innovative ways. It’s a fundamental mental mechanism that underpins creativity, language, and thought, allowing us to make sense of complex or novel ideas by mixing known elements into new constructs.