Analogy - or Cosmos vs. Universe

Here are just a few thoughts lacking even the defense of being finished:

• Analogy: to observe that two things are related, neither univocally nor equivocally.
  • "That dessert was sweet", "Her manner was sweet".
  • Obviously, the two uses of the term "sweetness" are not univocal; the sweetness of a dessert is not the same kind of sweetness as of a kindly woman's manner.
  • But neither are the two terms equivocal; we intuit that there is some correspondence between the two terms that cannot be ascribed to mere colloquialism; or, rather, that the colloquialism itself arises out of the intuition of correspondence.
• The Principle of Analogy: to say that Analogical Reasoning is valid because Analogy is a real, not mental, correspondence.
  • That "sweetness of dessert" and "sweetness of manner" are related is not a product of our own minds. If it were, we could not reason reliably using that relation.
  • We are not Kantians. We do not create "Reality" around us by virtue of some innate ideas, imperceptible because omnipresent. Our senses really perceive reality, not inherently-unmeaning phenomena.
• So, Analogy "works" because Analogy exists. There is an order relating different things, both within the same species and in totally-different genera.
• But this means that Reality itself is somehow highly ordered and highly structured. We might call this "κόσμος" ("kosmos", Cosmos).
  • One possible interpretation of the physical sciences — perhaps the most popular — is a kind of Materialistic Reductionism
    • "All that exists is material bodies. These bodies behave in apparently-reliable patterns, which we can express mathematically."
    • The universe is governed by unalterable mathematical relationships. Matter behaves as a universal "glob" within this universe.
    • (This was powerfully expressed, in embryo, by Lucretius.)
  • But this understanding of physical science is contradicted by this understanding of Analogy.
    • This Reductionism does not recognize things qua things. All "things" are nominal only; reality consists only in matter smashing together temporarily and (in the philosophical sense) "accidentally".
    • But Analogy requires that things really are things, both in their internal unity as themselves, and in their natural relation to everything else.
  • So which understanding do we accept as true? (If, indeed, there is no third option?)
  • Materialistic Reductionism is itself a fundamental metaphysic; i.e., it is an object of belief, because it is an axiom; and an axiom can only be the starting point of a system (and not be proved by the system itself).
  • But the Principle of Analogy (as here expressed) is itself a direct result of a fundamental metaphysic, "Dogmatic Empiricism" — or, if you will, "Common Sense" — which must itself also be an object of belief.

So it seems that one may be a Reductionist and have a Universe; or one may be an "Empiricist" and have a Cosmos. (Assuming that there is no third option in this respect. What would that be — Platonism?)