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The symbolism is important too. If the company is dedicated to reviving the canary, then that helps miners believe that the company also cares about their lives and will work to rescue them in case of a disaster.

If they don't care about the death of the canary in the coal mine...

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Huh, so the physical canary in the coal mine is also a metaphorical “canary in the coal mine” with respect to the company’s level of prudence. Is there a word for something which is analogy for itself?

A recursive analogy?

Though a quick verbatim google search reveals no precedent in linguistics... so I may have just invented that one.

or they don't use the word recursive to describe two meanings, rather than recursion.

Unless I misread it, it seems to be the same meaning in both cases?

So, a missing canarie can mean a lack of good air, or lack of employer caring about non-human (and to some extent human) health.

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