Emergence of a coherent metaphor

I'm currently reading Emergence by Steven Johnson, and it's a good book overall. But every so often he includes a paragraph of dizzying mixed metaphors, like this:

The pattern-seeking algorithms of emergent software are already on their way to becoming one of the primary mechanisms in the great Goldberg contraption of moden social life--as familiar to us as more traditional devices like supply and demand, representational democracy, snap polls. Intelligent software already scans the wires for constellations of book lovers or potential mates. In the future, our networks will be caressed by a million invisible hands, seeking patterns in the digital soup, looking for neighbors in a land where everyone is by definition a stranger.

I like how that last sentence goes from erotic to gastronomic to what may be a veiled reference to Robert Heinlein. Also, I think I'd prefer digital bouillabaisse. But anyway, these are petty criticisms. I think I just wanted Johnson to be as good at explaining complex ideas as James Gleick or Richard Rhodes.

(The simplified pencil sharpener is one of my favourite Goldberg devices, and I work it into presentations on usability whenever I can.)