 is to be understood as saying that (an) A has enough of the features of (a) B that are salient in the present context. Or if you prefer, (an) A is similar enough to (a) B in respects that concern aspects of (a) B that are salient in the present context. What counts as enough in the way of shared salient B-features or enough in the way of similarity to B in salient B-respects depends in turn on the contextually salient interests or concerns that are understood to motivate the making of the comparison in the first place. So whether they are to be taken literally or figuratively, unqualified simple comparisons have highly context-sensitive truth conditions.