TED演讲：暗喻言说(1)

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　　We utter about six metaphors² a minute. 于我们的言谈中，每分钟大约会出现六个暗喻。

　　Metaphorical³ thinking is essential to how we understand ourselves and others, 暗喻思维是一把钥匙，它可以开启我们相互理解

　　how we communicate, learn, discover and invent. 沟通、学习、发现和创新的大门。

　　But metaphor is a way of thought before it is a way with words. 首先，暗喻是一种思维方式。

　　Now, to assist me in explaining this, I've enlisted⁴ the help of one of our greatest philosophers, 为了说明这一点，我请教了一位当代最伟大的哲学家，

　　the reigning⁵ king of the metaphorians, a man whose contributions to the field are so great that he himself has become a metaphor. 当权的暗喻皇帝，一位因其对暗喻学的巨大贡献而自身成了一位暗喻的人物。

　　I am, of course, referring to none other than Elvis Presley. 当然，我指的不是别人，正是猫王埃尔维斯-普雷斯利。

　　Now, "All Shook Up" is a great love song. 好，《神魂颠倒》（意即整个人都被动摇了）是一首经典情歌。

　　It's also a great example of how whenever we deal with anything abstract 也是一个极好的暗喻范例，它诠释了当我们面临抽象事物时，

　　ideas, emotions, feelings, concepts, thoughts -- we inevitably⁶ resort to metaphor. 无论是主意、情绪、感觉、概念亦或是思想，都不得不求助于暗喻。

　　In "All Shook Up," a touch is not a touch, but a chill. 在《神魂颠倒》中，触摸不再是触摸，而是寒气。

　　Lips are not lips, but volcanoes. She is not she, but a buttercup. 嘴唇不再是嘴唇，而是火山。她不再是她，而是毛茛花（一种小黄花）。

　　And love is not love, but being all shook up. 爱情也不再是爱情，而是变得神魂颠倒了。

　　In this, Elvis is following Aristotle's classic definition of metaphor 在这里，埃尔维斯采用的完全是亚里士多德对暗喻的经典定义，

　　as the process of giving the thing a name that belongs to something else. 亦即是把B事物的名称赋予给A事物的过程。

　　This is the mathematics of metaphor. And fortunately it's very simple. X equals Y. 这就是暗喻的数学公式。幸好它很简单。X等于Y。

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