酸的輪廓：變化中的身體感

Tracing the Dynamic Contour of Sourness

許多詞彙可以用來描繪不同類別的感官知覺。這種跨界現象往往表示它們共享相同的動態輪廓。本文指出動態輪廓的概念能幫助我們對感官知覺作進一步的拆解與分析。動態輪廓不僅是感知世界的方式。透過類比的過程，可以將他人的動態輪廓模寫並拓印到自身，成為溝通的媒介。模寫與拓印是符號化的過程。這種符號卻與象徵符號有著不同的性質。不同的模寫與拓印有好壞之分，表示符號與表徵對象有內在的聯繫。象徵符號則是透過社會的約定俗成，將符號與表徵對象做出任意性的聯繫。此外，模寫與拓印追溯主體在時間流動中的感知的變化；象徵符號則將現象切割為一段段的同時限脈絡，以系統內部的關係來定義事物。本文將比較這兩種不同的符號，指出身體感可以提供一種不同於象徵符號的意義理論。

In the modern Chinese language the word sour (酸) is used to describe a wide variety of sensations. This paper shows that the cross-modality of sourness is based on a schematic of pointing upward or shrinking to a point from a flat plane. Thus Chinese experience sour not only as a taste but also as the sourness of sensitive teeth, sore muscles or ear-piercing sounds. From the idea of dynamic contour, this paper argues that sour should not be viewed as a simple and rudimentary sense category but rather can be further analyzed in terms of its schematic contour. Moreover, sourness is not to be identified through comparison and negation from other taste categories. Instead, it is by tracing the outline of the dynamic contour that Chinese identify sourness. This leads to a criticism of the idea of contextuality which dissolves the meaning of a thing to its relationship with other things. By tracing the dynamic contour of our sensations, we experience the world through the flow of time. This stands in sharp contrast to contextual paradigm that freezes time and identifies a thing by its relation to others things in a synchronic system. This paper also argues that dynamic contour may be a key to empathy, i.e., we grasp what others feel through mapping the dynamic contour of their senses. And the cross-modality in dynamic contour provides reference points for verification.