从隐喻到明喻——人类思维发展进程中的一座里程碑

现代隐喻学认为,隐喻是人类最古老最基本的认知思维方式,所以,对隐喻和明喻的区别必须从人类认知思维产生发展的历史角度予以说明。由此发现,隐喻和明喻的根本区别在于它们分别代表了人类认识世界的两个基本维度——事物间的相似性和相异性,以及两种基本的认知方式——感性直觉的求同认识和综合同异的理性认识。隐喻和明喻从形式到内容、从语义特征到功能效用等方面的一系列不同特征,只有在这一本源性质区别的意义上才能得到终极的说明。

From Metaphor to Simile——A Milestone in the Course of Human's Thinking Progress

Modern metaphor admits that metaphor is the oldest and most primary cognitive thinking mode of human being,therefore,distinguishing metaphor from simile must be illustrated from the perspective of the history of creation and development of human's cognitive thinking.Thereby,the ultimate distinction between metaphor and simile is that they respectively stand for two fundamental dimensionalities(comparability and heterogeneity) with which people cognize the world and two primary cognitive modes,seek-common-ground cognition and rational cognition.From forms to contents,from semantic characteristics to functional utility and so on,metaphor and simile share differences that can be explained only by making clear the different sources of each.