{
  "id": "touch.together",
  "term": "touch",
  "sense": "together",
  "pos": "verb",
  "status": "published",
  "level": 3,
  "arena": "E1",
  "domain": "physics",
  "style": null,
  "definition": "When there is no space between the boundaries of two things, and each can change the other.",
  "folk_gloss": null,
  "emergence": {
    "components": [
      "space.extent",
      "boundary.limit",
      "interaction.process",
      "change.process"
    ],
    "interaction": "The meeting of two boundaries in space enables mutual change, allowing energy or influence to pass between the things.",
    "novel_properties": [
      "mutual change",
      "contact-mediated interaction",
      "spatial continuity"
    ]
  },
  "examples": [
    {
      "text": "Two drops of mercury coalesce on a glass slide, instantly reshaping each other into a single sphere.",
      "domain": "physics"
    },
    {
      "text": "The human fingertip touches a hot stove, and both skin cells and nerve signals change in response.",
      "domain": "biology"
    },
    {
      "text": "Welding two steel beams in the Eiffel Tower frame fuses their surfaces into a single structural boundary.",
      "domain": "engineering"
    }
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "id": "interaction.process",
      "type": "enables",
      "note": "touch is the spatial precondition for direct interaction"
    }
  ],
  "used_by": [
    "beach.geographic",
    "click.mechanical",
    "contact.physical",
    "cross.symbol",
    "feel.sensory",
    "golf.sport",
    "hand.part",
    "held.grip",
    "hold.physical",
    "interacting.social",
    "people.social",
    "plug.electrical",
    "port.harbor",
    "search.action",
    "support.assistance",
    "surface.exterior",
    "upon.spatial",
    "web.structure"
  ],
  "forms": [
    "touch",
    "touched",
    "touches",
    "touching"
  ],
  "closed": true,
  "provenance": {
    "author": "hand",
    "date": "2026-07-29",
    "confidence": 1.0,
    "reconciled": {
      "by": "openrouter:qwen/qwen3-235b-a22b-2507",
      "date": "2026-07-31",
      "changed": "components",
      "note": "Added 'change.process' as a constitutive component since the definition requires that each thing can change the other, which is not entailed by 'interaction.process' alone. Definition remains correct "
    }
  },
  "canonical": "https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-touch.together"
}