Talk:Syntactic ambiguity
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In business communication, emphasis is placed on clear and direct communication, yet it is also said that some business communication effectively employ ambiguity. What are some of the instances that require a degree of ambiguity, and what are the reasons they require it? I kindly need at least three examples. Thank you.
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[edit] More ambiguous sentences?
I enjoy these, is there a list or something of that kind on Wikipedia? -Iopq 07:39, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
You might like these: List_of_linguistic_example_sentences
[edit] "Which of the three?" But couldn't that also imply four people?
That is: "Zechariah, son of Berekiah, son of Iddo, and the prophet"?
- The prophet being Berekiah's wife? Good point. -md
[edit] "Sally" Statement
Technically, doesn't "Sally can not go to the movies" ONLY imply that she is capable of not going to the movies? I always thought that there was a distinct difference between "can not" and "cannot": the latter being incapable of doing something, the former being capable of not doing something (sort of a litote for being able to do something). What do you think? --LoganK 13:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
- I entirely agree in terms of English orthographic (or really typographic) conventions. But as a spoken utterance, it seems to me that "can not" and "cannot" are not normally audibly distinct (unless, that is, one is deliberately speaking clearly, e.g., if one is speaking over a bad mobile phone connection). Perhaps we could restore the example, if it is qualified as ambiguous only if spoken aloud? RobinJ 22:25, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Punctuation
What about the effect of punctuation, or lack of it ? Is this appropriate to discuss here ? The distinction is much clearer in the written form than in the spoken form.
e.g.
"What's that in the road ahead ?" vs. "What's that in the road, a head ?"
"What's this thing called love ?" vs. "What's this thing called, love ?" Organhead (talk) 13:19, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
