In linguistic text, ambiguity is the possibility of two quite different meanings with exactly the same wording. Identifying and correcting ambiguity can sharpen your writing and copy-editing skills. Ambiguity occurs in all languages, but English is particularly prone. Unlike other Germanic languages, much of its morphological grammar was stripped away more than a thousand years ago; so the way modern English phrases and clauses relate to each other is complicated, and many words can function in several ways.
The same word, for example, can often serve as a noun or a verb ("Union demands increased unemployment", "we saw her duck"), and many words have multiple meanings ("prostitutes appeal to the pope", "the children made tasty meals"). There can be grammatical ambiguity, beyond the scope of individual words: "we asked how old Joe was" (how old was he? or how was he doing?); and "The chicken is ready to eat" (ready for us to eat it, or ready to eat its feed in the yard?).
English does have unfortunate engineering faults, such as the idiomatic ambiguity in "I can't recommend this dish too highly";1 and let's not forget words that—embarrassingly—can convey starkly opposite meanings ("in this city they sanction drug-dealing"; "she secretly replaced the cup she had chipped"). Hyphens (and en dashes) can make a difference ("a senior class teacher" is a class teacher who is senior, but "a senior-class teacher" teaches a senior class; see MOS:HYPHEN). So can commas ("The author thanked her parents, Sinéad O'Connor and President Obama", referring to four rather than two people).
Ambiguity may be removed by changing the word order, the grammar, or the punctuation, or by substituting a word that is unambiguous in the context.
The exercises below are meant to be entertaining. Often the task is a puzzle, and some of the unintended meanings can be amusing. To make it more challenging, ambiguous sentences are mixed randomly with some that are unambiguous: it would be too easy if you knew that every example was ambiguous. Some that are ambiguous would be perfectly fine in a larger context, and some wouldn't; but here, you're asked to consider the examples in isolation. This is a laboratory situation, if you like.
Visitors—why not register as a Wikipedia editor? Please consider the satisfaction you might gain from joining the global effort to build the largest repository of knowledge in human history, by becoming a registered editor. It's simple, free, confidential, and takes about five minutes. Share your knowledge with the world, and contribute only the amount of time you choose. (Of course, you're still welcome to do the exercises without registering.)
Feedback on how to improve these exercises is welcome on the talk page.
1Some of the examples in the lead are adapted from a book by Noel Burton-Roberts, from a NYT-affiliated website, and from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, all cited below.
Self-help writing tutorials:
Instructions
- For each exercise, we ask you to decide whether the sentence is ambiguous.
- If you think there's no possible double meaning, click on the box labelled Not ambiguous.
- If you think it is ambiguous, try to identify the two meanings in your mind, and then click open the box labelled Ambiguous.
First set
A
The missing iPod was found by the hotel.
Instructions: Decide whether this is ambiguous or not; then click on your decision. (If you think it is ambiguous, first think through what the alternative meanings are.) Then click on show at the right of whichever decision you've made.
Sorry, it is ambiguous. The crux of the problem lies in the word "by".
The missing iPod was found by the hotel.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.
B
System 2 in Kahneman’s scheme is our slow, deliberate, analytical, and consciously effortful mode of reasoning about the world.
True. This is adapted from a New York Times book review of Daniel Kahneman's transformative work, Thinking, Fast and Slow (2012).
Please proceed to the next example.
C
Some of Bangkok's poorest people live on water.
No, it is ambiguous. The ambiguity lies in "live on":
Some of Bangkok's poorest people live on water.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.
D
This is the only documentary ever on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96) filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer.
No, there's uncertainty about "ever" and how it relates to the last part of the sentence.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.Correct. Without a comma after "(1824–96)", there's a tugging towards the meaning that it was the only documentary on the composer that Fischer filmed in the 1970s.
So, "This is the only documentary on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96), filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer,"
or "This is the only documentary on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96), which was filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer."
E
The flagship event takes place in Delhi, where the prime minister hoists the national flag at the Red Fort and delivers a nationally broadcast speech from its ramparts.
You're right!
Please proceed to the next example.
F
They have shared views on the euro crisis.
No, it is ambiguous. The ambiguity lies in "shared".
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.You're right.
- Meaning 1: They have shared their views on the euro crisis.
- Meaning 2: They share the same view on the euro crisis.
Second set
G
Nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
Wrong: the problem is "Nearby".
Nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
Think again and click below.Correct. Is Epsilon Aurigae nearby something else, just mentioned previously?
- Meaning 1: Nearby is Epsilon Aurigae, an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
or if you like: The nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
- Meaning 2: Epsilon Aurigae is nearby an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
H
The dogs barked at the gate.
Wrong: the problem is "at".
Think again and click below.Yes. At is the problem. Are the dogs barking while they stand at the entrance (the verb is "bark"), or are they looking at the entrance and barking at it (the phrasal verb is "bark at")?
Whether and how you rephrase this depends on the context. The example comes from a promotional page for Noel Burton-Roberts's book Analysing sentences: an introduction to English syntax, 3rd ed., Pearson Longman, 2010.
I
Hawking's unimpressive study habits resulted in a final examination score on the borderline between first- and second-class honours, making an oral examination necessary.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
J
One of his fellow judges, Sir Robin Dunn, described him as the worst judge since the war.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
K
Include the dinner guests when preparing the roast lamb.
Yup.
- Meaning 1: Ask the guests to help with the cooking.
- Meaning 2: Account for the number of dinner guests when judging how much lamb to cook.
- Meaning 3: Put the guests in the oven with the lamb.
L
The government is ready to share the lessons learned with the people.
Third set
M
Put the ornament on the chair by the door in the living room.
Here are the three possible meanings:
- Put the ornament onto the chair that is by the door in the living room.
- Take the ornament that is on the chair and put it by the door in the living room.
- Take the ornament off the chair that is by the door and put it in the living room.
N
This function will add pages you move to your watchlist.
Correct.
- Meaning 1: This function will add to your watchlist any pages you move.
- Meaning 2: This function will add [to some unstated list?] any pages you move to your watchlist.
The difference is whether the verbal item is "add" or "add to".
The ambiguous phrase is adapted from an option descriptor in WP's editor preferences page (Watchlist tab).
O
Critical attention has focused on changing patterns of media consumption and engagement.
Right.
- Meaning 1: Critical attention has focused on patterns of media consumption and engagement that are changing.
- Meaning 2: Critical attention has focused on how to change patterns of media consumption and engagement.
P
The scenes in which Mulder infiltrates the facility were shot at a real United States airbase.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.Q
Beer drinkers are turning to powder.
R
It is one of a group of closely related animals that are descended from a common ancestral line of toads and which form a species complex.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
Fourth set
S
She spoke about the idea of information patterns that can't physically exist in that video.
Correct.
- Meaning 1: In that video she spoke about the idea of information patterns that can't physically exist.
- Meaning 2: She spoke about the idea of the information patterns that can't physically exist within that video.
T
Everyone in San Francisco is thinking about someone in Sacramento.
U
Desha argued that a large standing army provided the advocates of a larger federal government with an excuse to increase taxes, and proposed that the standing army consist of only 6,000 men.
V
The current laws are designed to prevent media companies from gaining dominance in any one capital city by limiting their ownership of television.
Correct. Who's doing the limiting? The laws or the media companies?
- Meaning 1: By limiting media companies' ownership of television, the current laws are designed to prevent them from gaining dominance in any one capital city.
- Meaning 2: The current laws are designed to prevent media companies from gaining dominance in any one capital city, which those companies could do by limiting their ownership of television.
W
The impact on the world economy of new and rapid networks of transport and communications at the end of the 19th century was at least as dramatic as the transformation wrought by the Internet and the deregulation and liberalization of financial markets a century later.
X
More surprisingly to Halperin, some gay commentators were extremely critical, seeing in his course descriptions a reversal of blatant stereotypes that excluded many homosexual men.
Correct. Was it the course descriptions or the blatant stereotypes that excluded many homosexual men? I'm still unsure.
The sentence is from Dennis Altman's review of David M Halperin's new book How To Be Gay (Sydney Morning Herald, 29–30 September 2012). The wickedest thing Altman says, by the way, is: "More interesting than the book is that [it's] published by Harvard University Press ..."!Y
We enable code contributions from community and staff while protecting the quality and security of MediaWiki as it supports our projects.
Z
The government retreated from its undertaking to maximise free speech by minimising racial-hatred protections.
Fifth set
AA
“and good will toward the project – a remarkable feat of altruism – could hardly be higher”
Correct. How to reword? One way is to make the subject not "good will toward the project" (with "good will" as the head), but "the project". Maybe this?
“and the project – a remarkable feat of altruism – could hardly be enjoying higher levels of good will”
It's the only ambiguity in Andrew Lih's excellent piece "Can Wikipedia Survive" in The New York Times Sunday Review, 20 June 2015.See also
External links
- The New York Times About.com on grammar and composition
- The Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (particularly sections 3 and 4)
In linguistic text, ambiguity is the possibility of two quite different meanings with exactly the same wording. Identifying and correcting ambiguity can sharpen your writing and copy-editing skills. Ambiguity occurs in all languages, but English is particularly prone. Unlike other Germanic languages, much of its morphological grammar was stripped away more than a thousand years ago; so the way modern English phrases and clauses relate to each other is complicated, and many words can function in several ways.
The same word, for example, can often serve as a noun or a verb ("Union demands increased unemployment", "we saw her duck"), and many words have multiple meanings ("prostitutes appeal to the pope", "the children made tasty meals"). There can be grammatical ambiguity, beyond the scope of individual words: "we asked how old Joe was" (how old was he? or how was he doing?); and "The chicken is ready to eat" (ready for us to eat it, or ready to eat its feed in the yard?).
English does have unfortunate engineering faults, such as the idiomatic ambiguity in "I can't recommend this dish too highly";1 and let's not forget words that—embarrassingly—can convey starkly opposite meanings ("in this city they sanction drug-dealing"; "she secretly replaced the cup she had chipped"). Hyphens (and en dashes) can make a difference ("a senior class teacher" is a class teacher who is senior, but "a senior-class teacher" teaches a senior class; see MOS:HYPHEN). So can commas ("The author thanked her parents, Sinéad O'Connor and President Obama", referring to four rather than two people).
Ambiguity may be removed by changing the word order, the grammar, or the punctuation, or by substituting a word that is unambiguous in the context.
The exercises below are meant to be entertaining. Often the task is a puzzle, and some of the unintended meanings can be amusing. To make it more challenging, ambiguous sentences are mixed randomly with some that are unambiguous: it would be too easy if you knew that every example was ambiguous. Some that are ambiguous would be perfectly fine in a larger context, and some wouldn't; but here, you're asked to consider the examples in isolation. This is a laboratory situation, if you like.
Visitors—why not register as a Wikipedia editor? Please consider the satisfaction you might gain from joining the global effort to build the largest repository of knowledge in human history, by becoming a registered editor. It's simple, free, confidential, and takes about five minutes. Share your knowledge with the world, and contribute only the amount of time you choose. (Of course, you're still welcome to do the exercises without registering.)
Feedback on how to improve these exercises is welcome on the talk page.
1Some of the examples in the lead are adapted from a book by Noel Burton-Roberts, from a NYT-affiliated website, and from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, all cited below.
Self-help writing tutorials:
Instructions
- For each exercise, we ask you to decide whether the sentence is ambiguous.
- If you think there's no possible double meaning, click on the box labelled Not ambiguous.
- If you think it is ambiguous, try to identify the two meanings in your mind, and then click open the box labelled Ambiguous.
First set
A
The missing iPod was found by the hotel.
Instructions: Decide whether this is ambiguous or not; then click on your decision. (If you think it is ambiguous, first think through what the alternative meanings are.) Then click on show at the right of whichever decision you've made.
Sorry, it is ambiguous. The crux of the problem lies in the word "by".
The missing iPod was found by the hotel.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.
B
System 2 in Kahneman’s scheme is our slow, deliberate, analytical, and consciously effortful mode of reasoning about the world.
True. This is adapted from a New York Times book review of Daniel Kahneman's transformative work, Thinking, Fast and Slow (2012).
Please proceed to the next example.
C
Some of Bangkok's poorest people live on water.
No, it is ambiguous. The ambiguity lies in "live on":
Some of Bangkok's poorest people live on water.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.
D
This is the only documentary ever on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96) filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer.
No, there's uncertainty about "ever" and how it relates to the last part of the sentence.
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.Correct. Without a comma after "(1824–96)", there's a tugging towards the meaning that it was the only documentary on the composer that Fischer filmed in the 1970s.
So, "This is the only documentary on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96), filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer,"
or "This is the only documentary on the famous composer Anton Bruckner (1824–96), which was filmed in the 1970s by Hans Conrad Fischer."
E
The flagship event takes place in Delhi, where the prime minister hoists the national flag at the Red Fort and delivers a nationally broadcast speech from its ramparts.
You're right!
Please proceed to the next example.
F
They have shared views on the euro crisis.
No, it is ambiguous. The ambiguity lies in "shared".
Try thinking it through again; then click on the next box.You're right.
- Meaning 1: They have shared their views on the euro crisis.
- Meaning 2: They share the same view on the euro crisis.
Second set
G
Nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
Wrong: the problem is "Nearby".
Nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
Think again and click below.Correct. Is Epsilon Aurigae nearby something else, just mentioned previously?
- Meaning 1: Nearby is Epsilon Aurigae, an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
or if you like: The nearby Epsilon Aurigae is an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
- Meaning 2: Epsilon Aurigae is nearby an eclipsing binary with an unusually long period.
H
The dogs barked at the gate.
Wrong: the problem is "at".
Think again and click below.Yes. At is the problem. Are the dogs barking while they stand at the entrance (the verb is "bark"), or are they looking at the entrance and barking at it (the phrasal verb is "bark at")?
Whether and how you rephrase this depends on the context. The example comes from a promotional page for Noel Burton-Roberts's book Analysing sentences: an introduction to English syntax, 3rd ed., Pearson Longman, 2010.
I
Hawking's unimpressive study habits resulted in a final examination score on the borderline between first- and second-class honours, making an oral examination necessary.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
J
One of his fellow judges, Sir Robin Dunn, described him as the worst judge since the war.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
K
Include the dinner guests when preparing the roast lamb.
Yup.
- Meaning 1: Ask the guests to help with the cooking.
- Meaning 2: Account for the number of dinner guests when judging how much lamb to cook.
- Meaning 3: Put the guests in the oven with the lamb.
L
The government is ready to share the lessons learned with the people.
Third set
M
Put the ornament on the chair by the door in the living room.
Here are the three possible meanings:
- Put the ornament onto the chair that is by the door in the living room.
- Take the ornament that is on the chair and put it by the door in the living room.
- Take the ornament off the chair that is by the door and put it in the living room.
N
This function will add pages you move to your watchlist.
Correct.
- Meaning 1: This function will add to your watchlist any pages you move.
- Meaning 2: This function will add [to some unstated list?] any pages you move to your watchlist.
The difference is whether the verbal item is "add" or "add to".
The ambiguous phrase is adapted from an option descriptor in WP's editor preferences page (Watchlist tab).
O
Critical attention has focused on changing patterns of media consumption and engagement.
Right.
- Meaning 1: Critical attention has focused on patterns of media consumption and engagement that are changing.
- Meaning 2: Critical attention has focused on how to change patterns of media consumption and engagement.
P
The scenes in which Mulder infiltrates the facility were shot at a real United States airbase.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.Q
Beer drinkers are turning to powder.
R
It is one of a group of closely related animals that are descended from a common ancestral line of toads and which form a species complex.
True.
Please proceed to the next example.
Fourth set
S
She spoke about the idea of information patterns that can't physically exist in that video.
Correct.
- Meaning 1: In that video she spoke about the idea of information patterns that can't physically exist.
- Meaning 2: She spoke about the idea of the information patterns that can't physically exist within that video.
T
Everyone in San Francisco is thinking about someone in Sacramento.
U
Desha argued that a large standing army provided the advocates of a larger federal government with an excuse to increase taxes, and proposed that the standing army consist of only 6,000 men.
V
The current laws are designed to prevent media companies from gaining dominance in any one capital city by limiting their ownership of television.
Correct. Who's doing the limiting? The laws or the media companies?
- Meaning 1: By limiting media companies' ownership of television, the current laws are designed to prevent them from gaining dominance in any one capital city.
- Meaning 2: The current laws are designed to prevent media companies from gaining dominance in any one capital city, which those companies could do by limiting their ownership of television.
W
The impact on the world economy of new and rapid networks of transport and communications at the end of the 19th century was at least as dramatic as the transformation wrought by the Internet and the deregulation and liberalization of financial markets a century later.
X
More surprisingly to Halperin, some gay commentators were extremely critical, seeing in his course descriptions a reversal of blatant stereotypes that excluded many homosexual men.
Correct. Was it the course descriptions or the blatant stereotypes that excluded many homosexual men? I'm still unsure.
The sentence is from Dennis Altman's review of David M Halperin's new book How To Be Gay (Sydney Morning Herald, 29–30 September 2012). The wickedest thing Altman says, by the way, is: "More interesting than the book is that [it's] published by Harvard University Press ..."!Y
We enable code contributions from community and staff while protecting the quality and security of MediaWiki as it supports our projects.
Z
The government retreated from its undertaking to maximise free speech by minimising racial-hatred protections.
Fifth set
AA
“and good will toward the project – a remarkable feat of altruism – could hardly be higher”
Correct. How to reword? One way is to make the subject not "good will toward the project" (with "good will" as the head), but "the project". Maybe this?
“and the project – a remarkable feat of altruism – could hardly be enjoying higher levels of good will”
It's the only ambiguity in Andrew Lih's excellent piece "Can Wikipedia Survive" in The New York Times Sunday Review, 20 June 2015.See also
External links
- The New York Times About.com on grammar and composition
- The Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (particularly sections 3 and 4)