[lit-ideas] Re: Conversation Without Implicature
- From: John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 25 Jun 2011 20:17:43 -0400
Thanks, Donal. The usual case is, to put it another way, that people agree
on a definition, with or without wiggle room, that fits what they are trying
to do. Mathematicians are more precise than lawyers, who, in turn, are more
precise than actors or admen. Once again, I invoke the Sage, in that passage
to which Robert Paul pointed us some years ago:
Our discussion will be adequate if it has as much clearness as the
> subject-matter admits of, for precision is not to be sought for alike in all
> discussions, any more than in all the products of the crafts. Now fine and
> just actions, which political science investigates, admit of much variety
> and fluctuation of opinion, so that they may be thought to exist only by
> convention, and not by nature. And goods also give rise to a similar
> fluctuation because they bring harm to many people; for before now men have
> been undone by reason of their wealth, and others by reason of their
> courage. We must be content, then, in speaking of such subjects and with
> such premisses to indicate the truth roughly and in outline, and in speaking
> about things which are only for the most part true and with premisses of the
> same kind to reach conclusions that are no better. In the same spirit,
> therefore, should each type of statement be received; for it is the mark of
> an educated man to look for precision in each class of things just so far as
> the nature of the subject admits; it is evidently equally foolish to accept
> probable reasoning from a mathematician and to demand from a rhetorician
> scientific proofs.
Cheers,
John
On Sat, Jun 25, 2011 at 4:50 PM, Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:
>
> --- On Sat, 25/6/11, John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> From: John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Conversation Without Implicature
> To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Date: Saturday, 25 June, 2011, 19:45
>
> >Quick online searches in a variety of dictionaries suggest that the
> primary definitions of ambiguity are
>
> 1. Indistinct or obscure, or
> 2. Susceptible of two or more interpretations>
>
> Clearly something like the seven types of ambiguity discussed by Empson are
> very different to the meaning given here in relation to "math":
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambiguity
> But then those seven types are some way off the topic as it is being
> discussed. According to that "math" meaning, something that is _vague_ and
> thus indistinct or obscure, is not therefore ambiguous (because it will be
> too vague or indistinct to be susceptible of alternative interpretations);
> and something susceptible of alternative interpretations is therefore not
> vague in this sense [the problem with "He was trapped in a vice", when
> determining what proposition is meant, is not vagueness but ambiguity in
> sense (2) of the dictionary definition given]:-
> "Ambiguity is a term used in writing and math, and under conditions where
> information can be understood or interpreted in more than one way and is
> distinct from vagueness, which is a statement about the lack of precision
> contained or available in the information."
> This would suggest that meaning (1) is a loose if prevalent use of the term
> but is not strictly accurate - as with many prevalent meanings of terms that
> refer to linguistic properties: for not only is meaning (2) more correct but
> that meaning is, analytically, distinct _and even opposed_ to the meaning of
> (1).
>
> >I have no trouble believing that lawyers would like to see ambiguity as a
> choice between distinct meanings, since it is their job to argue for one or
> another. But the the assumption that there must be distinct meanings, as
> opposed, for example, to a soup of nuances, seems to me, like the assumption
> that there must be a clear answer to every question, disputable.>
>
> The fact that every p has its negation, and these must be distinct - as
> they are logically contradictory, is enough to show there are distinct
> meanings and not merely a soup of nuances. Wider than that, the assumption
> that a "soup of nuances" can somehow exist without there being any "distinct
> meanings" floating in it, seems even more questionable than the fairly
> innocuous assumption that there are "distinct meanings". That "distinct
> meanings" are sometimes (or even always) distinct as a matter of degree
> would not make them not distinct.
>
> What lawyers may say, as laymen if honest may agree, is that if a practical
> decision [such as what obligation exists under a contract] depends on
> resolving an ambiguity in sense (2), then it can be done quite
> satisfactorily in most cases. The argument that resolution of "distinct
> meanings" cannot be done, because these do not exist and all is but a "soup
> of nuances", does not cut much ice. Ditto in "math", I would guess. Other
> worlds, like the creative ones of poetry and advertising, may be able to
> affect a more dismissive stance re "distinct meanings", though I would guess
> even in these worlds this does not extend to the bottom line.
>
> Donal
> Salop
>
>
>
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--
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
Tel. +81-45-314-9324
jlm@xxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.wordworks.jp/
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