Re: [math-fun] Quantifiers
Even with mathematics, stating the pigeon/person attack distribution is a challenge. Indeed, it could be the same pigeon attacking the same person. Every 30 seconds exactly? "The Seven Types of Ambiguity" by William Empson describes how English literature utilizes ambiguity. Nothing will come of nothing. Hilarie
Definitely recommend Empson's Seven Types of Ambiguity. Also his "The Structure of Complex Words". Empson was a poet and literary critic. The essence of poetry is the expression of multiple levels of meaning, which is obviously related to ambiguity. Ron Hardin, known in math circles for counting interesting combinatorial objects (another of today's subjects), introduced me to Empson. On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 9:43 AM Hilarie Orman <ho@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
Even with mathematics, stating the pigeon/person attack distribution is a challenge. Indeed, it could be the same pigeon attacking the same person. Every 30 seconds exactly?
"The Seven Types of Ambiguity" by William Empson describes how English literature utilizes ambiguity.
Nothing will come of nothing.
Hilarie
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Thanks, everyone, for teaching me about scoping, Empson, etc. (Speaking of ambiguity, I just remembered that some years ago I commented on math-fun about the differing connotations of the sentences “X did not deceive Y” and “Y was not deceived by X”. Not sure if that’s an example of general species of linguistic ambiguity or just an isolated oddity.) Jim
On 2020-06-15 11:27, James Propp wrote:
Thanks, everyone, for teaching me about scoping, Empson, etc.
(Speaking of ambiguity, I just remembered that some years ago I commented on math-fun about the differing connotations of the sentences “X did not deceive Y” and “Y was not deceived by X”. Not sure if that’s an example of general species of linguistic ambiguity or just an isolated oddity.)
"X did not deceive Y" is ambiguous, by itself, as so many other English sentences are, because of different connotations of the word "deceive". It could (at least) mean: "X did not <successfully> deceive Y" or "X did not <intentionally> deceive Y". In the former X could have intended to, but was unsuccessful. In the latter X may have succeeded in deceiving Y, despite having no intention to deceive.
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I think "deceive" includes intent. "X did deceive Y, in spite of having no intention to deceive" is a contradiction in terms. It should be "X unintentionally misled Y". Brent On 6/15/2020 12:12 PM, Michael Greenwald wrote:
On 2020-06-15 11:27, James Propp wrote:
Thanks, everyone, for teaching me about scoping, Empson, etc.
(Speaking of ambiguity, I just remembered that some years ago I commented on math-fun about the differing connotations of the sentences “X did not deceive Y†and “Y was not deceived by Xâ€. Not sure if that’s an example of general species of linguistic ambiguity or just an isolated oddity.) "X did not deceive Y" is ambiguous, by itself, as so many other English sentences are, because of different connotations of the word "deceive".
It could (at least) mean: "X did not <successfully> deceive Y" or "X did not <intentionally> deceive Y". In the former X could have intended to, but was unsuccessful. In the latter X may have succeeded in deceiving Y, despite having no intention to deceive.
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On 2020-06-15 22:42, Brent Meeker via math-fun wrote:
I think "deceive" includes intent. "X did deceive Y, in spite of having no intention to deceive" is a contradiction in terms. It should be "X unintentionally misled Y".
My comment was only about the negation, not about "X did deceive Y". If X misled Y, but not intentionally, (or if X intended to deceive Y, but did not succeed), wouldn't it still be correct, in both cases, to say "X did not deceive Y"? But I was wrong when I said this was ambiguous, because as Dan Asimov (and you, and others pointed out), "deceive includes intent". So, not ambiguous, just that from "X did not deceive Y" we cannot infer whether X didn't succeed, or X didn't try to deceive. My mistake.
Brent
On 6/15/2020 12:12 PM, Michael Greenwald wrote:
On 2020-06-15 11:27, James Propp wrote:
Thanks, everyone, for teaching me about scoping, Empson, etc.
(Speaking of ambiguity, I just remembered that some years ago I commented on math-fun about the differing connotations of the sentences “X did not deceive Y†and “Y was not deceived by Xâ€. Not sure if that’s an example of general species of linguistic ambiguity or just an isolated oddity.) "X did not deceive Y" is ambiguous, by itself, as so many other English sentences are, because of different connotations of the word "deceive".
It could (at least) mean: "X did not <successfully> deceive Y" or "X did not <intentionally> deceive Y". In the former X could have intended to, but was unsuccessful. In the latter X may have succeeded in deceiving Y, despite having no intention to deceive.
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The ambiguity that most often bothers me is announcements of the form, "Thirty per cent chance of rain today." I know rain is defined as a measure greater than 0.1" But what does the 30% mean? Does it mean there will be at least 0.1" of rain on 30% of the people within range of the radio station? Or does it mean that if you hear this a hundred times, all the people in range will experience rain 30 times? Brent On 6/15/2020 9:27 AM, Hilarie Orman wrote:
Even with mathematics, stating the pigeon/person attack distribution is a challenge. Indeed, it could be the same pigeon attacking the same person. Every 30 seconds exactly?
"The Seven Types of Ambiguity" by William Empson describes how English literature utilizes ambiguity.
Nothing will come of nothing.
Hilarie
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https://xkcd.com/1985/ On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 4:48 PM Brent Meeker via math-fun < math-fun@mailman.xmission.com> wrote:
The ambiguity that most often bothers me is announcements of the form, "Thirty per cent chance of rain today." I know rain is defined as a measure greater than 0.1" But what does the 30% mean? Does it mean there will be at least 0.1" of rain on 30% of the people within range of the radio station? Or does it mean that if you hear this a hundred times, all the people in range will experience rain 30 times?
Brent
On 6/15/2020 9:27 AM, Hilarie Orman wrote:
Even with mathematics, stating the pigeon/person attack distribution is a challenge. Indeed, it could be the same pigeon attacking the same person. Every 30 seconds exactly?
"The Seven Types of Ambiguity" by William Empson describes how English literature utilizes ambiguity.
Nothing will come of nothing.
Hilarie
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-- Forewarned is worth an octopus in the bush.
participants (6)
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Brent Meeker -
Hilarie Orman -
James Propp -
Michael Greenwald -
Michael Kleber -
Tom Duff