different between ambiguous vs amphiboly

English

Etymology

From Latin ambiguus (“moving from side to side, of doubtful nature”), from ambigere (“to go about, wander, doubt”), from ambi- (“around, about, on both sides”) + agere (“to drive, move”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /æm?b??ju?s/

Adjective

ambiguous (comparative more ambiguous, superlative most ambiguous)

1. Open to multiple interpretations.

   Synonym: equivocal

   Antonym: unambiguous

2. (obsolete, of persons) Hesitant; uncertain; not taking sides.
   • 1662 Thomas Salusbury

     And forasmuch as in this same question I am ambiguous, and Simplicius is resolute....

Related terms

• ambages
• ambiguity
• ambiguate
• ambiguation
• disambiguation

Translations

See also

• contradictory
• mistakable
• confusing

Further reading

• ambiguous in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• ambiguous in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

References

• John A. Simpson and Edward S. C. Weiner, editors (1989) , “ambiguous”, in The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, ?ISBN

English

Etymology

From Old French amphibolie, from Latin amphibolia, from Ancient Greek ????????? (amphibolía, “ambiguity”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /am?f?b?li/

Noun

amphiboly (countable and uncountable, plural amphibolies)

1. (grammar) An ambiguous grammatical construction.
   • 1781, Kant, "Critique of Pure Reason," from John Meiklejohn 1855 translation

     Without this reflection I should make a very unsafe use of these conceptions, and construct pretended synthetical propositions which critical reason cannot acknowledge and which are based solely upon a transcendental amphiboly, that is, upon a substitution of an object of pure understanding for a phenomenon.

   • 1931, Adrian Coates, "Philosophy as Criticism and Point of View," Philosophy, vol. 6, no. 23, p. 339,

     By logical errors I mean such simple things as Equivocation, Amphiboly, and Begging the Question.

   • 1987, Jeffrey Buechner, "Radically Misinterpreting Radical Interpretation," The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, vol. 45, no. 4, p. 410,

     The language might be fraught with word ambiguity or sentence amphiboly.

Usage notes

• Strictly speaking, in an amphiboly the individual words are unambiguous; the ambiguity results entirely from the linguistic manner in which they have been combined.

Derived terms

• amphibology

Translations

See also

• equivocation

References

Anagrams

• ambophily