tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post5553911835093011389..comments2023-06-08T07:32:39.725-05:00Comments on Aristotle's Feminist Subject: Aristotle: "Avoid Ambiguities"J. K. Gaylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07600312868663460988noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-71245510163363268142008-02-06T15:09:00.000-06:002008-02-06T15:09:00.000-06:00Kurk,I wondered how it was that you came to know V...Kurk,<BR/>I wondered how it was that you came to know VNese. Did you read my ancient post that had a reference to cursing in VNese? If not, it's <A HREF="http://englishbibles.blogspot.com/2006/03/why-not-have-majestic-or-biblical.html" REL="nofollow">here</A>.<BR/><BR/>Sometime, off line, I'd like to find out what was likely said. I'm not squeamish about these things the way most evangelicals are, because I've done linguistic work on interjections. (I wrote the <A HREF="http://www.oup.com/us/brochure/0195139771/?view=usa" REL="nofollow">Oxford Encyclopedia of Linguistics</A> article on interjections.)Richard A. Rhodeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14227550014596898280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-38047201496679374592008-02-06T10:21:00.000-06:002008-02-06T10:21:00.000-06:00Rich, So glad you feel free to use the expletive "...Rich, So glad you feel free to use the expletive "Rats!" My siblings and I, once upon a time, were prolific comic book readers and learned that word there (I think it was from Charlie Brown); but our father(an evangelical Christian missionary in Vietnam the last 10 years of the war) forbade us from using such belligerent language (i.e., words and meanings all over again). To be fair to Dad, there were other words (Vietnamese words, which should NOT be used in comments on this blog!) which had for us children and our playmate friends and enemies meanings that he didn't share (although with these words there were sufficiently unambiguous pragmatic-only meanings for Dad). So the Vietnamese words couldn't be spoken around home either.<BR/><BR/>Appreciate your comments and the links here. Am tracking those down (and for anyone else doing the same, the "article...quite useful" is here: <A HREF="http://www.stanford.edu/~zwicky/ambiguity-tests-and-how-to-fail-them.pdf" REL="nofollow">http://www.stanford.edu/~zwicky/ambiguity-tests-and-how-to-fail-them.pdf</A>) Some of this may deserve a separate blog post.J. K. Gaylehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07600312868663460988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-72855557825532000242008-02-05T15:22:00.000-06:002008-02-05T15:22:00.000-06:00Rats, I forgot to say that Aristotle's example of ...Rats, I forgot to say that Aristotle's example of the oracle, is prototype vagueness.Richard A. Rhodeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14227550014596898280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-69586513169779909312008-02-05T15:20:00.000-06:002008-02-05T15:20:00.000-06:00Yes. The hoi poloi use the word ambiguous ambiguou...Yes. The hoi poloi use the word <I>ambiguous</I> ambiguously to mean either 'ambiguous' or 'vague'.<BR/><BR/>And the hoi poloi include dictionary makers (notoriously bad at semantics), literary translators, and Aristotle himself.<BR/><BR/>This is a backhanded way of saying that these are technical terms. It's only linguists who make the distinction between ambiguity and vagueness.<BR/><BR/>But the distinction is quite robust, even if there isn't an excluded middle. See this <A HREF="www.stanford.edu/~zwicky/ambiguity-tests-and-how-to-fail-them.pdf " REL="nofollow">article</A>. And it is quite useful.<BR/><BR/>You might also find the subdistinctions that specialized linguists make to be of interest, esp. the one numbered 4 <A HREF="http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/robyn/relevance/relevance_archives/0333.html" REL="nofollow">here</A>.<BR/><BR/>Notably absent from the discussion thus far is <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gricean_maxim" REL="nofollow">Grice</A>, whose maxims include:<BR/><BR/>"Avoid ambiguity."<BR/><BR/>By which he meant ambiguity in the non-technical sense, unless you consider that he covers prototypical vagueness under the maxim of quantity.<BR/><BR/>We really should talk about Grice separately, because the understanding of contextualization that's implicit in his thinking convinces me that there's less ambiguity and vagueness around than the written word -- esp. those words that are "remote" in Pete Becker's sense -- leads us to think. (Alton "Pete" Becker was a student of Pike's in the 60's and is very interested in <A HREF="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3654/is_199903/ai_n8851438" REL="nofollow">translation issues</A>.)<BR/><BR/>So on to the question of parables. That's what I was trying to get at when I mumbled that stuff about καθεδρα being ambiguous in a third way.<BR/><BR/>Parables are spang on specific as first order communication, but they have interesting second order meanings, and the difficulty of connection to those second order meanings render them, in some sense, both vague and ambiguous.Richard A. Rhodeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14227550014596898280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-22887326762591718822008-02-05T13:58:00.000-06:002008-02-05T13:58:00.000-06:00Fair enough, Rich.Let's not be vague about what Ar...Fair enough, Rich.<BR/><BR/>Let's not be vague about what Aristotle surely, unequivocally means.<BR/><BR/>But I didn't make all this stuff up. Note all the ambiguities <A HREF="http://www.answers.com/main/ntquery?s=vagueness&gwp=13" REL="nofollow">in "vagueness" here</A>; and all of the vagueness <A HREF="http://www.answers.com/ambiguity?cat=biz-fin&gwp=13" REL="nofollow">in "ambiguity" there</A>.<BR/><BR/>I do appreciate your endorsement of my "wrap around thing" (which I say is both ambiguous and vague).<BR/><BR/>But why do you suppose all the English translators of Aristotle's Greek <I>Rhetoric</I> (of 1686, 1818, 1823, 1890, 1926, 1954-the one I quoted at length here, 1960, 1991, and 2007), why do you suppose they mistranslate Aristotle's "vagueness" as "ambiguity"? Bad linguists who don't know better? And what of George A. Kennedy's footnote on his transliteration: “An amphiboly (lit. ‘what shoots both ways’) is an equivocation based on a word or phrase with an ambiguous meaning, often creating a fallacious argument”?<BR/><BR/>Now I don't expect you to defend all bad translators just as you don't expect me to defend all bad feminists. But don't you think that it's the translation method, the very call to eliminate sloppiness in language that Aristotle makes here, that each of the translators is following?<BR/><BR/>And would you say a parable is vague or ambiguous? Or (ambiguously) both?<BR/><BR/>Thank you again for the conversation (and your clarifications)!J. K. Gaylehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07600312868663460988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3931921496989071942.post-76971521654347522752008-02-05T13:19:00.000-06:002008-02-05T13:19:00.000-06:00OK, I'll bite.Linguists have long distinguished be...OK, I'll bite.<BR/><BR/>Linguists have long distinguished between between vagueness and ambiguity. Vagueness is when you give too little information:<BR/><BR/>"Honey, some guy called today and said he can't come until tomorrow."<BR/><BR/>Ambiguity is when there are two distinct interpretations:<BR/><BR/>"Visiting relatives can be dangerous."<BR/><BR/>(a) going to visit relatives can be dangerous.<BR/>(b) relatives coming to visit can be dangerous.<BR/><BR/><BR/>(OK, I'll cop to the fact that there's a small middle ground between vagueness and ambiguity, but the distinction is clear most of the time, and is quite useful.)<BR/><BR/>Aristotle rails against vagueness, not ambiguity.<BR/><BR/>And there is a third kind of thing that could legitimately be called ambiguity. That is when an expression is used pragmatically to convey its implication rather than it's reference, as in our discussion of καθεδρα some time back.<BR/><BR/>The metaphor of a "wrap around thing" is perfect for vagueness.Richard A. Rhodeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14227550014596898280noreply@blogger.com