Philosophy Now Forum

Can someone help me identify the terms of art to use for the following sort of ambiguity? Suppose A is prospecting for gold but finds only fool's gold. Back at the saloon, A says, "I panned for fool's gold." I.e. the thing A panned for, and intended to pan for, gold, turned out not to be the thing found. But most hearers would assume that this sentence AS WORDED implies that A intended to find fool's gold.

Is there a name for this sort of ambiguity? It seems to have to do with extensional vs intensional reference. Or is there no ambiguity; is A just stating a falsehood?

unintended ambiguity happens a lot with users of the English language...

confusing the intention with the actual deed because of the verbiage chosen (particularly with translation out of context/understanding) can be troubling as well

-Imp

It might not be exactly what you wanted, but the language, if treated as pure formal statement, doesn't support the ambiguity at all. So for there to be more than one way of taking that statement there must be a context which provides for that.

For this, we are in the territory of Conventional Implicature. Here's a video (recommended), or here's the original paper on the subject (wonky scan)

So it could be for instance that within that saloon there would be a running joke of loudly announcing you panned for fool's gold as a way of saying you had a bad day at the river. The litteral words don't convey such meanings but the implicature sorts that out.

ficino wrote: ↑Sat Apr 22, 2023 3:28 pm Can someone help me identify the terms of art to use for the following sort of ambiguity? Suppose A is prospecting for gold but finds only fool's gold. Back at the saloon, A says, "I panned for fool's gold." I.e. the thing A panned for, and intended to pan for, gold, turned out not to be the thing found. But most hearers would assume that this sentence AS WORDED implies that A intended to find fool's gold.

Is there a name for this sort of ambiguity? It seems to have to do with extensional vs intensional reference. Or is there no ambiguity; is A just stating a falsehood?

I don't know the technical term. But I would say he communicated poorly, precisely as you say because of what, I would say, every hearer will assume. Or at least every hearer will assume the sentence means it was intentional and be confused. Why would he do that?

It turns out I was just panning fool's gold

is a lot better.

Or I was panning for gold but only got fool's gold.

Now it could be meant ironically. I can hear it as bitter. So for the speaker the meaning and intentional ambiguity might be slightly cathartic. So, good communication for his needs, not so good for his listeners.

I'd just call it poor communication with potentially good expressive value.

i would like to make the ambiguity even greater if I may. say there's also a guy named Fool who owns the land the river is on and therefore the gold found in it.

ficino wrote: ↑Sat Apr 22, 2023 3:28 pm Can someone help me identify the terms of art to use for the following sort of ambiguity? Suppose A is prospecting for gold but finds only fool's gold. Back at the saloon, A says, "I panned for fool's gold." I.e. the thing A panned for, and intended to pan for, gold, turned out not to be the thing found. But most hearers would assume that this sentence AS WORDED implies that A intended to find fool's gold.

Is there a name for this sort of ambiguity? It seems to have to do with extensional vs intensional reference. Or is there no ambiguity; is A just stating a falsehood?

To me there is no ambiguity.

A is just telling a lie, which, as you already asked, is thus just stating a falsehood.

There's a flower ... blue-pinkish ... grows among trees ... close to their exposed roots ... the air is damp ... mist surrounds the slopes ... a stream ... close by ... a fox laps up the crystal clear water ... frogs and ... tadpoles ... a white dress ... a foot, a leg ... Hi Tom!

promethean75 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 27, 2023 12:29 am i would like to make the ambiguity even greater if I may. say there's also a guy named Fool who owns the land the river is on and therefore the gold found in it.

Nice. To add to your line....

But it turns out the gold is of poor quality, so whoever is speaking is panning (in the film critic's sense of panning) Fool's gold.

And, of course, it could be that he or she was panning panning Fool's gold.

Which could mean in your scenario either criticizing the process of getting gold from Fool's property
or
criticizing criticizing getting gold from Fool's property because actually it's pretty good quality gold there.

ficino wrote: ↑Sat Apr 22, 2023 3:28 pm Can someone help me identify the terms of art to use for the following sort of ambiguity? Suppose A is prospecting for gold but finds only fool's gold. Back at the saloon, A says, "I panned for fool's gold." I.e. the thing A panned for, and intended to pan for, gold, turned out not to be the thing found. But most hearers would assume that this sentence AS WORDED implies that A intended to find fool's gold.

Is there a name for this sort of ambiguity? It seems to have to do with extensional vs intensional reference. Or is there no ambiguity; is A just stating a falsehood?

'I panned, but found only fool's gold', is what ACTUALLY happened, and thus IS True.

Now, ONLY IF 'A' ACTUALLY panned for fool's gold, which would NOT be the case here if the words, 'but finds ONLY fool's gold', IS to be accepted as True. See, one does NOT say NOR CLAIM, 'I panned for fool's gold, but ONLY found fool's gold', with ANY disappointment.

Furthermore, IF 'A' is prospecting for gold, then IF 'A' is Honest, then they would say, 'I panned for gold, but only found fool's gold', and would NEVER say NOR claim, 'I panned for fool's gold'.

Considering there is NO 'ambiguity' here, there is NO 'name' for ANY 'sort of ambiguity'. But, there is a Falsehood, and one of the names for 'this Falsehood', which is here, is Dishonesty.

ficino wrote: ↑Sat Apr 22, 2023 3:28 pm Can someone help me identify the terms of art to use for the following sort of ambiguity? Suppose A is prospecting for gold but finds only fool's gold. Back at the saloon, A says, "I panned for fool's gold." I.e. the thing A panned for, and intended to pan for, gold, turned out not to be the thing found. But most hearers would assume that this sentence AS WORDED implies that A intended to find fool's gold.

Is there a name for this sort of ambiguity? It seems to have to do with extensional vs intensional reference. Or is there no ambiguity; is A just stating a falsehood?

I think this is just inaccurate.
I think he would have said "I panned fool's gold!"
Whilst he might have panned FOR gold, he only managed to pan fools gold.