AMBIGUITY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does ambiguity mean? 

• AMBIGUITY (noun)
  The noun AMBIGUITY has 2 senses:

1. an expression whose meaning cannot be determined from its context

2. unclearness by virtue of having more than one meaning

  Familiarity information: AMBIGUITY used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• AMBIGUITY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An expression whose meaning cannot be determined from its context

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("ambiguity" is a kind of...):

expression; locution; saying (a word or phrase that particular people use in particular situations)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "ambiguity"):

loophole (an ambiguity (especially one in the text of a law or contract) that makes it possible to evade a difficulty or obligation)

amphibology; amphiboly (an ambiguous grammatical construction; e.g., 'they are flying planes' can mean either that someone is flying planes or that something is flying planes)

parisology (the use of ambiguous words)

double entendre (an ambiguity with one interpretation that is indelicate)

Derivation:

ambiguous (open to two or more interpretations; or of uncertain nature or significance; or (often) intended to mislead)

ambiguous (having no intrinsic or objective meaning; not organized in conventional patterns)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Unclearness by virtue of having more than one meaning

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

ambiguity; equivocalness

Hypernyms ("ambiguity" is a kind of...):

unclearness (incomprehensibility as a result of not being clear)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "ambiguity"):

equivocation; evasiveness; prevarication (intentionally vague or ambiguous)

lexical ambiguity; polysemy (the ambiguity of an individual word or phrase that can be used (in different contexts) to express two or more different meanings)

no man's land; twilight zone (the ambiguous region between two categories or states or conditions (usually containing some features of both))

Antonym:

unambiguity (clarity achieved by the avoidance of ambiguity)

Derivation:

ambiguous (having more than one possible meaning)

ambiguous (open to two or more interpretations; or of uncertain nature or significance; or (often) intended to mislead)

 Context examples 

The red cross was, of course, far too large to be a guide; and the terms of the note on the back, as you will hear, admitted of some ambiguity.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Some people can easily make decisions in the face of ambiguity and some can’t, but I feel you can because you are ruled by the planet of genius, Uranus.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

Dating methods that determine time without ambiguity to a known level of accuracy.

(Absolute dating, NOAA Paleoclimate Glossary)

Though the 6th Edition of the AJCC Cancer Staging Manual indicates that unspecified TNM staging descriptors may be considered synonymous with the corresponding fully specified clinical category, such omission may lead to ambiguity in meaning, and in practice unqualified descriptors are frequently used with other intended meanings.

(Generic TNM Finding, NCI Thesaurus)

In her secret soul, however, she decided that politics were as bad as mathematics, and that the mission of politicians seemed to be calling each other names, but she kept these feminine ideas to herself, and when John paused, shook her head and said with what she thought diplomatic ambiguity, Well, I really don't see what we are coming to.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

An extension to UML that provides constraint and object query expressions on an object-oriented model that cannot otherwise be expressed by diagrammatic notation, providing expressions that have neither the ambiguities of natural language nor the inherent difficulty of using complex mathematics.

(Object Constraint Language, NCI Thesaurus)

The sums are the scoundrel's share, and where he feared an ambiguity, you see he added something clearer.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)