0
Miles Lee Posted 13 years ago
Grammar

Syntactic Ambiguity

The following sentence is ambiguous. "
The analysis of the sentence with mistakes is silly."
Here, the pp 'with mistakes' can modify either 'sentence' or 'analysis of the sentence'.
Then, why is the following sentence Not ambiguous?
"They read the story of the man with no name."

Help me, guys!
  

Top answer

" Here, the pp 'with mistakes' can modify either 'sentence' or 'analysis of the sentence'. The sentence itself seems odd. Do you mean ' a sentence with mistakes'?

— Mister Micawber

  • " Here, the pp 'with mistakes' can modify either 'sentence' or 'analysis of the sentence'.
  • The sentence itself seems odd.
  • Do you mean ' a sentence with mistakes'?
  • " It is ambiguous also for those who do not use reasoning to determine what is intended.
Free · every Monday

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

New words, one handy idiom, and a 2-minute quiz — delivered to your inbox to keep your streak alive.

11 Answers
0
miles LeeThe analysis of the sentence with mistakes is silly." Here, the pp 'with mistakes' can modify either 'sentence' or 'analysis of the sentence'.
The sentence itself seems odd. Do you mean 'a sentence with mistakes'?
miles LeeThen, why is the following sentence Not ambiguous?"They read the story of the man with no name."
0
0
In English, ambiguity usually comes from pronouns and their antecedents.

An adjectival prepositional phrase follows the noun or noun phrase that it modifies, but ambiguity can result with different logically sound possible parsings:

The analysis with mistakes is silly."
The analysis of (the sentence with mistakes) is silly."
But I would parse it the second way - the sen
0
0
Then, "The analysis of a sentence with mistakes is silly." sounds better to you?
0
0
miles Lee Then, "The analysis of a sentence with mistakes is silly." sounds better to you?
It does to me.
Better:
Trying to analyze a sentence with mistakes is silly.
Analyzing any sentence with mistakes is silly.
0
0
miles LeeHere, the pp 'with mistakes' can modify either 'sentence' or 'analysis of the sentence'.
I don't see 'with mistakes' as a very plausible modifier of 'analysis'. We don't analyze things by means of mistakes, and that's what '[analysis (of something)] with mistakes' means to me.
miles Leewhy is the following sentence Not
0
0
There is sometimes a problem with "with". How can one be sure that the with we use is a preposition and not a marker of the instrumental case?
0
0
AnonymousThere is sometimes a problem with "with". How can one be sure that the with we use is a preposition and not a marker of the instrumental case?
Rest assured, the instrumental case isn't in Modern English as it is in Russian.
0
0
AnonymousHow can one be sure that the with we use is a preposition and not a marker of the instrumental case?
'with' is a preposition either way. English does not have an instrumental case.

As with most other ambiguities, only context can help you understand the intended meaning.

CJ
0
0
And that's how you analyze a sentence with a mistake in it.
0
0
Thank you, AS and CJ, for your useful replies.
0

Related Questions