To what extent is it possible to overcome the ambiguity and vagueness in language? In what contexts might ambiguity either contribute to or impede knowledge or contribute to it? Does the balance between precision and ambiguity alter from one discipline to

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To what extent is it possible to overcome the ambiguity and vagueness in language? In what contexts might ambiguity either contribute to or impede knowledge or contribute to it? Does the balance between precision and ambiguity alter from one discipline to another? Well, firstly language goes beyond communication it is also a way of communication with other people, if other people understand what you are trying to say then the way you used to get your message across to the other person is a type of language. Which means body language is also a type of language. It creates meaning (defines and denotes) and it also provides images. The other key words in this question would be: ambiguity, which is about the words being unclear as some words sometimes have different meanings; vagueness, which means the words are not being expressed clearly; context, which means the parts of a statement that follows a certain word or a passage; contribute, which means to be a part of something by giving something, for example, money and knowledge; impede, which means hinder.

We use language in ways other than it is intended to, which causes problems. There are five problematic uses of language which makes languages very unclear and confusing: Vagueness, as I have mentioned above, it means that the words are not being expresses clearly; ambiguity, as I have mentioned above, it means  that the words are very vague and unclear; secondary meanings, which are words that have two different meanings. For example: the word ‘right’ means right side like left side but it also another word for correct, metaphor, is a figure of speech. An example of a metaphor would be: “her home was a prison” this doesn’t mean her home was an actual prison it’s just a figure of speech and Irony, is also a figure of speech. It is a sentence which actually means the opposite of what it says. An example would be “i had so much fun writing the English essay yesterday” it does not mean this person actually had fun writing the English essay, he or she is being ironic. However, I don’t think it is possible to overcome ambiguity and vagueness in language as most words in languages have so many different meanings to it which makes it confusing, for example: the word ‘light‘ it has two different meaning but it is spelled the same way. The word ‘light’ means something being not heavy ‘the feather is very light’ and it also means light from the sun or lamp ‘switch on the light’ all these words with multiple meanings makes language unclear since its very important to know the meaning of a word as words provide understanding. We cannot overcome it as it is basically impossible to get rid of ambiguity because every person has a different way of expressing their feelings and experiences through different areas of knowledge. For example, if you try to describe what a computer looks like to a blind person if they have never seen one before they would probably have a completely different image of a computer in their mind which probably looks completely different to what it actually looks like. This is because people use words differently and everyone has a different way of describing things which can be quite unclear. However, ambiguity and vagueness is possible to overcome if the common sense view is used. As if someone says “switch on the light” it is quite obvious that they are talking about a light or a lamp but, it can be misunderstood once in a while.  

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In language, I personally think that ambiguity does not contribute to knowledge because ambiguity will confuse people and especially if they are not fluent in a particular language. As mentioned before some words have a couple of meanings, some words sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings and some words have different meanings but have the same spelling and the same pronunciation. Other ways that makes a language confusing and can be easily led to misunderstanding is by using figurative sentences.  For example: when someone says “put yourself in his shoes” it doesn’t mean literally to ...

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