Editing Ambiguity (section)

=== Lexical ambiguity ===
The [[Polysemy|lexical ambiguity]] of a word or phrase applies to it having more than one meaning in the language to which the word belongs.<ref name="SmallCottrell2013">{{cite book|author1=Steven L. Small|author2=Garrison W Cottrell|author3=Michael K Tanenhaus|title=Lexical Ambiguity Resolution: Perspective from Psycholinguistics, Neuropsychology and Artificial Intelligence|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-J-fAgAAQBAJ|date=22 October 2013|publisher=Elsevier Science|isbn=978-0-08-051013-2}}</ref> "Meaning" here refers to whatever should be represented by a good dictionary. For instance, the word "bank" has several distinct lexical definitions, including "[[Bank|financial institution]]" and "[[Bank (geography)|edge of a river]]". Or consider "[[apothecary]]". One could say "I bought herbs from the apothecary". This could mean one actually spoke to the apothecary ([[pharmacist]]) or went to the apothecary ([[pharmacy]]).

The context in which an ambiguous word is used often makes it clearer which of the meanings is intended. If, for instance, someone says "I put $100 in the bank", most people would not think someone used a shovel to dig in the mud. However, some linguistic contexts do not provide sufficient information to make a used word clearer.

Lexical ambiguity can be addressed by [[algorithm]]ic methods that automatically associate the appropriate meaning with a word in context, a task referred to as [[word-sense disambiguation]].

The use of multi-defined words requires the author or speaker to clarify their context, and sometimes elaborate on their specific intended meaning (in which case, a less ambiguous term should have been used). The goal of clear concise communication is that the receiver(s) have no misunderstanding about what was meant to be conveyed. An exception to this could include a politician whose "[[weasel word]]s" and [[obfuscation]] are necessary to gain support from multiple [[Electoral district|constituents]] with [[mutually exclusive]] conflicting desires from his or her candidate of choice. Ambiguity is a powerful tool of [[political science]].

More problematic are words whose multiple meanings express closely related concepts. "Good", for example, can mean "useful" or "functional" (''That's a good hammer''), "exemplary" (''She's a good student''), "pleasing" (''This is good soup''), "moral" (''a good person'' versus ''the lesson to be learned from a story''), "[[righteous]]", etc. "I have a good daughter" is not clear about which sense is intended. The various ways to apply [[prefix]]es and [[suffix]]es can also create ambiguity ("unlockable" can mean "capable of being opened" or "impossible to lock").