https://xkcd.com/1985/ On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 4:48 PM Brent Meeker via math-fun < math-fun@mailman.xmission.com> wrote:
The ambiguity that most often bothers me is announcements of the form, "Thirty per cent chance of rain today." I know rain is defined as a measure greater than 0.1" But what does the 30% mean? Does it mean there will be at least 0.1" of rain on 30% of the people within range of the radio station? Or does it mean that if you hear this a hundred times, all the people in range will experience rain 30 times?
Brent
On 6/15/2020 9:27 AM, Hilarie Orman wrote:
Even with mathematics, stating the pigeon/person attack distribution is a challenge. Indeed, it could be the same pigeon attacking the same person. Every 30 seconds exactly?
"The Seven Types of Ambiguity" by William Empson describes how English literature utilizes ambiguity.
Nothing will come of nothing.
Hilarie
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