---
title: Ambiguity
tags:
  - topic/ambiguity
  - type/encyclopedia-entry
---
# Ambiguity

Not to be confused with [[uncertainty]].

## Common Fallacies

### Reification Fallacy

> [!quote] [Reification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reification_(fallacy))
> **Reification** ... is a fallacy of ambiguity,
> ...it is the error of treating something that is not concrete...
> as a concrete thing.

See ["the map is not the territory"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map-territory_relation "Map-territory relation").

> [!aside]
> This one is very common among my peers in estimating.
> The problem with fallacies, of course,
> is that you can't simply say "Reification fallacy, booyah".
> If some one is overgeneralizing,
> they likely just have a different understanding of the term.
> Certainty of definition only occurs with some quorum,
> and I'd argue most of [[construction-estimating|ours]] don't meet it,
> and that the choice of any term over another ought to be based on utility.
>
> > Note also that a term's definition can be certain ~~on some axis~~,
> > but ambiguous ~~on another~~.
> > See ["I know it when I see it"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it)
> > which, as far as I'm concerned, is a perfectly legitimate definition.

### Equivocation Fallacy

[Equivocation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equivocation "Equivocation")

The misleading use of a word with more than one meaning

### Composition Fallacy

[Composition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_composition "Fallacy of composition")

Assuming a whole has a property because its parts have that property

### Division Fallacy

[Division](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_division "Fallacy of division")

Assuming parts have a property because the whole has that property
