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Saturday, 13 March, 2010

Lexical Ambiguity
(with comments)

Found at Wikipedia:

"James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher."

It's an English sentence used to demonstrate lexical ambiguity and the necessity of punctuation, which serves as a substitute for the intonation, stress and pauses found in human speech. In human information processing research, the sentence has been used to show how readers depend on punctuation to give sentences meaning, especially in the context of scanning across lines of text.

The phrase can be understood more clearly by adding punctuation and quotation marks:

James, while John had had "had", had had "had had"; "had had" had had a better effect on the teacher.

Which means:

"It was the case that while John used 'had,' James used 'had had.' The teacher preferred 'had had.'"


Permalink | Posted in General |
  1. By Bisbonian. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @09:36am:
    The teacher preferred 'had had.'"

    I prefer Lucozade.
  2. By Inti. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @09:45am:
    Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
  3. By decibelcat. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @10:13am:
    Banana banana banana banana banana banana banana banana ...
  4. By wally the duck. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @10:19am:
    Redundant HAD Syndrome.
  5. By Shannon. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @10:38am:
    Now, if this can somehow be worked into a palindrome, pointy headed word nerds everywhere can die happy. Or, I guess I really mean happily die.
  6. By wombat. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @02:16pm:
    Not everyone is a writer.
  7. By Shel-tone. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @02:50pm:
    Brilliant. What exactly is it that you do, do?
  8. By wally the duck. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @05:04pm:
    Placi Dodo Mingo
  9. By boswell. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @05:15pm:
    . . .readers depend on punctuation to give sentences meaning, especially in the context of scanning across lines of text.


    I wish those idiots who keyboard solely in lower case would take note of that.
  10. By csi. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @05:32pm:
    DITTO FOR THE DOLTS WHO USE CAPS.
  11. By Redwood. Comment posted 13-Mar-2010 @11:50pm:
    Department of Redundancy Department
  12. By elusivefish. Comment posted 16-Mar-2010 @07:00am:
    Do you know the one about the sentence with 5 "and"s in a row?
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