Legal Writing

RE Syntactic Ambiguity

According to this entry at Wikipedia on the topic of Syntactic Ambiguity:

Syntactic ambiguity is a property of sentences which may be reasonably interpreted in more than one way, or reasonably interpreted to mean more than one thing.

Here’s an example:

The plaintiff is required to submit an affidavit setting forth at least one negligent act, error, or omission claimed to exist.

In a dispute, one side might claim that negligent modifies only act, while the other side claims it also modifies error and omission.

What strikes me is the grammatical error in the definition of syntactic ambiguity.

Can you spot the error? If not, read the post that (not which) describes one of the things that (not which) pushed Grammar Girl right over the edge.

Full post as published by Set in Style on June 08, 2009 (boomark / email).