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Comment by n4r9 | Hacker News Reader

Wikipedia has an interesting example where it's still ambiguous:

  They went to Oregon with Betty, a maid, and a cook.

It's not clear whether Betty is the maid. But tbh removing the comma doesn't help either.

Personally if I wanted to indicate that Betty was the maid I would put "a maid" between brackets or hyphens.

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This sounds like a case where we should just change the syntax. If Betty is the maid it should be written:

    They went to Oregon with Betty [a maid], and a cook.

(They (went (to Oregon) (with ((Betty (a maid)) and (a cook))))).

((That (is (the (most natural) syntax))) and ((all (of us)) (should (switch (to it))))).

Many years ago working on natural language to SQL, when we had ambiguities this is how we’d clarify things with the user (albeit with the minimal amount of brackets necessary).

It looks like you might have learned how to diagram a sentence as a youth

It seems you're speaking with a Lisp :P

This is how I was taught. Use ( ) or -- -- here and the Oxford comma for list of 3 or more.

I get lazy with adding the comma before the "and" in list, and without fail I hear my grandmother/father/teachers pointing out how wrong I am for doing so. Same for my use of semicolons followed by "and" or "but".

I never realized the Oxford comma was even something up for debate.

Or just switch the order if Betty is the maid and you don't want to provide additional context:

``` They went to Oregon with a cook and Betty, a maid. ```

It eliminated some ambiguity. It should be quite self evident that even without an example it is quite impossible to eliminate all ambiguity (it’s a feature of human language.) The more important property is that it never introduces more ambiguity. Ie at worst it doesn’t help, but not making it worse.

It did introduce ambiguity though. Without the comma it is 100% clear that sentence lists 3 people.

Practically that would be very likely to be the case to the reader, but grammatically no, it's still ambiguous.

> They went to Oregon with Betty, a maid and a cook.

Betty could be both a maid and a cook. So there is still ambiguity.

If Betty was the maid and the cook, I would write...

     They went to Oregon with Betty who was a maid and a cook.

If it was three people, I would write...

     They went to Oregon with Betty, the maid, and the cook.

The maid implies there was just one. Who travels with their only maid? Who will keep the manor lights on?

> They went to Oregon with Betty, the maid, and the cook.

Betty could be the maid. English meaning depends partly on word order:

  They went to Oregon with the maid, Betty, and the Cook.

Still ambiguous.

  They went to Oregon with the maid, the cook, and Betty
  They went to Oregon with the maid, the cook and Betty

In the former, I suppose the maid might be the cook also. The latter moves more easily and with less ambiguity.

If Betty was the maid, I would write…

     They went to Oregon with Betty the maid and the cook.

“a maid and cook.”

“a maid, and cook.”

As written it is perfectly clear that Betty is neither the maid nor the cook, neither of whom the author bothered to name in this sentence. If that wasn't the author's intention they should grammar better.

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