Intentional Vagueness

This paper analyzes communication with a language that is vague in the sense that identical messages do not always result in identical interpretations. It is shown that strategic agents frequently add to this vagueness by being intentionally vague, i.e. they deliberately choose less precise messages...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Erkenntnis 2014-04, Vol.79 (Suppl 4), p.855-899
Main Authors: Blume, Andreas, Board, Oliver
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Communication
Communication models
Conflict
Education
Epistemology
Ethics
Excess demand
Game theory
Gaussian distributions
Interpersonal communication
Language
Learning
Linguistic ambiguity
Listening
Logic
Mathematical monotonicity
Ontology
Original Article
Philosophy
Signal noise
Statutory interpretation
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This paper analyzes communication with a language that is vague in the sense that identical messages do not always result in identical interpretations. It is shown that strategic agents frequently add to this vagueness by being intentionally vague, i.e. they deliberately choose less precise messages than they have to among the ones available to them in equilibrium. Having to communicate with a vague language can be welfare enhancing because it mitigates conflict. In equilibria that satisfy a dynamic stability condition intentional vagueness increases with the degree of conflict between sender and receiver.
ISSN:0165-0106
1572-8420
DOI:10.1007/s10670-013-9468-x