Tom admires Martha as a politician. Who is a politician?

Question

'Tom admires Martha as a politician.'

Can this sentence have two interpretations?

Tom is a politician and admires Martha.
Tom admires Martha because she is a politician.

Does the interpretation change when we move the pharse 'as a politian' to the beginning of a sentence?

As a politician Tom admires Martha.

Of course it's ambiguous. Why bother asking such a question. — BillJ, Mar 08 '21 at 09:35
Without a specific context the text is ambiguous. And that context is nothing to do with language - we're really just being invited to speculate on whether politicians are more likely to *admire other people, or to be admired by other people*. — FumbleFingers, Mar 08 '21 at 12:46
Dude! If you know the sentence is ambiguous, bothering about what is the most common way it will be read is silly. Don't write it that way! — FeliniusRex - gone, Mar 08 '21 at 13:45
The question is important as regards the comparison of two languages. The lack of inflection results in ambiguity. I wanted to make sure if it is like that for you. — Arek, Mar 08 '21 at 15:02
Does this answer your question? What is this an example of: "FOR SALE: Car by elderly lady with new body and spare tire" [@Robusto:] 'These are examples of syntactic ambiguity. They demonstrate ambiguity between alternate syntactic structures underlying a sentence.
The man saw the boy with the binoculars. / They are hunting dogs. ... — Edwin Ashworth, Mar 08 '21 at 15:25

score -2 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 08 '21 at 11:13

It means that Tom admires Martha's quality as politician. Similarly 'Tom admires Martha as a mother' is not ambiguous (unless Tom is short for Thomasina).

If you put the "as a politician" at the front of the sentence then it does, indeed, reverse the meaning. In that case we are saying that Tom, in his capacity as a polititcian, admires Martha generally.

This becomes clearer if we have two descriptions such as:

Tom, as a politician, admires Martha as an activist.

or

As a politician Tom admires Martha as an activist

There is no ambiguity in this, Tom is a politician and Martha is an activist. Each descriptive phrase relates to the noun closest to it.

Tom admires Martha as a politician. Who is a politician?

1 Answers1