amphibological love

Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of or pertaining to amphibology; of doubtful meaning; ambiguous.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Of doubtful meaning; ambiguous.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective rare of doubtful meaning, ambiguous, quibbling.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin amphibologia.

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Examples

  • Consequently it must be recognised that the rather amphibological expression "soulless psychology" implies no negation of the existence of the soul.

    The Mind and the Brain Being the Authorised Translation of L'Âme et le Corps Alfred Binet 1884

  • The party found it alike inconvenient to do the one or the other, and ended by a compromise which might serve to keep them alive till after election, but which was as far from any distinct utterance as if their mouths were already full of that official pudding which they hope for as the reward of their amphibological patriotism.

    The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V Political Essays James Russell Lowell 1855

  • What time does it not consume, what study does it not require, at the present day, to unravel the amphibological oracles of the ancient philosophers, whose actual sentiments are almost entirely lost to the present race of men?

    The System of Nature, Volume 2 Paul Henri Thiry Holbach 1756

  • "That mode of speech, which some theologians call pure mental reservation, others call reservation not simply mental; that language which to me is lying, to the greater part of recent authors is only amphibological ....

    Apologia pro Vita Sua John Henry Newman 1845

  • Nor does there seem to me other difference when I consider their respective grounds, except that the ancients frankly called those modes of speech lies, and the more recent writers, not a few of them, call them amphibological, equivocal, and _material_. "

    Apologia pro Vita Sua John Henry Newman 1845

Comments

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  • a. Of doubtful meaning; ambiguous.

    "Amphibological expressions." --Jer. Taylor.

    Citation:

    "amphibological." Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary. MICRA, Inc. 18 Apr. 2009. .

    April 19, 2009