Ambiguity is caused by the very nature of a symbol, from which arise the three impositions of a word and the two intentions of a term.

The ultimate purpose of words and terms is to convey to another one’s ideas about reality. But between the reality as it exists and as one apprehends it and expresses it are a number of intermediate steps: the creation of the phantasm, the creation of the percept, and the creation of the concept.

If one uses a word or a term to refer directly to a reality not it self, to what we know, it is used predicatively (that is, said of another, or referring to another, to the reality which it symbolizes). This is the ordinary use of a word or a term, and it is then used in first imposition and in first intention. If, however, one uses a word or a term to refer to itself as an instrument in any one of the intermediate steps by which we know or by which we symbolize what we know, it is used reflexively (that is, referring t o itself, as a concept, a sound, a mark, a noun, etc.).

This is the peculiar use of a word or a term in an imposition or an intention different from the ordinary use, as may be seen in the following examples.