[cameronhowe]

There's no need to be so dismissive of Stallman's point of view. He has a great example in your link where using they is ambiguous.

Saying it's not a big deal unless people make it a big deal is not useful. Many people say the same about assuming gender. Language and the way we express ourselves matter and affect the way we think.

[angus-prune]

As many equivalently ambiguous examples could be formed with he or she, particularly when there are more than one person of the same gender.

There is ambiguity in all natural language and we work around it quite effectively with either assumed knowledge or phrasing which removes the ambiguity (while often adding other ambiguities which aren't plausible so ignored).

Stallman says himself that he can understand his examples, and a couple aren't even ambiguous. He's adding in hypothetical other people to make them ambiguous.

Stallman has highlighted a problem with English and happened to use singular they as an example. He hasn't highlighted a problem with singular they.

[tom_]

The weird thing is that we seem to do just fine with singular you, so it's not obvious - at least, not to me - why singular they would be such a problem.

[oe]

I don't think the examples are that great as Stallman's suggested replacement doesn't make much sense in them either.

[redial]

The usage of "you" is very ambiguous. The usage of "cold", or "warm", or "right" or "north" is very much as ambiguous as can be.

Ambiguity –or specificity– has nothing to do with why we talk the way we do. Sometimes, ambiguity is the whole point of a sentence.