What is a formal language?: Philosophy Shorts Volume 24

This short work clearly states what a formal language is and it thereby answers questions of fundamental importance about language in general. It is established that the concept of a perfectly formal language is incoherent but that the concept of a relatively formal language is coherent. The third edition contains a section in which it is explained what it is to formalize a scientific discipline, as well as a section in which it is said under what circumstances a given language L can be described as relatively formal (i.e. as more formal than some other language L*).