formal logic

See synonyms for formal logic on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. the branch of logic concerned exclusively with the principles of deductive reasoning and with the form rather than the content of propositions.

Origin of formal logic

1
First recorded in 1855–60

Words Nearby formal logic

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use formal logic in a sentence

  • But it is inconceivable that the generality of men should pass all their mental life with Greek accents or with formal logic.

    Discourses in America | Matthew Arnold
  • The scholastic education of this time laid special stress on formal logic and metaphysics.

  • formal logic teaches that our intellect must keep all things apart, but does not teach that it must also connect them.

British Dictionary definitions for formal logic

formal logic

noun
  1. Also called: symbolic logic the study of systems of deductive argument in which symbols are used to represent precisely defined categories of expressions: Compare philosophical logic

  2. a specific formal system that can be interpreted as representing a fragment of natural argument

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012