Formal slut

A girl or boy ( usually a chick) that goes to lots of formals for male validation. Either they have lots of male friends or they just want the attention.

Jack - “Holy fuck that Sarah chick is a formal slut she’s been to 4 this year”

John - “ yeh bro she’s done them all too”

by Soz x July 3, 2024

Formal Meta-Fallacies

Meta-errors related to the realm of formal logic and deductive reasoning. This involves incorrectly asserting that an argument's formal structure is invalid when it is valid, or valid when it is invalid. It can also include the mistake of treating a formally valid but utterly unrealistic syllogism as a serious argument, or dismissing a formally invalid argument whose conclusion nonetheless happens to be true based on other evidence. It's pedantry or confusion at the level of logical syntax.

Formal Meta-Fallacies Example: Someone presents a logically valid deductive argument: "All cats are reptiles. Fluffy is a cat. Therefore, Fluffy is a reptile." A critic, missing the point about the false premise, attacks it by saying, "That's affirming the consequent!" This is a Formal Meta-Fallacy—they've incorrectly identified the formal structure. The argument is actually valid but unsound due to the false first premise.

by Dumu The Void February 4, 2026

Formal Philosophy

The branch of philosophy that applies the tools of formal logic and mathematics to traditional philosophical questions, producing arguments that are either airtight or reveal that the question was nonsense to begin with. Formal philosophers ask not just "what is truth?" but "what are the logical conditions under which a statement can be considered true?" and then write 200 pages of symbols that answer the question so precisely that no one can understand the answer. It's philosophy for people who found regular philosophy too vague and decided to fix that by making it incomprehensible.

Example: "He read a paper in formal philosophy that used modal logic to prove that God either exists necessarily or cannot exist at all. He understood the symbols, followed the proof, and concluded that the argument was logically valid. He then realized he had no idea whether God actually existed, which was where he'd started, but now with more symbols."

by Abzugal February 14, 2026

Formal Sociology

The specific application of formal methods—mathematical models, network analysis, formal logic—to the study of group dynamics and social structures. It attempts to reduce the messy complexity of human interaction to equations, graphs, and probabilities, producing beautiful diagrams that capture approximately 30% of what's actually happening. Formal sociology is beloved by academics who love numbers and distrusted by everyone who has ever been in a human relationship and knows that love, hate, and awkward silences don't fit neatly on a graph.

Example: "His formal sociology thesis mapped friendship networks using complex algorithms that predicted who would become friends based on proximity and shared interests. The algorithm correctly predicted 40% of friendships and completely missed the ones that formed because two people happened to hate the same guy. The model had no variable for 'shared enemy,' which was, formally speaking, a mistake."

by Abzugal February 14, 2026

Formal Social Sciences

The attempt to apply the methods of formal sciences—mathematics, logic, abstract modeling—to the study of human society, with predictably mixed results. Game theory explains why people cooperate (sometimes), social network analysis maps who talks to whom (approximately), and formal models of political behavior predict elections (except when they don't). The challenge is that humans are not logical symbols; we are messy, contradictory, and prone to doing things just because. Formal social sciences are what happen when mathematicians discover that people refuse to follow the rules.

Example: "A formal social sciences study used game theory to prove that rational actors would never start a war, as the costs always outweigh the benefits. The researchers then looked at human history, which is basically a list of wars, and concluded that humans are either irrational or playing a different game. Probably both."

by Abzugal February 14, 2026

Formal Technologies

The tools and systems designed to manipulate abstract symbols according to strict rules, enabling everything from simple arithmetic to complex computer programs. This includes calculators (slaves to the algorithm), programming languages (formal systems that are surprisingly forgiving of missing semicolons), and the humble spreadsheet, which has launched a thousand careers and caused a thousand nervous breakdowns when someone sorted the wrong column. Formal technologies give us power over abstraction, which we primarily use to make pretty charts about things that don't matter.

Example: "She used formal technologies to build a complex financial model that predicted market trends with 95% accuracy. Unfortunately, the model was based on historical data, and the market, not being a formal system, promptly did something unpredictable and made all her charts wrong. She blamed the model; the model blamed reality."

by Abzugal February 14, 2026

Formal Sciences

The branch of knowledge that studies abstract structures and symbolic systems, unconcerned with whether they correspond to anything in the real world. Mathematics, logic, and theoretical computer science live here, in a pristine realm where 2+2 always equals 4 and arguments are either valid or invalid, not just "like, your opinion, man." Formal sciences are beautiful, consistent, and utterly indifferent to the messy reality of human existence, which is why mathematicians are so calm and everyone else is so confused.

Example: "He loved the formal sciences because in mathematics, unlike in relationships, things either worked or they didn't, and when they didn't, you could prove why. His girlfriend pointed out that this attitude might be why he had so much time for mathematics."

by Abzugal February 14, 2026