Singularity — Multiplicity
“The purest form of practical language is scientific language. The scientist needs a precise language for conveying information precisely. The fact that words have multiple denotations and various overtones of meaning is a hindrance to him in accomplishing his purpose. His ideal language would ba a language with a one-to-one correspondence between word and meaning; that is every word would have one meaning only, and for every meaning there would only be one word. Since ordinary language does not fulfill these conditions, he has invented one that does. A statement in his language looks something like this:

SO2 + H2O = H2SO3

In such a statement the symbols are entirely unambiguous; they have been stripped of all connotations and of all denotations but one. The world sulfurous, if it occured in poetry, might have all kinds of connotations: fire, smoke, brimstone, hell, damnation. But H2SO3 means one thing and one thing only: sulfurous acid.

The ambiguity...