Is English a ¨scientific¨ language?

[Traveler]

I mean, is English too focused on ¨concreteness¨ so to speak. Is it too focused on objects and not enough on descriptors and such? It seems to me that English is more attuned to things like science because of its ability to be precise. (To be fair, I think at least any European language is about the same.) When I started learning some Chinese, and hearing things in English from my Chinese coworkers, I was surprised at how vague Chinese can be. It made me wonder how scientific research and other precise endeavors worked in China. I don't know enough in Chinese to say conclusively. Perhaps vagueness is the norm, but is changed for precision when need be.

I forgot where, but I once read this strange theory about English - that it was developed as a creole to make science, math, counting, etc. very easy for traders to communicate better. Seems a little crazy.

Thoughts?

[BearAcrosser]

It's never easy, or very useful, to make generalizations about languages. But languages are strongly connected to cultures, and what you noticed could simply be a consequence of different cultures expressing concepts differently.

I have translated a few technical texts from English to Italian in the past, so I can give you my perspective on this: compared to Italian, it does not seem more precise. It is, however, more short and to the point than Italian is. If you translate a technical English text keeping the same tone, in Italian it will sound quite informal. This is because academic and scientific texts in Italian tend to be overly complicated in their syntax and vocabulary, while those in English don't.

So in my opinion it could be more a matter of style or tone than a matter of precision.

I have a question for anyone knowledgeable about this: are we sure that English became the language of science because of its precision? Or did it change because of its status as main scientific language?

About that theory: that seems far-fetched. There are numerous sources detailing the development of the English language, and they all describe a long, slow and gradual process of diachronic variations. If it had been created artificially for practical purposes there would be several signs of that, historical linguists would have discovered it.

[pcgamer]

I don't think it's a scientific language. English, as we all know, is an international language. If you don' know how to speak or write English, you are in real trouble a you won't be able to communicate with people of other culture. So I would say it's more of n international language.

[sidney]

I don't think it's a scientific language. English, as we all know, is an international language. If you don' know how to speak or write English, you are in real trouble a you won't be able to communicate with people of other culture. So I would say it's more of n international language.

My thoughts exactly. I am actually weirded out by your post, English isn't really a scientific language, it's an international language. The official scientific language are the scientific names of insects, plants, animals like fishes, etc. English is quite mainstream and easy to understand in my opinion.

[Trellum]

I don't think it's a scientific language per she, it's just it's very widely used internationally. I think that's why it's used in scientific works, I think the very same can be done in Spanish, but the latter isn't so widespread.