Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Followup-To: alt.peeves
From: hoey@zogwarg.etl.army.mil (Dan Hoey)
Date: 3 Feb 93 13:55:13 GMT
Subject: Re: word used as its own opposite

RVEST...@vma.cc.nd.edu (Bob Vesterman) writes:
>"inflammable" means "very flammable".
>"flammable" does not mean "very flammable".

Not according to Webster's 3d New International Dictionary, The Random
House Dictionary (2d Ed), The American Heritage Dictionary (1st Ed),
or Webster's II New Riverside Dictionary, all of which list ``flammable''
as a synonym of ``inflammable.''  The last goes on to explain:

  ``_Inflammable_'' is derived ultimately from the Latin prefix
  _in-_, ``in,'' and the noun _flamma_, ``flame.''  There is another
  prefix _in-_... that means ``not....''  In order to eliminate
  possibly dangerous confusion about the combustibility of various
  materials, safety officials in the 20th century have adopted the
  term _flammable_, which had a brief life in the early 19th
  century, to mean ``able to burn.''

If you wish to demonstrate a difference between the meanings of the
words you might cite some authority, lest we think it's just a
peculiarity of your dialect.

Dan Hoey
Hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil