Any etymologists in the house.

EdFred

EdFred

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I have a question about bugs. Kidding.

My question is "in-" vs "im-"

visible --> invisible, not imvisible
proper --> improper, not inproper

and a whole bunch of other ones. Why one over the other?
 
As a general rule "un" is used to negate words of English derivation, and "im", "in" and "il" for words of Latin derivation. Not sure if there is a specific rule for "im" vs "in" other than common usage.
 
Sac Arrow said:
As a general rule "un" is used to negate words of English derivation, and "im", "in" and "il" for words of Latin derivation. Not sure if there is a specific rule for "im" vs "in" other than common usage.
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Yeah, I read about the un/in difference, but I was wondering why the im/in preference for some. I get the im with movable or material, but why in vs im for the other options.
 
Well, certainly, "invisible" is easier to say than "imvisible" although the converse isn't true with "proper." I don't know, I guess someone decided that certain negators would be applied to certain words based on ease of speech.
 
Sac Arrow said:
I don't know, I guess someone decided that certain negators would be applied to certain words based on ease of speech.
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Probably the same guy that got to decide gender of objects in Spanish.
 
Bob Noel said:
Yes. ;-)

more directly: inflammable is indeed easily set on fire.
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Pretty sure someone f'ed up on that definition. What is the generic term for something that is not easily set on fire?
 
EdFred said:
Pretty sure someone f'ed up on that definition. What is the generic term for something that is not easily set on fire?
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non-flammable - or perhaps flame resistant.
 
If pro is the opposite of con and progress is moving forward then what is congress?
 
well, water is pretty absolute when it comes to being on fire.
 
Your spelling of Absolut is inperfect.
 
EdFred said:
well, water is pretty absolute when it comes to being on fire.
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Not according to this guy. At least for salt water anyway. Salt water exposed to certain RF waves can burn. Well technically the process causes elemental hydrogen to be released and that will burn.
 
Sac Arrow said:
Not according to this guy. At least for salt water anyway. Salt water exposed to certain RF waves can burn. Well technically the process causes elemental hydrogen to be released and that will burn.
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Yeah, but after electrolysis happens, it's no longer water.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flammability#Flammable_vs._inflammable


Flammable and inflammable both mean capable of burning. The word "inflammable" came from the Latin inflammāre = "to set fire to," where the prefix "in-" means "in" as in "indoctrinate", rather than "not" as in "invisible" and "ineligible". Nonetheless, inflammable is often erroneously thought to mean "non-flammable". This safety hazard has been avoided by the use of flammable on warning labels referring to physical combustibility. In the United States the word inflammable has been largely abandoned in common, scientific, industrial, and written language.[1] Antonyms of flammable/inflammable are non-flammable, non-inflammable, incombustible, non-combustible, or simply not flammable.
 
EdFred said:
Yeah, but after electrolysis happens, it's no longer water.
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But the same could be said of wood, no? Not the electrolysis part, of course, but wood doesn't burn, the gases released from wood heated past a certain point burn. At least that's what I remember being told a long time ago; I suppose I could have been misinformed. From a practical standpoint... doesn't matter much, I suppose.
 
DaleB said:
But the same could be said of wood, no? Not the electrolysis part, of course, but wood doesn't burn, the gases released from wood heated past a certain point burn. At least that's what I remember being told a long time ago; I suppose I could have been misinformed. From a practical standpoint... doesn't matter much, I suppose.
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The gases produce flame, but the wood itself goes through an exothermic chemical oxidation process.
 
Impossible to give a inaccurate answer to this improper thread.....
 
It's the English language and the English language sucks. That's your answer.

(English is my second language)







(and I don't have a first)
 
timwinters said:
It's the English language and the English language sucks. That's your answer.

(English is my second language)







(and I don't have a first)
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Sure ya do, Tim. It's the same as my first language: *******. :D
 
Jim Logajan said:
If that were the case, "amoral" would be the negative of "moral" so that "immoral" would appear to be a synonym for "amoral".
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But "amoral" is the absence of morality. "immoral" is the opposite of morality.

"I am amoral. I stand not to judge his actions."
"Well, I will judge his actions and they are immoral."

"His actions are amoral."
"I agree with you, they have no ethical consequence whatsoever."
 
EdFred said:
I have a question about bugs. Kidding.

My question is "in-" vs "im-"

visible --> invisible, not imvisible
proper --> improper, not inproper

and a whole bunch of other ones. Why one over the other?
Click to expand...

Greek or Latin derivative. Kinda like Hygro and Hydro.
 
FastEddieB said:
Maybe someone can come up with a word to describe someone who is not a theist?
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The "a' allies to the "thea" not to the "ist".

It's a believe in no god not the not believing in god.

Perhaps theologically they are the same but etymologically they are different.

And yes, I know whether anal retentive has a hyphen or not.
 
Quick search revealed:

"an-/a- meaning:not, without - examples: anemic, asymmetric"

It's a fine point but I usually see the "without" meaning as appropriate.

Amoral means without morals. Immoral would be to have bad morals.

Asexual means without sex.

Apolitical means without politics.

And so on.

So a-theist would mean "without God". I know many put forth that atheists should be able to make an affirmative case for "no God", but I kind of like the "without God" - it seems to fit most of the atheist positions I've seen articulated. It's hard to prove a negative as is an unwarranted shifting of burden.

Though I'm sure there are exceptions.

I live my life without God, so I think atheist is an appropriate label.
 
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