Pick out the correctly spelt workd:

I have read that the US military does take a large proportion of its grunts from segments of society which have had less educational opportunity but on the other hand I believe they have extensive education programmes so that should restore the situation, shouldn't it? I don't think any military organisation would want genuinely stupid people.

I remember as a kid being briefly intrigued by the "in-" at the start of the word "inflammable", but since one place I often saw it was the sides of cans of lighter fuel, (which I knew was very easy to set alight!) the perplexity was never likely to cause me to start a conflagration. At the time it was illegal to sell petrol ("gasoline") in any container that did not have the words "Petroleum Spirit - Highly Inflammable" permanently applied (e.g. stamped into the metal).

Exactly (although the choice of 'flammable' is not necessarily because of 'a belief that some might [mis]interpret the...prefix'). As a general rule, the prefix in- denotes a negative, e.g. incompatible, invalid, invincible etc. It's not a matter of causing confusion in anyone's mind (U.S. Army or otherwise); it's a matter of avoiding an unfortunate redundancy. The fact that use of 'inflammable' pre-dates 'flammable' is really immaterial (pls note the prefix there ). Numerous archaic words have been supplanted in modern English by more felicitous ones.

I'm temped to pick holes in this, because it's a bit wonky, but I'll just register my disagreement instead.

But cf. words like incur, infuse, insurrection, instigate, imbibe, enthuse, insert... if you want to think more about it. These prefixes do not indicate a negative.

But the 'in-' in these words isn't really a prefix. There is no -cur or -fuse or -surrection. One cannot -stigate nor -bibe. The 'in-' in your examples is a component part of the word, not a prefix, Mac. Such is not the case with 'flammable.'

Disagree again.

And now I'm going out to hire some highland dresswear.

I'd say the etymology for 'inflammable' points to it having a close connection to 'inflame'. The 'in' here is necessary for the particular meaning of 'inflame but it clearly isn't necessary for the adjective form.

I don't think that the "redundancy" is any big deal, for language is chock full of redundancy. Even though some substances are equally capable of being 'inflamed' or being 'flamed', the former is a more accurate description of this particular process.

[I wonder, was there ever a 'flame something' which had the literal meaning of 'put flame to something' or has it only been used figuratively and recently in 'flame someone'?

However, given that 'flammable' works independently from 'inflame' illustrates that though there may be an etymological connection, different word forms have different meanings.

How do they acquire such meanings? Not from the mistaken notions of "logic" as put forth by folks like OmSigDavid, but by the people who use them in language and infuse them with new meaning or a slightly different nuance.

Inflame probably comes from Norman French c. 1066 and all that, en flamme but I must confess I haven't looked it up yet in my dad's old dictionary.

As such it would be similar in construction to words like encourage, ennoble, insert, introduce, insinuate and so on.

Compared to all that, which describes a very old and fundamental facet of the language, "flammable" (AmE) is a very recent confection. And an unnecessary and fairly trivial and silly one, imho.

If it is similar in construction to these words, McTag, and not just in a surface sense, these words certainly aren't similar to 'inflame' in their "take apart" meanings.

It seems to have come from a number of places/languages.

I’m with MA. It’s an irksome and silly word. Why, it’s downright puttin’ on airs.

Though I must admit I loathe it slightly less after reading JTT’s explanation.

Not "introduce" obviously, I misspoke.

Having looked it up, it is from "en flamme" (Old French) and "enflammer" (Middle English)

Mr Webster should never have mucked about with it.

I disagree, Merry. Just because we have recently decided that the adjective form 'flammable' works as well as the older form 'inflammable' doesn't mean that the 'in' wasn't a component part of the word.

If it actually did form from 'inflame', then 'flammable' could well have been regarded as meaningless/silly/[put any pejoriative on it] way back when. We have to consider that 'flammable' never existed before.

It would be interesting to see how active the verb 'inflame' was and what its nuances were.

I doubt that he's the one to blame for this, McTag.

It looks like 'flammable' is taking over even in the UK.

Google - USA region only:

Results 1 - 10 of about 4,590,000 English pages for "flammable"

Results 1 - 10 of about 771,000 English pages for "inflammable"

======================

Google - United Kingdom region only:

Results 1 - 10 of about 170,000 English pages for "inflammable"

Results 1 - 10 of about 341,000 English pages for "flammable"

jtt your posts are fl amatory

the slip up is parapraxis or freudian slip

always enjoy your posts btw

Parapraxis!!
What a great word. I'll remember that.

At first, Solipsister, I thought that you'd coined a new meaning but upon checking further, but not extensively, it appears that it may have already been done.

Thank you. I also enjoy yours.