[Spellyans] off-topic - Drok yu genef!

[A. J. Trim]

From: Eddie Climo 
Sent: Friday, July 25, 2008 3:38 PM
To: Standard Cornish discussion list 
Subject: Re: [Spellyans] off-topic - Drok yu genef!


On 25 Jul 2008, at 14:56, A. J. Trim wrote:
  . . .. Actually, there is a smidgen of confusion in English. The term “inflammable” has had to be re-spelt “flammable” for safety reasons!

To be precise, it was for *alleged* safety reasons. 'Inflammable' was on reagents bottles in Chemistry labs when I was at school, and I don't recall ever hearing of even the dimmest students barbecuing themselves by mis-parsing the word. The opposite then was 'non-inflammable', which is pretty unambiguous as well. 


But what have we moved to now, I wonder? Logically, if we believe the horror stories of those who advocated the change, it should have become:
  flammable/inflammable.


But according to my recent OED, it's actually:
  flammable/non-flammable.


Furthermore, the medical profession didn't feel the need to start talking about "flammation of a wound", did they? And have you ever heard reference to a 'flammatory remark'? Hah!


No, it was just the fledgling Health & Safety Industry trying to find solutions to non-existent problems, to give themselves something to do.


'in lel'? 'yn lel'? 'idn lel'?


:D

Eddie Foirbeis Climo
- -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- - -- -
Dres ethom akennow byner re bons lyeshes
Accenti non multiplicanda praeter necessitatem




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


_______________________________________________
Spellyans mailing list
Spellyans at kernowek.net
http://kernowek.net/mailman/listinfo/spellyans_kernowek.net
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://kernowek.net/pipermail/spellyans_kernowek.net/attachments/20080725/9b2fff39/attachment.htm>