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Something I see all over the place, everywhere I turn...

Something as old as "flammable" and "hacker." As well as the square and rectangle.

Flammable use to mean not combustable. And inflammable use to mean combustable, but some person as a kid misheard it in a use of a sentence, and has used flammable as combustable, trend caught on, and now a dictionary now says it means combustable.

There were to computer terms, in the earlier ages of computer. One was cracker, and the other was hacker. Hacker was someone who programmed at excelled speeds, a cracker was one who infiltrated, and bypassed computers, and/or computer security. Both took, and still take great computer skill. However someone probably heard someone talk "he's a hacker" and he thought of the news he saw about skilled computer infiltration. Thought of both of the same and of course that trend caught on. And now hacker means what cracker meant. Hell hacker has found it's way to cheating. You don't have to be bypassing of any sort, using a third person program isn't. You're using a bypassing utility, but YOU aren't hacking.

And newbie have found it's way through as well. A word intended for someone who is new. However it has been misconcieved and carried as a insult refering to someone as be in poor quality of skill.

Woot, an old everquest term refering to wonderful loot. How many people who knows this, very few. People use it in the form of killing someone, or in the form of a taunt now. So... there's wonderful loot upon killing people?

Own, has changed and found it's way to "pwn/pwnt" which is an old counter-strike term for pistol owned. However of course someone saw it in the form of dominating someone and that's all they saw. Ask a people what pwn means, and you'll almost never get the same answer. "Power ownage," "Pitifully owned," "P**** owned," and the list goes on.

I've vaguly seen it before, but in this forum I see it to be more than a coincidence, people think just because you're talking about serious topic it must mean you're talking seriously...

Here's an analogy that's a math rule. "A square is a rectangle, but a rectangle isn't always a square." or "A rectangle is a parallelagram, but a parallelagram isn't always a rectangle."

How is it we let misconception to become trend and rule our language?

whatever your smoking, i want some......... oh, and its two

lol, that was NOT a flame, if you want me to flame, i will. anyway, this string belongs in a less serious topic.....

You're saying my view is out of whack, rather than discussing it in a mild manner.


I beg to differ, this happens to deal with society's mental detrition.

I agree with Durk. Whatever you're smoking, let me have some! >.<

But to prove you wrong, Flammable means that something may catch on fire. IE, Ruber Cement, Wool, and other various types of things. Imflammable is the word used to describe something that cannot catch on fire very easy. IE, A Fire Blanket, Metal, Glass, Gas (In it's liquid form, mind you) Water, and various things.

Where did you get those two misconstrued?

Take out an old dictionary... And you'll see.

the prefix "in" means not.......go back to english and youll learn that.

... if you are going to use flammable in that way it's going to be a metaphor. It has to refer to being able to catch on fire.

Yeah. Im and In means not.

For example, INdestructible, IMpartial.

I could go on and on... >.<

Yes, older definition for flammable meant it could not combust. And inflammable, if it's not flammable, then well it's the other option being able to combust.

Because the majority of people don't bother to get the real definition and they don't care? They are the ones using the words and they give it their own meaning.

Also by looking up the definition of inflammable, it has the same definition of "flammable".

Like, I have a sign for semi-trucks, that it says "inflammable," now would you warn about something that's not a threat?

that made no sence........ please clarifie.

Even if flammable used to mean not able to combust, it has the same meaning as inflammable now.

Okay, semi-trucks tend to carry hazordous material, such as fuel, and/or biological threats. And when they have such, it is by law that they must have warning signs on them. Now there are warning signs for trucks that say "inflammable." Now... If it couldn't set you a flame, mess you up. Then why would you warn for it?

He probibly means why would you need tell the public something when they should already know it.

But if you were smart you would realize that the public in general, is stupid.

And you know that some Semi-Trucks carry flammable things inside them... Right?

In response to you above me: Because the public are idiots! Do you not understand that the world is full of morons and rejects?!?

Which is why the definition for inflammable is the same as flammable.

Found this off a quick search:

they have the signs cus its federal regulation. and when they carry inflammible gasses or such.....its usualy comressed air. that it what it usualy means..

All I have to say is that, like everything else language evolves like the English thorn (looks like a "y") was used to mean "th" hence why you see Ye old bookstore in some places. We don't use that anymore probably because the public didn't like. Another evolution was that the English language used to have masculine and feminem "the's"
like the Spanish el and la, again the public probably didn't like it or found no use for it really. One more is that mouses wasn't a word until computers came out; my point is what Trigonometry is saying is just another example of the evolution of the English language.
people probably didn't like the term cracker for a computer infiltrator and thought hacker had a more sinister way to it.

Am I the only one that noticed that line?
Pointing out that recent dictionaries give them the same meaning means nothing.

I had in a message said look at an old dictionary.

And this is now way off the topic, the point of this is how we let foolishness rule our life styles, not a definition of a word. No more talking about flammable and inflammable. If you want to discuss such further then make a fricken topic about it in Lite Discusion.



I can't say that's a good analogy, considering that wasn't made out of misconception.

"Inflammable means flammable?!"
-Dr. Nick

Here you go f*** clowns...

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Let me summurize...

Inflammable use to mean combustable, and flammable use to mean non combustable. (Check an old dictionary)

Through the foolishness of people, the word was misconcieved, carried, became trend, and the meanings got reversed.

Now flammable means combustable, and inflammable means combustable. (Check a new dictionary)

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Have at it!

>>This Post has been merged into the discussion.
-Kame

How is it "foolishness" and how is it "ruling" our lifestyle? So what if people create new words and give other words a new meaning. As long as the people who they are talking to can understand them then there's nothing wrong.