If someone says something is “bunk,” we understand that to mean that they think it is garbage, unworthy or something similar. However, if we say that we “debunked” a particular theory, we would understand it to mean that we proved the theory false. So … how do bunk and debunk seem to mean the same thing? Or am I just missing something obvious?
If something is bunk, it’s BS.
To debunk something would be to remove the BS label from it.
Are you sure?
If I debunked the Big Bang Theory, wouldn’t that mean I proved it was incorrect?
Two things.
Words mean whatever they are used to mean, regardless of logic or etymology.
If you must find some logic in debunk, then think of it this way. You reach in and pull the nonsense out of something that wasn’t belived to have nonsense in it and you hold it up for everyone to see.
Worth repeating that.
I guess it’s like Flammable and Inflammable (which I appreciate do actually mean subtly different things, but rather more subtly different that Soluble and Insoluble)
The ‘de-’ prefix means ‘to do the reverse of’ or ‘to undo’, similar to one of the senses of ‘un-’ (though ‘un-’ can also mean ‘non-’) or ‘dis-’. Debunk means ‘to remove bunk from’. Usually the form with and without ‘de-’ can both be used as verbs (as with ‘humidify’ and ‘dehumidify’), but ‘bunk’ cannot be used as a verb in this sense. The opposite of ‘debunk’ would be ‘embunk’ or something like that; the opposite of ‘bunk’ would be ‘truth’.
Do you know how (in)flammable are used differently? I, and apparently oed.com, have been using them synonymously to mean “that can burn”
I thought it was something to do with ignition of vapour; that flammable means something can burn if it comes into direct contact with a flame, whereas inflammable means it produces combustible vapours or gases and can ‘flash over’ without being directly exposed to a flame. Something like that, anyway.
I say ‘thought’ because all of my searches on the subject (and most notably those targeted specifically at regulatory bodies dealing with labelling of hazardous substances) turn up phrases to the effect
Didn’t they have a discussion about this on Seinfeld? Yeah, now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure it was on the season 8 episode “The Abstinence,” and it went something like … (paraphrasing from memory here)
So that’s authoritative, obviously.
[George Carlin]
There’s flammable, inflammable, and non-inflammable. Make up your minds–either it flams or it doesn’t!
[/GC]
AFAIK, the original word, taken from Latin, was “inflammable,” and was used until the 19th century when someone came up with “flammable,” which was based on a different Latin word, “flammare,” which meant “to set something on fire.”
So we used both until the 20th century when it was decided to out-phase inflammable because in English the ‘in’ prefix normally refers to the word not as in ‘inedible’ or ‘inaudible’. Seeing as people might mistake inflammable to mean ‘not flammable’, flammable is the preferred word.
Source : A Word Detective book that I leant to Tom and would like back thanks !
Do I press it? Or do I depress it?
English sucks. 
cite for Word Detective :
Depends on what it is. If it’s a key on your keyboard, then you depress it.
Why is sanction its own opposite (to allow, to punish for doing something)? Or cleave? Why is there “disgruntled” but not “gruntled”?
Or, rather, why do people insist on the notion that because their are patterns, or trends if you will, to language, that it must therefore ultimately conform to rules that we make up to describe it after the fact?
Language is like that. That’s why it’s fun to learn new ones.
goes off to study his Chinese