Why does this word exist as a synonym of “flammable”?
Until I was around 14 or 15 I’d never found the word inflammable used used in that context, and had probably used it myself to mean “not flammable”, in- sounding right as a negative prefix for flammable.
The first time I came across it used to mean “flammable” was on a warning label and I remember being initially confused and then quite shocked when I found out what it meant there. It seemed downright dangerous to use a word as ambiguous as that in a warning.
In this case, “in-” is an intensifier, as in the word “inflame”, which is why “inflammable” means “easily inflamed”, as well as “flammable”. From the Latin inflammare.
Originally the word was inflammable. It was derived from the same Latin verb as inflame. (“The situtation is likely to become inflamed…”)
In recent years, people like insurance examiners and the folks who manage hazardous materials discovered that the cause of several fires had been yokels who thought the in- prefix was a negative, as though it meant ‘nonflammable’. So they deliberately removed the prefix, creating a new word, flammable, as though derived from a hypothetical verb *to flame.
Insurance examiners may be influenced in their approach by the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in linguistics. Mr. Whorf was an insurance examiner who found a pattern that the cause of fires was often people misunderstanding hazardous materials because they had been misleadingly labeled. So if language contributed toward fires, the language had to be changed. It’s a case of the dumbing-down of America.
No offense, but this has alwaus annoyed the hell out of me. I think it was the book Class that said something like “Many people are unaware that ‘in-’ can act as an intensifier”. Well, many snobs are apparently unaware that “in-” usually acts as a negative: “Insoluble”. “inactive”, “inconceivable” (the word that Means What I Think It Does). “Inflammable” is one of the few commonly-used cases where the prefix does not mean “the opposite of”. I can’t blame people for getting it wrong, when the same use of logic would in other cases give them the correct meaning of the word. Yokels, indeed!
Safety officers and Insurabce companies have precisely the right idea – in a life-or-death situation, the correct interpretation of “inflammable” could be critical. There’s no room for language mavens decrying the fact that too few people appreciate the subtle difference between “flammable” and “inflammable”.
CalMeacham has it right. The word ‘flammable’ was created so that warning notices and such could be absolutely clear to people in a hurry. The approved opposite is ‘non-flammable’.
I always think of Woody Boyd from “Cheers” on this topic. The folks at the bar were talking about “famous” vs. “infamous” (maybe, or something along those lines), and Woody said, “Sort of like how ‘inflammable’ means the same as ‘flammable’? Boy, I learned that one the hard way…”