tricky synonyms

Posted by montanius on 2013/10/27 20:53:25

Checking "fat chance" vs "slim chance" I found an interesting question, worth to get through the comments too.



The words flammable and inflammable mean the same thing, but (to someone unfamiliar with their meaning) appear to be opposites (because of the "in" prefix). Is there a name for such word pairs that appear to be opposites but actually mean the same thing?

A few other examples are ravel/unravel, regardless/irregardless, radiation/irradiation, incite/excite, culpatory/inculpatory, press/depress, to/unto, part/depart, fat chance/slim chance, thaw/dethaw/unthaw, candescent/ incandescent, canny/uncanny, dead/undead, write up/write down, valuable/invaluable


http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/57144/is-there-a-name-for-synonyms-that-appear-to-have-opposite-meanings