why are terrible and horrible basically the same thing but horrific and terrific are basically the opposite

Question

English will never be something I fully understand

In: 9830

Answer 1

“Terrific” and “Terrible” both used to mean “terrifying”. However over time, the meanings diverged so ‘terrific’ ended up meaning ‘terrifyingly good’ and ‘terrible’ ended up meaning ‘terrifyingly bad’. And of course, we just use ‘terrifying’ for the general concept