Edit: SERIOUSLY, THANK YOU—
BTW my confusions stems from them having the same meaning online
Flammable: “easily set on fire”
Inflammable: “easily set on fire”
Definitions from Oxford Languages
In: Other
Flammable objects are things that could catch in fire (wood, paper, people). Inflammable objects could catch fire and/or burst without the introduction of a flame (element introduction, certain gases, nitroglycerin)
> Flammable and inflammable do not mean the same thing. If something is flammable it means it can be set fire to, such as a piece of wood. However, inflammable means that a substance is capabble of bursting into flames without the need for any ignition. ([Source](https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,,-78567,00.html&ved=2ahUKEwjeicyfw6PiAhUBTBUIHWpIDYcQFjAWegQIEBAI&usg=AOvVaw3ZG4M7gwkcT7T4fp1ZdpOD))
The issue is that the prefix “in-” has two different meanings. It is most commonly known as meaning “not” as “inaudible” (in- audi -ble, “not able to be heard”). But it also means “in, into” in such words as “inquiry” (in- query, “ask into”).
So here, “inflammable” isn’t meant to be parsed as in-(flammable) as in “not able to set on fire” but rather (inflamm)-able as in, “able to be inflamed.” After all, you might have heard the word “inflame” and understand it to meant to set something on fire or to make a fire bigger. (Where inflame comes from in- flame with “in-” taking on the second meaning, e.g. “to put into flames”).
EDIT:
If you, too, are interested in how things like this come about, an INvaluable resource is the [Online Etymology Dictionary](https://www.etymonline.com/).
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Hmm, maybe people are too young to remember this!
Initially when I lived in the USA in the 1950’s, combustible materials were required to have a label stating “INFLAMMABLE” meaning they can inflame.
https://thumbs.worthpoint.com/zoom/images1/1/0518/04/shell-best-oil-tanker-truck-tin-toy_1_1dd26eda0e0d2fd838102200bf76eabe.jpg
However, this confused some workers, who didn’t know the meaning of ‘inflammable’ and guessed from the prefix that it meant non-flammable.
The clever solution was to actually *coin a new word that had never existed before* which was the word ‘flammable.’
Virtually anyone seeing a warning ‘flammable’ knew that the substance being carried was inflammable. Grammar perfectionists would be *annoyed* but accidents were prevented.
“‘Inflammable’ has always meant ‘tends to catch fire easily’; but, because the prefix ‘in-‘ often means ‘not’ (as in ‘ineffective’) and for that reason ‘inflammable’ might be misinterpreted, ‘flammable’ has become the preferred alternative on warning labels. ‘Nonflammable’ is the antonym.”
Source: [https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,,-78567,00.html](https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,,-78567,00.html)
They mean the same thing, but since inflammable was so confusing, we created the word flammable to keep it less confusing.
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Holy snap sticks I always thought inflammable means it can not catch fire. Geeeeez 40 years of being an avid reader and I never picked that up
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