14 Comments
User's avatar
Bill Strong's avatar

Then there are nice contronyms which work only in sound - raise and raze.

Brent Hartinger's avatar

Nice. You're right! Perfect opposites.

Kevin J Lynch's avatar

I programmed computers back in the day, and before the Morris worm in ‘88, we would consider a quick SW job, just thrown together, a “hack”, not well thought out, barely working, a prototype. Hack means to “break apart roughly”, we used it to “put together roughly”. Its meaning and connotations have changed since then too.

Brent Hartinger's avatar

oh! Interesting.

Yeah, I'm okay if we ban the word "hack" for ever and ever and ever at this point. It should be over and done. LOL

Curtis's avatar

Or words that look like antonyms but aren't, like flammable and inflammable.

April Henry's avatar

My coworker and I used to collect heteronyms, words that were spelled the same, but pronounced differently and meant different things.

Brent Hartinger's avatar

What a fantastic crazy language English is! 🤣

Melissa Capers's avatar

This is more than a word, but "it's all downhill from here" can mean it's all good, easy going until the end, or this is the point from which it all falls apart.

Brent Hartinger's avatar

Oh that's great! LOL

Robin Reardon's avatar

Hope the collaboration goes well! Meanwhile, here are a couple of contronyms:

Clip: attach something to something else, or cut out of something (like a newspaper)

Garnish: to reduce, as in wages, or to add, as to garnish a dish of food

Brent Hartinger's avatar

Very good ones! There are more than I knew...

BmG's avatar

I now understand how the universe works!! “Cleave” has driven me to the dictionary more than once 😂!

Brent Hartinger's avatar

Glad I could help! 😏🙂🤩