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July 13

Valuable vs. Invaluable

I was talking with a colleague who is a non-native of English a couple of days ago, and mentioned to him that in a recent job I had just completed, his help had been 'invaluable'. He looked at me pretty shocked, because he took the word to mean 'worthless' - the opposite of 'valuable'. After the breaking of chairs and tables had ceased, the knives put away, and our Matrix fight scene was over (just joking), I explained that it did not mean that at all, and it was a word formed in the same way as the dichotomy we appear to have with 'flammable' and 'inflammable'. I said the 'in-' suffix in this case is not the same as the negative suffix (variously expressed as 'in-' or 'un-'). But then he said he had thought it might mean 'worthless', as in 'of no value', but then said it may be better understood as 'priceless'. Which got me thinking. Where does it actually come from, and how do other native English speakers view this word? KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 15:19, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Indo-European en- prepositional suffix and syllabic nasal n- negative prefix fell together in pronunciation in an early form of Latin, and ever since then there has been a certain amount of confusion between the two -- people can have conflicting perceptions of what "inflammable" means, for example... AnonMoos (talk) 15:36, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for nuking your comment. Unintentional. Itsmejudith (talk) 19:09, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Same phenomenon as the diametrically opposite meanings of "worthless" and "priceless". Some things are so bad you cannot put a value/worth/price on them. Some are so good you cannot put a value/worth/price on them. (Puts me in mind of water and diamonds for some reason.)Itsmejudith (talk) 15:37, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. Some sources say that it comes from an old way of using "value" as a verb -- to value something means to calculate how much value it has. For example, he valued the car at two thousand dollars. Thus, to say that something is invaluable means that it is impossible to calculate how much value it has. ~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Looie496 (talk • contribs) 15:41, 13 July 2012‎

According to the Online Etymological Dictionary, it did mean "worthless" back in the 1630s, but now it means priceless. But at any rate, the in- is the negative in- and not the in- of inflammable. Angr (talk) 15:45, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Cheers to all. It's one of those satori moments when you've been using a word for 40 years and suddenly you understand what it literally means. Thanks. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 15:56, 13 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This reminds me of a 1980s cartoon episode where a villain destroyed an expensive musical instrument. Its owner protested "It is a priceless instrument", and the villain replied "Well, now it's a worthless instrument". JIP | Talk 20:20, 14 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"If Spiderman doesn't want to be famous, I'll make him infamous." V85 (talk) 20:51, 14 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That's just a quip; in another movie it was an actual plot point. "COME TO SANTO POCO STOP THE INFAMOUS EL GUAPO". --Trovatore (talk) 20:53, 14 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]