MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com wrote:
In a message dated 3/26/2006 4:22:00 AM Central Standard Time, ecartis@digitalkingdom.org writes:"Not" is not the same as "opposite." "not good" doesn't mean "evil" or "bad", and "not hot" doesn't mean "cold."Ok, but a claim that there are other reasons is not as convincing as the reasons themselves might eventually be. I am not saying that OPPOSITE has to be a prime, all I'm saying is that it is odd that they wouldn't have it as a prime, given that it's so productive. (And also given that I can't imagine what it's paraphrase in terms of the given primes might be.)It seems that "NOT" would provide the meaning of "OPPOSITE".
Esperantists deal with this all the time, since their prefix for opposite, "mal-", is very productive, and they also use the "not" prefix a lot.
~mark