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Subject:Re: You may From:Brian Bennett <bb18+ -at- ANDREW -dot- CMU -dot- EDU> Date:Fri, 5 Aug 1994 17:15:47 -0400
That's interesting. I've always had the opposite problem; when I read
INvalid I think inVALid (til I consider the context, of course). A college
friend of mine, a statistician who works in an outpatient mental hospital,
once said to me, "We really don't treat inVALids there; just outpatients."
>Bonni Graham writes, wrt to invalid:
>>spots at the grocery store. But in reality, according to two different
>>thesauri, inVALid is the correct antonym for valid. I guess this proves
>>that there's a lot to be said for emphasizing syllables.
>"Not valid" is also acceptable, and unambiguous. I remember getting a list
>once of words to avoid (purportedly to ease translation), and "invalid"
>was featured prominently. Whether any decent translator would ever really
>make that mistake, given the context, is a different question....
>It certainly does give some people pause, however, and in this case that's
>enough for me to choose the first alternate: not valid.
>Have a good weekend all,
>Michael Priestley
>mpriestley -at- vnet -dot- ibm -dot- com
>Disclaimer: all claims not valid
Brian S. R. Bennett
Senior Information Developer
H. B. Maynard and Company
Pittsburgh, PA 15220