Post by t-bob on Jun 1, 2019 10:16:59 GMT -5
DISINVENT
verb (used with object)
1. to undo the invention of; to reverse the existence of.
Quotes
However alarmed we are by those weapons, we cannot disinvent them. The world cannot cancel the knowledge of how to make them. It is an irreversible fact. -- Margaret Thatcher, "Disarmament with Security: Towards Peace with Freedom," speech to UN General Assembly, June 23, 1982 A number of science fiction movies have actually had to “disinvent” existing technologies in order to retell the myth of how rebels against “the system” help preserve free and open societies. -- Mark Hagerott and Daniel Sarewitz, "A Future in Denial," Slate, July 30, 2013
Origin
Disinvent is an obvious compound of the prefix dis-, here having a reversing force, and the verb invent. It is quite rare, first appearing in the second half of the 19th century (for the “disinventing” of the telegraph). In the 20th century disinvent has been applied to the impossibility of “disinventing” nuclear or chemical weapons.
verb (used with object)
1. to undo the invention of; to reverse the existence of.
Quotes
However alarmed we are by those weapons, we cannot disinvent them. The world cannot cancel the knowledge of how to make them. It is an irreversible fact. -- Margaret Thatcher, "Disarmament with Security: Towards Peace with Freedom," speech to UN General Assembly, June 23, 1982 A number of science fiction movies have actually had to “disinvent” existing technologies in order to retell the myth of how rebels against “the system” help preserve free and open societies. -- Mark Hagerott and Daniel Sarewitz, "A Future in Denial," Slate, July 30, 2013
Origin
Disinvent is an obvious compound of the prefix dis-, here having a reversing force, and the verb invent. It is quite rare, first appearing in the second half of the 19th century (for the “disinventing” of the telegraph). In the 20th century disinvent has been applied to the impossibility of “disinventing” nuclear or chemical weapons.