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I basically learnt that words that start with a 'm' or 'p' get 'im' as a negative prefix, whilst words starting with 'r' get 'ir' in such a case (irreverent, irrelevant).

However, I stumbled upon 'realistic'. I'm almost sure it is 'unrealistic'. A quick search on Google revealed 13 million hits for 'unrealistic'; 'irrealistic' on the contrary only results in 14.000 hits.

Therefore, is 'unrealistic' an exception to this rule?

pimvdb
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    The rule is bogus. You have to take the etymology into account. You would never say irready or irruly, either. – RegDwigнt Mar 22 '11 at 19:06
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    Do you say "unready"? New one to me... ;-) – Jürgen A. Erhard Mar 22 '11 at 19:10
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    Ever hear of King Æthelred (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%86thelred_the_Unready)? – Kelly Hess Mar 22 '11 at 19:12
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    @jae: you miss the point. As does Kelly, actually, as Æthelred's name has nothing to do with not being ready, and everything with being ill-advised (cf. German Rat, "counsel"). My point was that whether or not unready, unround, unright, and unrude exist, you would prefer them over irready, irround, irright, and irrude any time. – RegDwigнt Mar 22 '11 at 20:00
  • Oh, him. Yeah, heard of him, just didn't recall (and of course, this singular use doesn't make "unready" a (proper) word. Especially since it seems to be a mistranslation (according to the linked WP-article)) – Jürgen A. Erhard Mar 22 '11 at 20:02
  • @jae: true, one singular and possibly erroneous usage doesn’t show that “unready” is a proper word — but a cursory look into any dictionary shows that it is one. Admittedly, it seems to have fallen out of use somewhat in the 20th century; but it was a well-used word for quite a few centuries. – PLL Mar 22 '11 at 20:44
  • jae: Unready is actually a proper word. @PLL: True, one meaning of the word is now archaic. However, the meaning, unprepared, is still quite current. – Jimi Oke Mar 23 '11 at 01:34
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    "She was young and unready for motherhood." – apaderno Mar 23 '11 at 09:22

2 Answers2

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The word realistic is negated with the prefix un-, which is not the same as in-/im-/ir-, and is not subject to the rule regarding in-/im-/ir-. The rule that you cited is correct, but only for words that take the negative prefix in-/im-/ir- (e.g. intractable, impossible, irresponsible). Words that are negated with un- always use un- (e.g. untreatable, unbearable, unready), and never vary the second letter of the prefix.

There is no general rule that will allow you to know which words take the negative prefix un- and which take the negative prefix in-.

The forms that you find on the net with the word irrealistic are either mistakes by non-native speakers, people being clever with word-play, or possibly people creating derivations off of the specialized linguistic term irrealis.

JSBձոգչ
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    So, basically, "Theorem: A holds whenever A holds."? – Jürgen A. Erhard Mar 22 '11 at 19:09
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    @jae, kind of. If you know that the word is negated with one of in-/im-/ir-, then you can use the OP's rule to predict which version of the prefix to use. But if you don't know whether to negate with un- or in-, then you're pretty much hosed. – JSBձոգչ Mar 22 '11 at 19:15
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    +1 — excellent answer! More examples of un + r: unreasonable, unreadable, unrelated, unrated, unrhymed … – PLL Mar 22 '11 at 20:47
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Yes.

Never heard of such a rule. Or I may have forgotten about it. Never been a fan of rules about language anyway: you learn the rule and the myriad of exceptions (depending on rule and language in question)- Why not just learn the words, and be done with it?

Jürgen A. Erhard
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    When rules often apply, it is a good idea in my opinion to learn those instead of each single word. Of course there are exceptions, but it's useful to fall back on. – pimvdb Mar 22 '11 at 19:13
  • Yes, and why not just learn all the sentences, instead of bothering with grammar? Patterns are for the birds. – Jason Orendorff Mar 22 '11 at 19:25
  • They think differently about that at my school :o) – pimvdb Mar 22 '11 at 19:48
  • I didn't learned rules (or grammer, which is rules), I just learnt the language. Just like I learn not German, I just learndit. Seriously (no, seriously seriously), I never bothered much with grammar in school (and my grades were as one would expect ;-)). We had a German-teacher who was all about comma rules; she had a catalog of rules for where to put commas, and most of the class learned those rules slavishly -- I didn't bother. I learn by... osmosis, if you will. – Jürgen A. Erhard Mar 22 '11 at 19:59
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    To put it in context: I know it's "unruly", and "not ready" and "irrelevant"... but I don't see, nor do I need, any rules behind that. So, I don't bother with them anymore. Not for the actual activity of speaking/writing. As an academic/intellectual exercise, grammar (and "rules") can be fun... but mostly by amusing oneself with the exceptions. But that's MVPO (my very personal opinion). – Jürgen A. Erhard Mar 22 '11 at 20:05
  • People are much better at learning the rules of grammar, punctuation, and spelling "by osmosis" than at learning them consciously. A 3-year-old knows enough about the grammar, vocabulary, and diction of his or her native language to fill books and books. But that doesn't mean the 3-year-old hasn't learned the rules. You can tell by the mistakes kids make that they know the rules (subconsciously). Mainly they don't know all the exceptions yet. – Jason Orendorff Mar 23 '11 at 03:44