> My favorite example is anti thesis -> antithesis.
That's quite an unfortunate example: it comes straight from classic Greek (another very bitchy language when it comes to pronunciation pseudo-rules), and percolated into Latin and eventually English.
Still, I agree large chunks of current English pronunciation "rules" (rules? what rules?) just don't make any sense from a logical perspective; proof is that even born-and-bread Englishmen can often struggle with spelling well into their late 20s and beyond, regardless of education level.
That's quite an unfortunate example: it comes straight from classic Greek (another very bitchy language when it comes to pronunciation pseudo-rules), and percolated into Latin and eventually English.
Still, I agree large chunks of current English pronunciation "rules" (rules? what rules?) just don't make any sense from a logical perspective; proof is that even born-and-bread Englishmen can often struggle with spelling well into their late 20s and beyond, regardless of education level.