> I can’t imagine why a language designer would choose “mal” as the prefix for “not”. In English and Spanish (two common languages), mal has some bad connotatio

> I can’t imagine why a language designer would choose “mal” as the prefix for “not”. In English and Spanish (two common languages), mal has some bad connotations (malodour, malady, malfeasance, malo, malformed). Well, there's also the Latin word "sinister" which has a very different meaning in English... Kinda seems like a common theme.