Potable water... Is it "POE-tabul" or "POT-abul" ?

[Bucky]

And if you say "po-tah-blay" just move along to the next thread.

[hlthe2b]

1. the first

[Rorey]

2. I'm going to go with Alec Trebek

1st one

[gratuitous]

19. And Art Fleming before him

Yeah, I'm old.

[Rorey]

22. I remember Art Fleming

But I didn't watch it much then. I never really had time to watch it until maybe 15 years ago.

But how could I ever forget "Potent Potables"? I haven't seen that category for a long, long time.

[Thomas Hurt]

3. The first AFAIK, in a decade it maybe the other though, languages evolve.

[Thyla]

4. POT-abul

For my liking.
Never heard it said the any other way.

[Tanuki]

6. #1, and here's why:

https://www.waywordradio.org/potable-pronunciation/

..."The word derives from Latin potare, meaning to drink, and traditionally the long o sound in the Latin has been preserved in the pronunciation of potable so it sounds something like /POE-tuh-bull/. Increasingly, though, many people pronounce it with a short o, something like /PAH-tuh-bull/, as if assuming that the adjective describes something that might be put in a pot and boiled. This pronunciation is especially common in the military. Potable is a linguistic relative of the word potion, a type of drink, and symposium, from Greek words that literally mean drinking together."....

[catbyte]

7. I've only ever heard it pronouced POE-table.

[pwb]

8. Pot able is how the Army pronounced it

in the 60s.

[Aristus]

16. And the 90's.

Lot of idjits in the Army...

[RockRaven]

9. The first is definitely correct, but maybe the second is also correct. I'll explain below...

The first is how I say it, and how everyone I know IRL says it. Also how Alex Trebek says it on Jeopardy, and he's been saying it on a regular basis on international TV for decades -- it it were wrong, he'd probably have been corrected by now.

So the question remaining, as I see it, is: is the second way wrong or is it also accepted/correct? I suspect the latter. Over the years I have heard a number, albeit a minority, of science/health journalists use the second pronunciation. Journalists can mispronounce too, certainly, but I've heard enough of them use it that I suspect it is an accepted alternative.

[Blues Heron]

10. Edgar Allen Poetable

[Bucky]

11. This all comes as a great relief to me. I prefer POtable over POTable

but when so many people get it wrong, wrong eventually becomes right. Just like with orphan slapping.

[Iggo]

24. Wait. What?

[sl8]

12. It's WISS-kee. WISS-kee.

I swear, some peoples kids ...

[Harker]

14. My late MIL, from Mexico

via Spain, said "wick-skey", as did the Mexican bandit played by Jamaican actor Frank Silvera in "Hombre."

She also occasionally "watched the ditches" after dinner.

[Harker]

13. If it can be put in a pot

it's pottable.

If it's safe to drink it's potable.

Most, if not all potables are also pottable.

[Bucky]

17. reminds me of what vodka is

potable potatoes

[Harker]

20. Very!

https://m.

[Yavin4]

15. Ask the Google God

[Harker]

21. Poet-able?

Is there anything a poet wouldn't drink?

[ailsagirl]

18. Long O

Rhymes with notable

[Iggo]

23. I've only ever heard it pronounced correctly as POE-tuh-bull.