Verbs, backformed

Backformation of verbs is making verbs by truncating portions of nouns, linguistically and many lexicons often mention the formation process. Backformed nouns are also possible whereby nouns are formed, mostly, by addition portions to verbs. About a decade and a half ago, one of the seniors on the editorial desk, writing a story, used 'to destruct' to mean 'to destroy.' He was corrected in exchange for a bit of frowning. The word 'self-destruct' on red buttons in labs or contraptions in sci-fi led the writer believe that the noun of 'destruction' was 'to destruct.' The verb 'to construct' also had a hand in the belief.

A couple of days ago, a junior writer used the verb 'to solute' to solve the problems, a backformed entity from 'solution.' Asked why he did this, he said the Microsoft Word speller did not mark the word with a red wavy line underneath. Fair enough. He depended heavily on MS speller. But he did not care to consult the dictionary which would have told him that 'solute' is a substance that is dissolved in another substance called 'solvent,' a term in the knowing of the people involved in the studies of chemistry. The Microsoft speller has no reason to mark it with a red wavy line.