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Great word Bunjee! If counterintuitive has any synonyms???, they couldn't be as good as that word.
I can use phrases to explain it, but I need to keep sentences short and simple. I have one task to write for an audience of kids, and I could say something is odd or strange or unexpected instead. But that's a weak way of expressing something everyone understands, something being true even if one thinks instinctively that it shouldn't be. C'mon, English! Let's at least get some slang going for "counterintuitive"!
ETA: I'd even consider a commonly understood analogy, if there were one. So here's a relevant Star Trek phrase I love:
I'm not a Trekkie, but this is one episode I loved. Captain Picard was on a diplomatic mission to reach out to a race that had been isolated. Any contact always ended up in hostility, because no one could understand them.
Instead of common linguistic devices like morphemes and symbolic sound, they used historic analogies to express all meaning. It's pretty interesting to consider. Instead of "he went to the store" it might be "Ulu proceeded." (I just made that up, but we'll say everyone understands that Ulu is someone who famously would go to the store.) So there was no problem with translating words, it's just no one could get what they meant. Obviously, this is an episode inspired by someone who studied linguistics.
"Temba, his arms wide open!" refers to the diplomat's relief that Picard finally unlocked the code: "He understands!"
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