critical
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈkɹɪt.ɪ.kəl/
ipa: /ˈkɹɪt.ɪ.kəl/
ipa: [ˈkɹɪɾ.ɪ.kəl]
Forms: form: more critical
form: most critical
Etymology: From Latin criticus + -al, from Ancient Greek κριτικός (kritikós, “of or for judging, able to discern”), from
κρίνω (krínō, “I separate, judge”); also the root of crisis.
Senses: examples: text: A good teacher is fair but critical.
text: Let us go back to the beginning and consider what the charge is that has made people so critical of me, and has encouraged Meletus to draw up this indictment.
ref: 1993, Plato, translated by Hugh Tredennick and Harold Tarrant, “Justice and Duty (i): Socrates Speaks at his Trial: the Apology”, in The Last Days of Socrates (Penguin Classics), revised edition, London; New York, N.Y.: Penguin Books, →ISBN, page 39:
synonyms: fastidious
captious
censorious
exacting
judgmental
glosses: Inclined to find fault or criticize.
examples: text: This is a critical moment.
text: Such a scandal as the prosecution of a brother for forgery—with a verdict of guilty—is a most truly horrible, deplorable, fatal thing. It takes the respectability out of a family perhaps at a critical moment, when the family is just assuming the robes of respectability: […] it is a black spot which all the soaps ever advertised could never wash off.
ref: 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:
glosses: Pertaining to, or indicating, a crisis or turning point.
examples: text: It's critical that you deliver this on time.
text: Oxygen levels on Earth skyrocketed 2.4 billion years ago, when cyanobacteria evolved photosynthesis:[…]. The evolutionary precursor of photosynthesis is still under debate, and a new study sheds light. The critical component of the photosynthetic system is the “water-oxidizing complex”, made up of manganese atoms and a calcium atom.
ref: 2013 September-October, Katie L. Burke, “In the News”, in American Scientist:
text: Third Pole glaciers are critical to billions of people from Vietnam to Afghanistan.
ref: 2018, VOA Learning English > China's Melting Glacier Brings Visitors, Adds to Climate Concerns:
synonyms: crucial
imperative
glosses: Extremely important.
examples: text: The movie was a critical success, but bombed at the box-office.
text: “Unless you are purchasing cereal from a health food store, many brands that are marketed as healthy are usually full of sugar and processed ingredients,” says Garcia.
 So when you’re choosing cereal, bread or any other whole-grain product, Garcia recommends reading labels with a critical eye.
ref: 2012 April 19, Alexandra Sifferlin, “‘Healthy’ Foods that Really Aren’t: Nutritionists Weigh In”, in Time:
glosses: Relating to criticism or careful analysis, such as literary or film criticism.
examples: text: The patient's condition is critical.
topics: medicine
sciences
coordinate_terms: fair
serious
stable
glosses: Of a patient condition involving unstable vital signs and a prognosis that predicts the condition could worsen; or, a patient condition that requires urgent treatment in an intensive care or critical care medical facility.
examples: text: The patient is critical.
text: Two critical after fatal Wimbledon school crash
topics: medicine
sciences
glosses: In such a condition.
examples: text: The political situation was so critical that the government declared the state of siege.
glosses: Likely to go out of control if disturbed, that is, opposite of stable.
examples: text: The reaction was about to become critical.
topics: natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
glosses: Of the point (in temperature, reagent concentration etc.) where a nuclear or chemical reaction becomes self-sustaining.
topics: natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
glosses: Of a temperature that is equal to the temperature of the critical point of a substance, i.e. the temperature above which the substance cannot be liquefied.
examples: text: critical plants
topics: biology
botany
natural-sciences
glosses: Needing great discrimination to be correctly classified; easily confused.
Derived terms: accelerated critical illness
acritical
antecritical
anticritical
autocritical
bicritical
biocritical
business-critical
cricondentherm
crifanac
critical altitude
critical angle
critical apparatus
critical applied linguistics
critical brain hypothesis
critical care
critical commentary
critical condition
critical dissonance
critical exponent
critical function
critical hit
critical illness
critical incident stress management
criticality
critical load
critically
critical mass
Critical Mass
critical micelle concentration
criticalness
critical opalescence
critical path
critical period
critical philosophy
critical point
critical point drying
critical race theory
critical rationalism
critical reception
critical Reynolds number
critical section
critical success factor
critical taper
critical temperature
critical theory
critical thinking
critical tide level
delayed critical
ecocritical
ethnocritical
Eurocritical
form-critical
gender-critical
gender critical
gender-critical feminism
gender-critical feminist
geocritical
gynocritical
historical-critical
historicocritical
hypercritical
intercritical
life-critical
metacritical
mission-critical
multicritical
neocritical
neurocritical
non-critical
noncritical
on the critical list
overcritical
paranoiac-critical
postcritical
precritical
prompt critical
pseudocritical
quasicritical
safety-critical
self-critical
semicritical
sociocritical
subcritical
supercritical
supracritical
technocritical
tetracritical
time-critical
transcritical
tricritical
ultracritical
uncritical
unicritical
Related terms: critic
criticism