critical
[krit-i-kuh l]
- inclined to find fault or to judge with severity, often too readily.
- occupied with or skilled in criticism.
- involving skillful judgment as to truth, merit, etc.; judicial: a critical analysis.
- of or relating to critics or criticism: critical essays.
- providing textual variants, proposed emendations, etc.: a critical edition of Chaucer.
- pertaining to or of the nature of a crisis: a critical shortage of food.
- of decisive importance with respect to the outcome; crucial: a critical moment.
- of essential importance; indispensable: a critical ingredient.
- Medicine/Medical. (of a patient's condition) having unstable and abnormal vital signs and other unfavorable indicators, as loss of appetite, poor mobility, or unconsciousness.
- Physics.
- pertaining to a state, value, or quantity at which one or more properties of a substance or system undergo a change.
- (of fissionable material) having enough mass to sustain a chain reaction.
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Origin of critical
Synonyms
See more synonyms for critical on Thesaurus.com1. captious, censorious, carping, faultfinding, caviling. 3. discriminating, exact, precise.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for criticality
Historical Examples
Jack could have spitted anybody for coming to disturb him at such a criticality.
The Ned M'Keown StoriesWilliam Carleton
criticality
- the state of being critical
- physics the condition in a nuclear reactor when the fissionable material can sustain a chain reaction by itself
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critical
- containing or making severe or negative judgments
- containing careful or analytical evaluationsa critical dissertation
- of or involving a critic or criticism
- of or forming a crisis; crucial; decisivea critical operation
- urgently neededcritical medical supplies
- informal so seriously injured or ill as to be in danger of dying
- physics of, denoting, or concerned with a state in which the properties of a system undergo an abrupt changea critical temperature
- go critical (of a nuclear power station or reactor) to reach a state in which a nuclear-fission chain reaction becomes self-sustaining
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for criticality
critical
adj.
1580s, "censorious," from critic + -al (1). Meaning "pertaining to criticism" is from 1741; medical sense is from c.1600; meaning "of the nature of a crisis" is from 1640s; that of "crucial" is from 1841, from the "decisive" sense in Latin criticus. Related: Criticality (1756; in the nuclear sense, 1950); critically (1650s, "accurately;" 1815, "in a critical situation"). In nuclear science, critical mass is attested from 1940.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
critical
(krĭt′ĭ-kəl)- Of or relating to a medical crisis.
- Being or relating to a grave physical condition especially of a patient.
- Of or relating to the value of a measurement, such as temperature, at which an abrupt change in a chemical of physical quality, property, or state occurs.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.