Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Most favorable or desirable; optimum.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Best; most favorable: specifically, in experimental psychology, referring to the frequency or duration of stimuli, to the length of intervals between experiments, etc., so timed as to allow of most accurate reproduction or apprehension, or of most adequate attentive preparation: as, the optimal interval for reproduction, the optimal preparation-time, the optimal rate of recurrence, the optimal rhythm, etc.
- Of or pertaining to the optimum, as of temperature, moisture, etc. See optimum.
Wiktionary
- adj. The best, most favourable or desirable, especially under some restriction.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Best possible; most desirable; optimum.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. most desirable possible under a restriction expressed or implied
Etymologies
- From the Latin optimum suffixed with -al. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“This poses serious problems for the claim of engineers that their designs are optimal solutions, since Arrow's theorem implies that in a multi-criteria problem the notion of ˜optimal™ cannot be rigorously defined.”
“One suspects that the term optimal came into widespread use among economists as a marketing device to promote their normative propositions based on efficiency.”
“In order to achieve what I call "optimal stress," you must realize that stress is a process, not an event.”
The Huffington Post: How to Find Your Personal 'Best Stress Zone'
“Then, in 1951 the American mathematician John Nash (yes, the same Nash in "A Beautiful Mind"), wrote a work called “Non-Cooperative Games” in which the outcomes inevitably evolve into two kinds of equilibrium, which he characterized as optimal and suboptimal.”
Some informal extensions to mathematical game theory: factoring in elites and religious fanatics.
“I may define an optimal society as one that looks like it holds property "rights" but what I define as optimal and what I think is moral are two different things.”
Do Progressives Believe This?, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“In his teaching and practice he would force an inhale on the downstroke of a squat and then have a forced exhale on the upstroke, which he called optimal breathing.”
“Well, there are certainly opportunities because as we have talked in the past, we have many markets where we have less than what we called optimal amount of share, which is 10% in market.”
KeyCorp CEO Discusses Q3 2010 Results - Earnings Transcript Call -- Seeking Alpha
“Plenty of others (myself included) eat a perfectly healthy diet, get enough exercise, and yet for whatever reason, cannot attain "optimal" weight.”
Dru Blood - I believe in the inherent goodness of all beings: News & Opinion Blogging, Jan 9, 2006
“Conclusions about creationism are made in relation to 'optimal' life without defining the word optimal or showing how creationism does not produce optimal life and intentionally combining contradictory philosophical and scientific grounds.”
“More recent research indicates that for children raised in optimal rearing conditions, IQ is more heritable than in less optimal rearing conditions (poverty etc).”
The Volokh Conspiracy » 1. Science, Faith, and Not Ruling Out Possibilities
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘optimal’.
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GRE 2014
abase, abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
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2nd part
prelude, ample, escalate, prototype, accession, acquisition, archives, zealot, indict, verdict, intimidating, timid and 454 more...
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EU Buzz - single words (1+2+3)
1. Strictly EU terms with special European meaning used only in the EU
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2. Keywords central to the understanding of the EU (people working for the EU are usually able to give thematic...acceleration, action, additionality, administrator, agenda, agricultural, agri-environmental, agriflation, agri-food, applicant, approach, assent and 1325 more...
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opt
opt, optic, Coptic, option, adoption, co-opt, optimal, optical, optician, optometrist, apoptosis, hemoptysis and 21 more...
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SCIE - game theory
unilateral moral ..., instable, best for all, stable, worst for all, personal game, common moral deci..., cooperate, Prisoner's dilemma, punish, be nice, prospect theory and 33 more...
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Words from "Pearls Before Breakfast"
nondescript, shrewd, seed money, bureaucrat, indeterminate, fungible, cupidity, banal, grandeur, utilitarian, buffer, ecstatic and 123 more...
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bearfax december 2006
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Rita's List of Words
preliminary, rudimentary, stance, conduit, locale, implicit, vicissitude, empirical, repository, apophthegm, apothegm, invariable and 431 more...
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Papageno's Words, Pt. I
hobbledehoy, absquatulate, chthonic, prolix, ululate, internecine, verisimilitude, animadversion, concupiscence, vertiginous, cucullate, lucubrate and 1554 more...
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1
hypomania, hypomanic, complementary, deem, problematic, volatile, mercurial, unaccompanied, counterpart, irritability, hyperthymia, violent and 130 more...
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Words of the Day
glabella, chirotony, nook-shotten, crapehanger, filemot, swirlie, egosurf, lexiphanicism, Ruritanian, stichometry, chrononaut, faldstool and 2014 more...
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Sat Vocabulary List
abandon, abash, abate, abjure, ablution, abnegate, abominable, aboriginal, abortive, abrade, abridge, abrogate and 2155 more...
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_mark's list
Words I like!
( personal list, favorite words, randomness )psy, nanobot, success, smack, vibration, microcosmic, springgraph, marksmanship, estranged, homoerotic, flex, fiasco and 1693 more...
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useful vocab
pysmatic, relentless, storge, preamble, oscillate, itinerary, frolic, frolicsome, abdicate, frolicking, divergent, abnegate and 312 more...
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lucidityprevails's Words
lucidity, journalistic, truthiness, foolhardy, egotism, lesbian, orgasmic, activism, moonglow, voodoo, conquer, demolish and 534 more...
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SAT PSAT ALPHABETICAL O
obdurate, obeisance, obese, obfuscate, obligatory, oblique, obliterate, oblivious, obloquy, obnoxious, obsequious, obsession and 45 more...
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