cynical
- 1Inclined to doubt the integrity, sincerity, or true motives of other people.
Years of covering city hall made the reporter cynical about official explanations.
She gave his sudden friendliness a cynical reading, suspecting he wanted a favor.
Similarskeptical, suspicious, distrustful, doubtful, jaded
- 2Bitterly or jadedly distrustful or contemptuous of people and things, often in a mocking way.
His cynical laugh made it clear he thought the charity gala was pure theater.
Decades in the industry had left her cynical, sneering at each new 'revolutionary' product.
Similarjaded, sardonic, sneering, scornful, mocking
Oppositeidealistic, earnest
Note
Bitterness is what separates this from the merely skeptical meaning. A person who is cynical in this way does not just doubt; they scoff. The word attaches readily to speech and expression: a cynical remark, a cynical laugh. George Orwell gives it to a character who says God gave him a tail to keep the flies off, but he would sooner have had no tail and no flies. That is weary, deflating humor.
- 3Relating to the belief that human actions are driven only or mainly by selfishness or base desires.
The novel presents a cynical philosophy in which every act of kindness conceals self-interest.
His cynical worldview holds that even heroism is just vanity in disguise.
Similarpessimistic, misanthropic, jaundiced
Oppositeidealistic, optimistic
Note
Here the word names a view of human nature, and its history explains it. It entered English in 1542 from Latin cynicus, 'Cynic', which goes back to Greek kunikós, 'doglike'. The word suits nouns for outlooks, such as philosophy, view and theory. Samuel Johnson, writing To the Earl of Chesterfield in 1755, applies it to asperity, a harshness of temper. That use already leans toward the bitter, mocking meaning.
- 4Acting as though commonly accepted ideas of right and wrong deserve no respect.
The company's cynical decision to bury the safety report put profits over lives.
Pundits saw the pardon as a cynical bid to reward loyalists before the election.
Similarcalculating, unscrupulous, self-serving, opportunistic
Oppositeprincipled, scrupulous
Note
Here the word judges conduct rather than outlook. A cynical act is calculated, and it knows exactly which standard it is setting aside. The word sits naturally with nouns for schemes and choices, such as decision, bid and suggestion. In Robert W. Chambers's The Younger Set (1907), a cynical suggestion persuades a man to exploit his own club and resign from it to do so.
Less common meaning
- 5Resembling a dog's snarl, as when facial nerve paralysis draws the mouth into a snarling expression.
Demetrius Attalicus studied the symptomatologies due to strictura cerebri, characterized by a cynical spasm of the facial nerve.
1986, Giuseppe Roccatagliata, A History of Ancient PsychiatryTowards noon, he experienced convulsive movements; the extremities became stiff, the pulse extremely small, and he died during an attack of cynical spasm.
1818, Matthieu Joseph Bonaventure Orfila, A Treatise on MineralNote
A rare medical use takes the doglike root traced under the philosophical meaning literally, describing a face pulled into a snarl. It lives mainly in the phrase cynical spasm, found in Orfila's Treatise on Mineral, Vegetable, and Animal Poisons (1818) and the New Orleans Medical News of 1857. A modern reader may hear an attitude in it, but in clinical and historical writing it describes only the face.
Practice
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Origin
First recorded in 1542, from Classical Latin "cynicus" ("Cynic") plus the suffix "-al". It ultimately traces to Ancient Greek "kunikos" ("doglike"), a reference to dogs.