| Main Entry: | |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | tricky, doubtful |
| Synonyms: | ambiguous, borderline, chancy, contingent, dangerous, delicate, dicey, dubious, dynamite, equivocal, hairy*, hanging by a thread, hazardous, iffy, impugnable, indecisive, insecure, loaded, on thin ice, open, out on a limb, perilous, problematic, risky, rocky, rugged*, sensitive, shaky, slippery, ticklish, touch and go, touchy, uncertain, unhealthy, unreliable, unsafe, unsettled, unstable, unsteady, unsure |
| Antonyms: | certain, definite, firm, stable, strong, sure, undoubted |
| Main Entry: | critical |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | urgently important |
| Synonyms: | acute, all-important, climacteric, conclusive, consequential, crucial, dangerous, deciding, decisive, desperate, determinative, dire, exceptive, grave, hairy*, hazardous, high-priority, integral, momentous, perilous, pivotal, precarious, pressing, risky, serious, significant, strategic, urgent, vital, weighty |
| Antonyms: | trivial, uncritical, unimportant |
| Main Entry: | dangerous |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | hazardous, troubling |
| Synonyms: | alarming, bad, breakneck, chancy, critical, dangersome, deadly, delicate, dynamite, exposed, fatal, formidable, hairy*, heavy*, hot*, impending, impregnable, insecure, jeopardous, loaded, malignant, menacing, mortal, nasty, on collision course, parlous, perilous, portentous, precarious, pressing, queasy, risky, serious, serpentine, shaky, speculative, terrible, thorny, threatening, ticklish, touch-and-go, touchy, treacherous, ugly*, unhealthy, unsafe, unstable, urgent, viperous, vulnerable, wicked |
| Antonyms: | careful, guarded, safe, secure, unhazardous, untroubled |
| Main Entry: | delicate |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | difficult, sticky (situation) |
| Synonyms: | critical, hair-trigger, precarious, sensitive, ticklish, touchy, tricky, uncertain, unpredictable, volatile |
| Main Entry: | doubtful |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | questionable, unclear |
| Synonyms: | ambiguous, borderline, chancy, clouded, contingent, debatable, dicey, disreputable, doubtable, dubious, dubitable, equivocal, far-fetched, fat chance, fishy, hazardous, hazy, iffy, impugnable, inconclusive, indecisive, indefinite, indeterminate, indistinct, insecure, long shot, obscure, on thin ice, open, pending, precarious, problematic, shady, sneaky*, speculative, suspect, suspicious, touch-and-go, touchy, uncertain, unconfirmed, undecided, uneasy, unsettled, unstable, unsure, up for grabs |
| Notes: | a person is capable of doubting, whereas a thing is dubitable; dubious, unlike doubtful, carries the connotation of suspicion |
| Antonyms: | certain, clear, confirmed, decided, definite, exact, resolved, settled, unquestionable |
| Main Entry: | hazardous |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | dangerous, unpredictable |
| Synonyms: | chancy, dicey, difficult, hairy*, haphazard, hot*, insecure, parlous, perilous, precarious, risky, touchy, uncertain, unhealthy, unsafe, unsound, venturesome, wicked |
| Antonyms: | certain, guarded, predictable, protected, safe, secure |
| Main Entry: | mischievous |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | devilish, wicked |
| Synonyms: | arch, artful, bad, bothersome, damaging, dangerous, deleterious, destructive, detrimental, dickens, evil, exasperating, foxy*, frolicsome, harmful, hazardous, holy terror, hurtful, ill, ill-behaved, impish, injurious, insidious, irksome, malicious, malignant, misbehaving, naughty, nocuous, perilous, pernicious, playful, precarious, puckish, rascal, rascally, risky, rude, sinful, sly, spiteful, sportive, teasing, tricky, troublesome, vexatious, vexing, vicious, wayward |
| Antonyms: | behaved, good, nice, obedient |
| Main Entry: | mortal |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | human |
| Synonyms: | animate, bipedal, corporeal, creatural, earthly, ecce homo, ephemeral, evanescent, fading, finite, frail, fugacious, impermanent, momentary, passing, perishable, precarious, sublunary, temporal, transient, weak, worldly |
| Antonyms: | animal, immortal, inhuman, plant |
| Main Entry: | narrow |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | confined, restricted |
| Synonyms: | attenuated, circumscribed, close, compressed, confining, constricted, contracted, cramped, definite, determinate, exclusive, exiguous, fine, fixed, incapacious, limited, linear, meager, near, paltry, pent, pinched, precarious, precise, scant, scanty, select, set, shrunken, slender, slim, small, spare, strait, taper, tapered, tapering, thin, threadlike, tight |
| Antonyms: | broad, generous, liberal, unconfined, unrestricted, wide |