Volatile \Vol"a*tile\, a. [F. volatil, L. volatilis, fr. volare
to fly, perhaps akin to velox swift, E. velocity. Cf.
Volley.]
1. Passing through the air on wings, or by the buoyant force
of the atmosphere; flying; having the power to fly. [Obs.]
[1913 Webster]
2. Capable of wasting away, or of easily passing into the
aeriform state; subject to evaporation.
[1913 Webster]
Note: Substances which affect the smell with pungent or
fragrant odors, as musk, hartshorn, and essential oils,
are called volatile substances, because they waste away
on exposure to the atmosphere. Alcohol and ether are
called volatile liquids for a similar reason, and
because they easily pass into the state of vapor on the
application of heat. On the contrary, gold is a fixed
substance, because it does not suffer waste, even when
exposed to the heat of a furnace; and oils are called
fixed when they do not evaporate on simple exposure to
the atmosphere.
[1913 Webster]
3. Fig.: Light-hearted; easily affected by circumstances;
airy; lively; hence, changeable; fickle; as, a volatile
temper.
[1913 Webster]
You are as giddy and volatile as ever. --Swift.
[1913 Webster]
Volatile alkali. (Old Chem.) See under Alkali.
Volatile liniment, a liniment composed of sweet oil and
ammonia, so called from the readiness with which the
latter evaporates.
Volatile oils. (Chem.) See Essential oils, under
Essential.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Volatile \Vol"a*tile\, n. [Cf. F. volatile.]
A winged animal; wild fowl; game. [Obs.] --Chaucer. --Sir T.
Browne.
[1913 Webster] Volatileness
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
volatile
adj 1: evaporating readily at normal temperatures and pressures;
"volatile oils"; "volatile solvents" [ant: nonvolatile]
2: liable to lead to sudden change or violence; "an explosive
issue"; "a volatile situation with troops and rioters
eager for a confrontation" [syn: explosive]
3: marked by erratic changeableness in affections or
attachments; "fickle friends"; "a flirt's volatile
affections" [syn: fickle]
4: tending to vary often or widely; "volatile stocks";
"volatile emotions"
n : a volatile substance; a substance that changes readily from
solid or liquid to a vapor; "it was heated to evaporate
the volatiles"
WordNet (r) 2.0
167 Moby Thesaurus words for "volatile":
adrift, afloat, agitable, airy, alternating, amorphous,
birdbrained, birdwitted, bouncy, brittle, bubbly, buoyant,
capricious, changeable, changeful, charged, coquettish,
corruptible, deciduous, desultory, deviable, dizzy, downy, dying,
eccentric, edgy, effervescent, ephemeral, erratic, eruptive,
ethereal, evanescent, evaporable, evaporative, expansive,
explosive, faddish, fading, fast and loose, featherbrained,
feathery, fickle, fitful, fleeting, flickering, flighty, flippant,
flirtatious, flitting, fluctuating, fluffy, fly-by-night, flying,
foamy, fragile, frail, freakish, frivolous, frothy, fugacious,
fugitive, giddy, gossamery, hair-trigger, impermanent, impetuous,
imponderous, impulsive, inconsistent, inconstant, indecisive,
infirm, insubstantial, irregular, irresolute, irresponsible, leger,
light, light as air, light-minded, lighter than vanity, lubricious,
mazy, mercurial, momentary, moody, mortal, mousse, mutable,
nondurable, nonpermanent, passing, perishable, protean,
quicksilver, rambling, resilient, restless, roving, scatterbrained,
sensitive, shallow, shallow-headed, shallow-minded, shallow-pated,
shallow-witted, shapeless, shifting, shifty, short-lived,
shuffling, skittery, skittish, souffle, spasmodic, spineless,
startlish, superficial, temperamental, temporal, temporary, tense,
ticklish, toying, transient, transitive, transitory, unaccountable,
uncertain, uncontrolled, undependable, undisciplined, undurable,
unenduring, unfixed, unheavy, unpredictable, unprofound,
unreliable, unrestrained, unsettled, unstable, unstable as water,
unstaid, unsteadfast, unsteady, vacillating, vagrant, vaporable,
vaporescent, vaporizable, vaporizing, variable, versatile,
vicissitudinary, vicissitudinous, volatilizable, wandering, wanton,
wavering, wavery, wavy, wayward, weightless, whimsical,
wishy-washy, yeasty
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
volatile
1. volatile variable.
2. See non-volatile storage.
(1997-06-05)
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (27 SEP 03)
explosive, fickle
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