precipitant
/pri'sipitənt/
Học thuậtThân thiện
Definition
Adjective:
- Done with very great haste and without due deliberation: Acting or occurring suddenly, rashly, or without careful thought.
Noun:
- (Chemistry) An agent that causes a precipitate to form: A substance that causes a dissolved substance to separate from a solution as a solid.
Usage and Examples
Adjective:
- The company's precipitant decision to launch the product led to numerous unforeseen problems.
- He later regretted his precipitant resignation, realizing he had acted in anger.
Noun:
- In the laboratory, silver nitrate is often used as a precipitant for chloride ions.
- The addition of the precipitant caused an immediate cloudiness in the clear solution.
Advanced Usage and Notes
- The adjective form often carries a negative connotation, implying that the hasty action was unwise or reckless.
- In scientific contexts, the noun is neutral and technical, describing a standard chemical reagent.
Variants and Related Words
- Precipitate (verb): To cause (a substance) to be deposited in solid form from a solution; to cause (an event or situation) to happen suddenly or unexpectedly.
- The crisis precipitated a major policy change.
- Precipitation (noun): The action or process of precipitating a substance from a solution; rain, snow, sleet, or hail that falls to the ground.
- Precipitous (adjective): Dangerously high or steep; (of a change) rapid and dramatic. (Note: Often confused with , but primarily describes physical steepness.)
Synonyms
- Adjective: hasty, rash, impulsive, hurried, abrupt, headlong.
- Noun: precipitating agent.
Antonyms
- Adjective: deliberate, considered, cautious, measured, prudent.
Idioms and Phrases
- Act with precipitant haste: To act with reckless speed.
- The board acted with precipitant haste in dismissing the CEO, without a full investigation.
Adjective
- done with very great haste and without due deliberation
- hasty marriage seldom proveth well- Shakespeare
- hasty makeshifts take the place of planning- Arthur Geddes
- rejected what was regarded as an overhasty plan for reconversion
- wondered whether they had been rather precipitate in deposing the king
Noun
- an agent that causes a precipitate to form