kinetic

UK/kɪˈnɛtɪk/US/kɪˈnɛtɪk/

adjectiveC2Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #9,861 of 15,258leans writtentechnical · an editor’s judgement

Kinetic means to do with movement and the energy in it. Anything moving has it.

Physics gives the precise sense, since kinetic energy is the energy an object has because it is moving, and it rises with the square of the speed, which is why crashes at high speed are so much worse. Art has kinetic sculpture, which moves. Design uses it loosely for anything full of visible movement, so a kinetic painting has energy in it. The word comes from Greek kinesis, movement, which also gives us cinema.

Definitions of kinetic

1adjectivekineticRelating to motion and the energy of moving things.C2
“The brakes turn kinetic energy into heat.”

Remember it

The Greek behind it means to move. Kinetic energy is the energy a thing has only because it is moving.

hooks ontomove

Where it comes from

Kinetic is Greek for moving. Kineō means I move or set in motion, and kinētikos is the adjective for whatever does the moving.

Ancient Greek
κινητικός
English, today
kinetic

Built from

κινέω · Ancient Greek — I move, put in motion

From Ancient Greek κινητικός. From Ancient Greek κινητικός (“puts in motion”), from κινέω (“I move, put in motion”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 9 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

kinetic in the wild

In quantum mechanics, the Hamiltonian of a system is an operator corresponding to the total energy of that system, including both kinetic energy and potential energy.
Hamiltonian (quantum mechanics)
In physics, the kinetic energy of an object is the form of energy that it possesses due to its motion.
Kinetic energy
In classical mechanics, the kinetic energy of a non-rotating object of mass m traveling at a speed v is 1 2 m v 2 {\textstyle {\frac {1}{2}}mv^{2}}.
Kinetic energy
Like a bullet or kinetic energy weapon, this type of ammunition does not contain explosive payloads and uses purely kinetic energy to penetrate the target.
Kinetic energy penetrator
During the 1960s, exhibitions devoted to kinetic art were organized across Europe and a number of artist groups formed around experiments with movement, optical effects and viewer participation.
Kinetic art

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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