OPTICAL • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Optical

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/ˈɑptɪkəl/ Listen

adjective

Optical, Optic adj.

1.

Of, pertaining to, or using vision or sight; as, optical illusions.

Synonyms: ocular, optic, visual. "The moon, whose orb Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views."

2.

Of or pertaining to the eye; ocular; as, the optic nerves (the first pair of cranial nerves) which are distributed to the retina; the optic (or optical) axis of the eye.

3.

Relating to the science of optics or to devices designed to assist vision; as, optical works; optical equipment.

Optic angle (Opt.), the angle included between the optic axes of the two eyes when directed to the same point; sometimes called binocular parallax.

Optic axis. (Opt.)

(a)

A line drawn through the center of the eye perpendicular to its anterior and posterior surfaces. In a normal eye it is in the direction of the optic axis that objects are most distinctly seen.

(b)

The line in a doubly refracting crystal, in the direction of which no double refraction occurs. A uniaxial crystal has one such line, a biaxial crystal has two.

Optical circle (Opt.), a graduated circle used for the measurement of angles in optical experiments.

Optical square, a surveyor's instrument with reflectors for laying off right angles.

See images of 'Optical'

Etymology of 'Optical'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Optical" Quotes from Famous Books

... discovery of his own. After every care, he conceived there might still be undestroyed germs in the air inside the flasks. If the air were absolutely germless and pure, would the myriad-life appear? He manipulated his experimental vessels in an atmosphere which under the high test of optical purity—the most delicate known test—was absolutely germless. Here not a vestige of life appeared. He varied the experiment in every direction, but matter in the germless air never ...

— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond

... became life-threatening. Hearts were pounding hideously, gearing up for futures full of incurable aneurysms. The entire crew suffered from a nervous excitement that it's beyond me to describe. Nobody ate, nobody slept. Twenty times a day some error in perception, or the optical illusions of some sailor perched in the crosstrees, would cause intolerable anguish, and this emotion, repeated twenty times over, kept us in a state of irritability so intense that a reaction was ...

— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne

... Jingo is contemptible not because he is impudent, but because he is timid. The reason why modern armaments do not inflame the imagination like the arms and emblazonments of the Crusades is a reason quite apart from optical ugliness or beauty. Some battleships are as beautiful as the sea; and many Norman nosepieces were as ugly as Norman noses. The atmospheric ugliness that surrounds our scientific war is an emanation from that evil panic which is at ...

— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton

... look at the box. There could be no doubt about it; the noise was louder. And, if I could trust my eyes, the box was moving—giving a series of little jumps. This might have been an optical delusion, but it seemed to me that at each tick the box gave a little bound. During the screeches—which sounded more like the cries of an animal in an agony of pain even than before—if it did not tilt itself first on one end, and then on another, ...

— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various

... appeared suspended in the air, and magnified far beyond natural size. High up in the air could be seen the reflection of animals that were many miles distant from the place they appeared to be occupying. These optical illusions were the cause of much annoyance to the thirsty travellers,— especially to their animals, unable to understand them. Excited with the hope of quenching their thirst, they were with much difficulty ...

— The Giraffe Hunters • Mayne Reid

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