• IPA: /ˈsɪnɪkəl/

cynical

1. Of or relating to the belief that human actions are motivated only or primarily by base desires or selfishness.
2. Skeptical of the integrity, sincerity, or motives of others.
3. Bitterly or jadedly distrustful or contemptuous; mocking.
   • 1945 August 17, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter 1, in Animal Farm: A Fairy Story, London: Secker & Warburg, OCLC 3655473 ↗:

     He seldom talked, and when he did, it was usually to make some cynical remark-for instance, he would say that God had given him a tail to keep the flies off, but that he would sooner have had no tail and no flies.

4. Showing contempt for accepted moral standards by one's actions.
   • 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter X, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326 ↗:

     When he, at Neergard's cynical suggestion, had consented to exploit his own club […] and had consented to resign from it to do so, he had every reason to believe that Neergard meant to either mulct them heavily or buy them out. In either case, having been useful to Neergard, his profits from the transaction would have been considerable.

5. (medicine, rare) Like the actions of a snarling dog, especially in reference to facial nerve paralysis.

• French: cynique
• German: zynisch
• Italian: cinico
• Portuguese: cínico
• Russian: цини́чный
• Spanish: cínico

cynical (not comparable)

1. Of or relating to the Cynics, a sect of Ancient Greek philosophers who believed virtue to be the only good and self-control to be the only means of achieving virtue.