conditional: Meaning and Definition of

con•di•tion•al

Pronunciation: (kun-dish'u-nl), [key]
— adj.
  1. imposing, containing, subject to, or depending on a condition or conditions; not absolute; made or allowed on certain terms: conditional acceptance.
  2. (of a sentence, clause, mood, or word) involving or expressing a condition, as the first clause in the sentence If it rains, he won't go.
    1. (of a proposition) asserting that the existence or occurrence of one thing or event depends on the existence or occurrence of another thing or event; hypothetical.
    2. (of a syllogism) containing at least one conditional proposition as a premise.
  3. (of an inequality) true for only certain values of the variable, as x + 3 &whence; 0 is only true for real numbers greater than −3. Cf. absolute (def. 12).
—n.
    1. (in some languages) a mood, tense, or other category used in expressing conditions, often corresponding to an English verb phrase beginning with would, as Spanish comería “he would eat.”
    2. a sentence, clause, or word expressing a condition.
Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Copyright © 1997, by Random House, Inc., on Infoplease.
See also: