The meaning of "dangerous"

[ritaxis]

When you say something is dangerous
do you mean

A.there is a very high likelihood of something bad happening

or

B.there is any possibility of something extremely -- lethally or near-lethally -- bad happening

or

C. there is a very high likelihood of something very very bad happening?

D. there is either a high likelihood of something bad happening, or any likelihood of something very bad happening or both?


(C is the most exclusive as it requires both a high probability and high stakes: D is the least exclusive as it allows high probability, high stakes or both)

I ask because I was reading a thing and I wasn't sure what I would have meant by saying something about that thing was dangerous, or whether I ought to use the word at all. I am being vague because in the eight and a half minutes it took me to put the question together I have forgotten what I was reading.

Comments

[del-c.livejournal.com]

In risk assessment we multiply the severity of consequence by the likelihood of occurrence, and if the result is too high, we say the expected consequence is severe, or the danger of occurrence is high. We can draw a risk plot showing all these cases, with a diagonal red line indicating the danger zone above and to the right of the line.

So I'd say D, "high likelihood of mildly bad consequence or low likelihood of very nasty consequence", plus some intermediate cases where the consequence was mildly nasty and the likelihood was middling high.