Re: Cypherpunks' mail database does exist (fwd)

> 
> It does my heart good to hear someone use the term 'grok' -- I don't
> hear many folks use that term very much anymore.   ,-)
> 
> - paul
>  
> 
What does it mean?

osten@hurricane.seas.ucla.edu says:
> > It does my heart good to hear someone use the term 'grok' -- I don't
> > hear many folks use that term very much anymore.   ,-)

> What does it mean?

Its the martian word for the verb "to drink".

.pm

You wrote:

| > It does my heart good to hear someone use the term 'grok' -- I don't
| > hear many folks use that term very much anymore.   ,-)
| > 
| > - paul
| >  
| > 
| What does it mean?

To drink. :)

	(Actually, it means to understand something fully &
completely, but the literal translation is 'to drink.'  See Robert
Hienlien's Stranger in a Strange Land for its origins.)

Adam



-- 
Adam Shostack 				       adam@bwh.harvard.edu

Politics.  From the greek "poly," meaning many, and ticks, a small,
annoying bloodsucker.

> 
> > 
> > It does my heart good to hear someone use the term 'grok' -- I don't
> > hear many folks use that term very much anymore.   ,-)
> > 
> > - paul
> >  
> > 
> What does it mean?
> 

You _would_ ask.   

grok  /grok/, var. /grohk/ [from the novel _Stranger_in_a_Strange_Land_,
by Robert A. Heinlein, where it is a Martian word meaning literally
'to drink' and metaphorically 'to be one with'] vt. 1. To understand,
usually in a global sense. Connotes intimate and exhaustive knowledge.
Contrast zen, similar supernal understanding as a single brief flash.
See also glark. 2. Used of programs, may connote merely sufficient
understanding. "Almost all C compilers grok the void type these days."


(From "The New Hackers Dictionary," edited by Eric Raymond, adapted
from the original Internet "jargon file")

- paul

From: osten@hurricane.seas.ucla.edu
   Date: Wed, 15 Jun 1994 15:04:09 -0800 (PDT)

   > 
   > It does my heart good to hear someone use the term 'grok' -- I don't
   > hear many folks use that term very much anymore.   ,-)
   > 
   > - paul
   >  
   > 
   What does it mean?

Hmmm...  Someone who doesn't grok ``grok''.  How interesting!

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