Grok

Citation needed – Can somebody add some links/references? This is literally the first time I've heard the word grok used in this way --Fochti (talk) 21:04, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Grok /ɡräk/ verb

To understand the subject on a level that cannot be effectively communicated with words.

To be in a state of knowing and awareness of the subject that is beyond translation.

Grok is used in Autistic circles because Special Interests, Pattern Recognition, Hyper and Hypo senses, and other Neurodivergent traits and experiences can give an Autistic person profound insights that are experienced and known but nearly impossible to communicate effectively to others.

When an Autistic person says they "grok it" a way to interpret this is the Autistic person saying "I have profound understanding and intuition of the thing, and I have supreme confidence in the accuracy of my opinion, but I won’t be able to explain this understanding without abundant effort and perhaps needing to educate the potential audience on various subjects."

Grokking can also be used when the double empathy problem between the speaker and the listener is too great to convey the knowledge.

Example: Allistic Person: "How can you tell that person we just met is Autistic?" Autistic Person Responding: "I just grok it."

The author Patrick Rothfuss introduces a similar concept with "Naming" and the "Sleeping mind" and the "Waking mind" in his series the KingKiller Chronicle.

“Each of us has two minds: a waking mind and a sleeping mind. Our waking mind is what thinks and talks and reasons. But the sleeping mind is more powerful. It sees deeply to the heart of things. It is the part of us that dreams. It remembers everything. It gives us intuition. Your waking mind does not understand the nature of names. Your sleeping mind does. It already knows many things that your waking mind does not.”

In this analogy, you "grok" what your sleeping mind tells you but it would be difficult to convey it with your waking mind.

Etymology: A neologism coined by Robert A. Heinlein in "Stranger in a Strange Land."