Since I’ve never heard the word granfalloon outside of Cat’s Cradle, I have to assume it never caught on, which is too bad. I don’t know of any word that means quite the same thing. Vonnegut defined a granfalloon as a “seeming team that was meaningless in terms of the ways God gets things done. . . . Examples of granfalloons are the Communist party, the Daughters of the American Revolution, the General Electric Company, the International Order of Odd Fellows—and any nation, anytime, anywhere.”
Contrasting with the granfalloon was the karass, a team that does “God’s Will without ever discovering what they are doing.” Pondering the karass takes more effort than my brain can handle right now. It raises too many questions about Fate and God and whatnot.
The granfalloon, on the other hand, is something that I’ve actually encountered before. People are all too eager to include themselves in groups that have no real meaning in the grand scheme of things. One could get all twisted and turned around in life by believing too strongly in the importance of one’s granfalloons.
Beware the granfalloons!