In common usage "grounded" means

"Connected to a conductor which I have arbitrarily deemed to be at an electric potential of 0, and which has such high capacitance that you can assume it never builds up any charge."

Of course, the word comes from the convention that we literally use the ground as a potential reference. In any experimental physics building there's a huge spike of metal that's literally driven into the ground. That spike is big and fat so that it's resistance is really low. By connecting one of the wires of each piece of equipment to this spike you are guaranteed that they are all using the same voltage as their reference.

This is important because current flows through that "ground wire." If the resistance is not small then there will be a voltage difference between different points on the ground reference, which means that different pieces of equipment each measuring the same voltage would report different numbers.

There are other considerations, but that's the essence.

In common usage "grounded" means

Connected to a conductor which I have arbitrarily deemed to be at an electric potential of 0, and which has such high capacitance that you can assume it never builds up any charge.

Of course, the word comes from the convention that we literally use the ground as a potential reference. In any experimental physics building there's a huge spike of metal that's literally driven into the ground. That spike is big and fat so that it's resistance is really low. By connecting one of the wires of each piece of equipment to this spike you are guaranteed that they are all using the same voltage as their reference.

This is important because current flows through that "ground wire." If the resistance is not small then there will be a voltage difference between different points on the ground reference, which means that different pieces of equipment each measuring the same voltage would report different numbers.

There are other considerations, but that's the essence.

In common usage "grounded" means

"Connected to a conductor which I have arbitrarily deemed to be at an electric potential of 0."

Of course, the word comes from the convention that we literally use the ground as a potential reference. In any experimental physics building there's a huge spike of metal that's literally driven into the ground. That spike is big and fat so that it's resistance is really low. By connecting one of the wires of each piece of equipment to this spike you are guaranteed that they are all using the same voltage as their reference.

This is important because current flows through that "ground wire." If the resistance is not small then there will be a voltage difference between different points on the ground reference, which means that different pieces of equipment each measuring the same voltage would report different numbers.

There are other considerations, but that's the essence.

In common usage "grounded" means

"Connected to a conductor which I have arbitrarily deemed to be at an electric potential of 0, and which has such high capacitance that you can assume it never builds up any charge."

Of course, the word comes from the convention that we literally use the ground as a potential reference. In any experimental physics building there's a huge spike of metal that's literally driven into the ground. That spike is big and fat so that it's resistance is really low. By connecting one of the wires of each piece of equipment to this spike you are guaranteed that they are all using the same voltage as their reference.

This is important because current flows through that "ground wire." If the resistance is not small then there will be a voltage difference between different points on the ground reference, which means that different pieces of equipment each measuring the same voltage would report different numbers.

There are other considerations, but that's the essence.