0 very serious thought or talk about complicated ideas, especially in a way that is annoying or not helpful:
I go see a film to be entertained, not enlightened; I leave the beard-stroking to others.
1 thinking very carefully and seriously about something, especially in a way that is annoying or not helpful because you are trying to impress people with your knowledge:
It was just a bunch of beard-stroking men talking about philosophy.
He is an academic, with an air of pipe-sucking and beard-stroking.
The men sat around and engaged in smoking and beard-stroking.
Forget what the beard-stroking rock journalists say.
You too could become an archaeological boffin like those beard-stroking chaps on Open University programmes.
We need action. Beard-stroking philosophical discussions are no use.
