If you’re using “null pointer” to describe the situation where a person knows what a phrase means but not the etymology that caused it to take on that meaning, then I think you should consider nearly everyone to have “null pointers” for nearly every word that they know. That’s the ordinary default way that people understand words.
You probably don’t know why words like “know” or “word” have the meaning that they have. You’d probably have a marginally more nuanced understanding of their meaning if you did. This does not make a practical difference for ordinary communication, and I would not advise most people to try to learn the etymologies for all words.
If you’re using “null pointer” to describe the situation where a person knows what a phrase means but not the etymology that caused it to take on that meaning, then I think you should consider nearly everyone to have “null pointers” for nearly every word that they know. That’s the ordinary default way that people understand words.
You probably don’t know why words like “know” or “word” have the meaning that they have. You’d probably have a marginally more nuanced understanding of their meaning if you did. This does not make a practical difference for ordinary communication, and I would not advise most people to try to learn the etymologies for all words.