Definition of "cons"

cons¹

/ˈkɑnz/

noun
plural conses
1. (programming) A data structure in Lisp that is a pair of pointers, car and cdr, used mainly for lists.
verb
third-person singular simple present conses, present participle consing, simple past and past participle consed
1. (programming) To obtain a list from a cons or a nesting of conses; to prepend an element to a list by forming a cons of that element and the list; to obtain a list from a smaller one by repeated application of such kind of prepending.
  Quotations
  This version of length arises naturally from the recursive definition of a list: “a list is either the empty list or an element consed onto another list.”
  1992, Peter Norvig, Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp, Morgan Kaufmann, page 62