Common Sense

Common Sense. Common Sense. Common Sense. What is it, exactly? It is in the title of my blog…in fact the title implies that you’ll find quite a bit of it on this blog. It’s a commonly used term – often subconsciously. It’s the title of a historic pamphlet written by Thomas Paine during the American Revolutionary War. That was a great pamphlet…a true world-changer…and it was written in the plain down-to-earth style that I myself like to adapt at times. But perhaps I will post more on that another time. This post is about plain old Common Sense – the root of the concept itself. It is defined by Merriam-Webster as “sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts.” That is not the only way of saying it. But it gets right to the point: Common Sense is prudent, it is simple and it is a conclusion one comes to based on given (usually obvious) information.

I like to base a lot of my beliefs and practices on Common Sense. It is what I use for my broad, down-to-earth, intellectual philosophy on life, love, politics and business alike. It differs in many ways from Conventional Wisdom. Conventional Wisdom is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the generally accepted belief, opinion, judgment, or prediction about a particular matter.” Plainly said. Conventional Wisdom does not HAVE to be contradictory with Common Sense. Often, they go hand-in-hand. “Don’t stare into the Sun for long periods of time without shades.” Here, Common Sense and Conventional Wisdom are in happy agreement. “Don’t wear all black and stand in the center of the highway in the middle of the night.” Again, Common Sense and Conventional Wisdom do not diverge.

However, a widely accepted belief is often blatantly wrong when one sees it plainly. It is then that Common Sense says one thing and Conventional Wisdom another. All too often, people are prone to follow Conventional Wisdom. In yesterday’s post I discussed the Drug War and how Common Sense said it was time to end it but after all these years the Conventional Wisdom of drug prohibition is deeply embedded into our culture. So, something can be both Common Sense and Conventional Wisdom and something can also be Common Sense but not Conventional Wisdom. When such an occasion happens, the opposing view is then Conventional Wisdom but not Common Sense. There are also some things that are neither Common Sense nor Conventional Wisdom. For instance, “Neptune has the strongest winds of any planet in the solar system, measured as high as 2100 km/hr.” This is not Common Sense, as it is not a based on simple perception. It is also not Conventional Wisdom, since it is a remote fact and most people don’t know (unless they’re astronomers) or, frankly care.