What is common sense?
It is not common anymore…
We live in societies where there is no common truth. A basic, unwritten logic, which is part of the culture to interact without conflicts.
Common sense is a concept that has been debated since the beginning of philosophy.
According to Aristotle, common sense is the common perception of the facts that happen and our reactions.
For example, the taste of coffee. Although we cannot compare it, it is supposed to be the same taste for everyone.
Or, if you walk through a forest and hear a branch snapping above you, you jump and protect yourself. These are senses that anyone in that place would have perceived and reacted to similarly.
For Descartes, for many the father of modern philosophy, common sense acts between the immaterial and rational being, the governed body, and the physical environment limited by time and space.
It made him realize he thinks, and it is the only thing he knew with certainty.
Common sense made him realize that there is a world outside his thinking, and he needs a rationality to understand it.
That rationality with which we interpret the universe is, according to him, common sense.
In the 19th century, pragmatist philosophy emerged in Great Britain. For them, common sense is a set of beliefs about practical and basic aspects of everyday life that are useful for getting by.
Common sense is not defined by its proximity to truth, but by the consequences of believing certain ideas.
Now, what is considered common sense depends on the context. Believing, or not believing, certain things have different effects depending on the place and time in which we live.
I live between two opposing cultures on different continents. Both cultures have basic unwritten rules that everyone in them uses and calls common sense. But they are not at all similar. Nor do they approach an absolute truth.
What we define as “common sense” is actually “common belief”. Those beliefs can bring us closer to absolute truth, or they can obscure it.
In practice, common sense is a rhetorical tool. It is used to make it difficult for anyone to question widespread ideas that the majority considers naturally self-evident.
Conclusion:
We take it for granted that by living similar experiences, we all draw similar conclusions. But that is not the case.
The modern concept of common sense does not exist. It should be called common belief.
Appealing to common sense to support an idea, or to leave a belief out of discussion, are fallacies.
A method of limiting critical thinking.
