Common sense

Common sense is "knowledge, judgement, and taste which is more or less universal and which is held more or less without reflection or argument".[1] As such, it is often considered to represent the basic level of sound practical judgement or knowledge of basic facts that any adult human being ought to possess.[2] It is "common" in the sense of being shared by nearly all people. The everyday understanding of common sense is ultimately derived from historical philosophical discussions.[citation needed] Relevant terms from other languages used in such discussions include Latin sensus communis, Ancient Greek κοινὴ αἴσθησις (koinḕ aísthēsis), and French bon sens. However, these are not straightforward translations in all contexts, and in English different shades of meaning have developed. In philosophical and scientific contexts, since the Age of Enlightenment the term "common sense" has been used for rhetorical effect both approvingly and disapprovingly. On the one hand it has been a standard for good taste, good sense, and source of scientific and logical axioms. On the other hand it has been equated to conventional wisdom, vulgar prejudice, and superstition.[3]

"Common sense" has at least two older and more specialized meanings which have influenced the modern meanings, and are still important in philosophy. The original historical meaning is the capability of the animal soul (ψῡχή, psūkhḗ), proposed by Aristotle to explain how the different senses join and enable discrimination of particular objects by people and other animals. This common sense is distinct from the several sensory perceptions and from human rational thought, but it cooperates with both. The second philosophical use of the term is Roman-influenced, and is used for the natural human sensitivity for other humans and the community.[4] Just like the everyday meaning, both of the philosophical meanings refer to a type of basic awareness and ability to judge that most people are expected to share naturally, even if they cannot explain why. All these meanings of "common sense", including the everyday ones, are interconnected in a complex history and have evolved during important political and philosophical debates in modern Western civilisation, notably concerning science, politics and economics.[5] The interplay between the meanings has come to be particularly notable in English, as opposed to other western European languages, and the English term has in turn become international.[6]

It was at the beginning of the 18th century that this old philosophical term first acquired its modern English meaning: "Those plain, self-evident truths or conventional wisdom that one needed no sophistication to grasp and no proof to accept precisely because they accorded so well with the basic (common sense) intellectual capacities and experiences of the whole social body."[7] This began with Descartes's criticism of it, and what came to be known as the dispute between "rationalism" and "empiricism". In the opening line of one of his most famous books, Discourse on Method, Descartes established the most common modern meaning, and its controversies, when he stated that everyone has a similar and sufficient amount of common sense (bon sens), but it is rarely used well. Therefore, a skeptical logical method described by Descartes needs to be followed and common sense should not be overly relied upon.[8] In the ensuing 18th century Enlightenment, common sense came to be seen more positively as the basis for empiricist modern thinking. It was contrasted to metaphysics, which was, like Cartesianism, associated with the Ancien Régime. Thomas Paine's polemical pamphlet Common Sense (1776) has been described as the most influential political pamphlet of the 18th century, affecting both the American and French revolutions.[3] Today, the concept of common sense, and how it should best be used, remains linked to many of the most perennial topics in epistemology and ethics, with special focus often directed at the philosophy of the modern social sciences.

  1. ^ van Holthoorn & Olson (1987, p. 9)
  2. ^ Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary: "sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts"; Cambridge Dictionary: "the basic level of practical knowledge and judgment that we all need to help us live in a reasonable and safe way". C.S. Lewis (1967, p. 146) wrote that what common sense "often means" is "the elementary mental outfit of the normal man."
  3. ^ a b Hundert (1987)
  4. ^ The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary of 1973 gives four meanings of "common sense": An archaic meaning is "An internal sense which was regarded as the common bond or centre of the five senses"; "Ordinary, normal, or average understanding" without which a man would be "foolish or insane", "the general sense of mankind, or of a community" (two sub-meanings of this are good sound practical sense and general sagacity); A philosophical meaning, the "faculty of primary truths."
  5. ^ See the body of this article concerning (for example) Descartes, Hobbes, Adam Smith, and so on. Thomas Paine's pamphlet named "Common Sense" was an influential publishing success during the period leading up to the American Revolution.
  6. ^ See for example Rosenfeld (2011, p. 282); Wierzbicka (2010); and van Kessel (1987, p. 117): "today the Anglo-Saxon concept prevails almost everywhere".
  7. ^ Rosenfeld, Sophia (2014). Common Sense: A Political History. [S.l.]: Harvard Univ Press. p. 23. ISBN 978-0674284166.
  8. ^ Descartes (1901) Part I of the Discourse on Method. Note: The term in French is "bon sens" sometimes translated as "good sense". The opening lines in English translation read:

    "Good Sense is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess. And in this it is not likely that all are mistaken: the conviction is rather to be held as testifying that the power of judging aright and of distinguishing Truth from Error, which is properly what is called Good Sense or Reason, is by nature equal in all men; and that the diversity of our opinions, consequently, does not arise from some being endowed with a larger share of Reason than others, but solely from this, that we conduct our thoughts along different ways, and do not fix our attention on the same objects. For to be possessed of a vigorous mind is not enough; the prime requisite is rightly to apply it. The greatest minds, as they are capable of the highest excellencies, are open likewise to the greatest aberrations; and those who travel very slowly may yet make far greater progress, provided they keep always to the straight road, than those who, while they run, forsake it."


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