Common sense is a rarity in people nowadays. This has created many problems, one of which is that people tend to listen to others’ opinions and accept them as their own thoughts, rather than trusting their own common sense and intuition. For example, they often rely on AI, doctors, celebrities, politicians, or other authority figures more than on themselves, who yes given plenty of incorrect information, allot of times intentionally. They might know something is a lie but ignore their skepticism because “Celebrity A” said it’s true. Sometimes, they even listen to their uninformed neighbors more than to themselves or to people on social media, who, ironically, also don’t listen to their own judgment. It’s a clown world.
Common sense would mean deferring to people who have more experience and/or knowledge than you when possible.
Even in Idiocracy, President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho deferred to who he acknowledged to be the smartest person in the world.
It’s only one part. Other part is to test them yourself, don’t just take their word as fact, which is most important part. Examples, industries like tobacco funding in order to promote consumption of their product & downplaying harmful role of their product, countries releasing ranking of other countries who lacks “media freedom”. Most of this can be solved by peer review. and experts can be wrong sometimes, reminds me of episode of its always sunny in Philadelphia. And I think this paragraph is just common sense & whole post is was about soft sciences.
There is story about common sense in Panchatantra
- (33) Better common sense than erudition;
- good sense is superior to book-learning;
- absence of sense invites destruction;
- as with the scholars who made a dead lion living.’
'And how was that?’ asked Wheelbearer. And Goldfinder then began the tale of The Scholars who brought a dead lion to life. In a certain settlement lived four Brāhmanas in close friendship. Three of them had mastered all the branches of knowledge but they lacked one thing—common sense. One, however, the fourth among them, who had decisively set his face against scholarship possessed just this—plain and simple good sense. Once, the four of them sat discussing among themselves; and one observed, ‘What use is scholarship to a man who does not travel to other lands to earn wealth by gratifying kings? So whatever we do, it is imperative that we travel abroad.’ And they set out. When they had gone some distance, the eldest said, ‘Look, the fourth among us is an unlettered fellow. What does he have but just common sense. Without scholarship, depending on mere good sense, how can anyone gain the favour of princes. So, we shall not share the wealth we earn, with him. Let him therefore part company with us and go home.’ The second Brāhmana chimed in with, ‘All right, friend Commonsense you have no scholarship; so you had better go home.’ But the third Brāhmana courteously interprosed, ‘No, no, this is no way to talk; we have played together since we were small children.’ Turning to the fourth Brāhmana, he said, ‘Come along, my good friend; you shall share equally with us.’ With this understanding, the four of them continued their journey. In a forest they chanced upon the bones of a dead lion. And one of them remarked, ‘Look, here is an opportunity for us to demonstrate the value of our learning and put it to practical use. Here lies a creature dead. Let us bring it back to life using the knowledge we have gained by diligent study.’ Immediately one of them rose to the occasion. ‘Oh, I know how to assemble the bones and make the skeleton.’ A second added, ‘And I can provide it with skin and flesh and blood as well.’ The third capped this with, ‘But I can give it the breath of life. So, when one had assembled the bones properly, another furnished flesh and blood and covered it with skin. Just as the third Brāhmana scholar was going to infuse life into the form, the fourth stopped him, saying, ‘Look; this is a lion; if you give it life, it is going to kill us all.’ But the third scholar retorted bristling, ‘Shame upon you! You wretched fool! What! You think I am the one to make my learning useless and unfruitful, do you?’ The fourth man’s reply came pat, ‘Well, all right then; go ahead; but just wait one moment while I climb this tree nearby.’ As Commonsense climbed up the tree, the third scholar breathed life into the form which straight away rose up as a lion and killed all the three scholars. When the lion went elsewhere the fourth Brāhmana, the man of sense, climbed down and went home. ‘Therefore I told you, “Better common sense than erudition…” and the rest of it,’ concluded Goldfinder
In Mahabharata, When Grandfather Bhisma was instructing Yudhishthira about Dandaniti.
‘Yudhishthira said, “You have instructed me about a terrible thing that is false and lacks devotion. This is the kind of restraint followed by bandits and I avoid it. I am confused and distressed. My bonds of dharma have become weak. I do not have any initiative in following this. How can I even think about it?”
‘Bhishma replied, “In instructing you about dharma, I have not depended on the sacred texts alone. This is wisdom and experience and it is the honey that wise people have collected. A wise king will have many means of prevention, from here and there. Progress on the journey does not take place along a single branch of dharma. O Kouravya! When kings ignite their intelligence to follow dharma, they are always victorious. Therefore, understand my words. Kings who desire victory and regard intelligence as the best, are always triumphant. Here and there, using his intelligence, a king thinks of means that are in conformity with dharma. The dharma for kings was not determined as a dharma that only has a single branch. Why has the dharma for weak ones not been described earlier?98 If an ignorant person sees a fork in the road, he will be confused. O descendant of the Bharata lineage! You should have already realized that intelligence can also offer a dilemma.99 The wisdom is by one’s side, but it flows everywhere, like a river. One must know that the dharma followed by people can have a course and also the opposite course. Some know this properly. There are others who possess an understanding that is false. Understanding the truth of all this, one acquires knowledge from the virtuous. Those who steal100 from the sacred texts are against dharma. They understand their purport unevenly and vainly seek to explain them. They desire fame in every way and wish to earn a living off this learning. All of them are the worst among men and are against dharma. They are stupid and their views are not ripe. They do not know the true purport. In every way, their final objective is never to be accomplished in the sacred texts. They steal from the sacred texts and point to what is wrong in the sacred texts. They do not act well when they proclaim their own knowledge. In an attempt to establish their own learning, they criticize the knowledge of others. They use words as their weapons and words as their knives. Their milking of knowledge is fruitless. O descendant of the Bharata lineage! Know them to be the traders of knowledge, like rakshasas. They laugh at dharma and believe that all of it is deceitful. ‘We have not heard of any words of dharma in their words, or any intelligence.’ When speaking of Brihaspati’s knowledge, Maghavan himself said this.101 There are no words that are spoken in this world without a reason and some are versed in the sacred texts. But others do not act in accordance with them. There are learned ones who have said that dharma is only what people follow in this world. Even if a person is learned, virtuous and instructed about dharma, he cannot understand it on his own. O descendant of the Bharata lineage! He can be intolerant about the sacred texts, or confused in his learning. Even when wise men speak about the sacred texts collectively, insight may be missing. What is praised is intelligent words that are derived from the sacred texts. Even if an ignorant person speaks words that are full of knowledge and reason, that is thought of as virtuous. In ancient times, to dispel the doubts of daityas, Ushanas said, ‘Know that if the sacred texts do not possess meaning, they are abhorrent. Knowledge that cannot be defined is non-existent.’ Why do you wish to be satisfied with something that has a severed root? Do not resort to words that are false and injurious. You have been created for fierce deeds, but you are paying no attention to what you should do. O king! Look towards my own limbs, decorated with the effects of good policy.(Bhisma was wounded by arrows) Others escaped and are delighted because of this. Brahma created the goat, the horse and the kshatriya for similar reasons.104 Therefore, some105 are successful in their journey by glancing towards other beings. The sacred texts say that the sin from killing someone who should not be killed is the same as the sin from not killing someone who should be killed. This is certainly a rule which they106 shun. If the king does not establish them in their own dharma, the subjects face extreme decay. They roam around and devour each other, like wolves. If there is a kingdom where bandits roam around and steal the possessions of others, like egrets snatching fish from the water, that person is the worst among kshatriyas. Choose noble advisers who possess the learning of the Vedas. O king! Rule the earth. Follow dharma and protect the subjects. If a lord of the earth appoints inferior people to tasks and seizes, without knowing the difference between the two,107 he is a eunuch among kshatriyas. According to dharma, fierceness is not praised. But nor is lack of fierceness. One should not transgress either. Having been fierce, become mild. The dharma of kshatriyas is difficult to follow and there is plenty of affection in you. But you were created for fierce deeds. Rule the kingdom accordingly. Always chastise the wicked and protect the virtuous. O bull among the Bharata lineage! The intelligent Shakra said that this was what should be done in a time of distress.”
That is a movie! Common sense is NOT referring to other people. It’s basically knowledge accumulated through observation, experience and obviousness (a dictionary will help to prove it’s closer to my explanation than yours). Like it’s common sense don’t put your hand in a damn fire. Good God, even you all seem like you are fiending to have others to tell you what to think.
The dictionary definition of common sense just means to have good judgement in practical matters. And it is good judgement to take the advice of others who know more than you do about something.
It doesn’t say the second part lol
Good judgement could have told you that I wasn’t saying the second sentence is part of the definition.
Forget it. That user thinks they are the smartest person in the room, no matter who else is in the room. They think that narcissistic ignorance is a virtue.
I mean, have you seen their user name?
Crazies be crazy.
Well at least it truly is an unpopular opinion.
Too bad for them, they posted this to Showerthoughts.
What’s the lemmy equivalent to r/LostRedditors?
Our ability to rapidly ingest the opinions and experiences of others through language, media, demonstrations, etc. has given us as a species, an incredible advantage, along with some risks you noted.
For an example species following the “learn it for yourself” approach, see the very intelligent but very limited octopus.
No, the issue is that people listen to the wrong people. People who listen to themselves more than to others usually turn really crazy, because they think they know better than anyone else.
Free thinkers who are responsible with research and actually getting to the truth would disagree. But I can see what you mean for the average lazy thinker who just believes something even their own thoughts without verifying it
Research is listening to other people, unless you decide to bootstrap science from scratch, which puts you back into the crazy category.
To be able to do somewhat decent research, you first need to have a lot of education (=listening to people). Then you need to gather research that was already done in the field (=listening to people) to figure out what’s the scientific consensus (=listening to a lot of people). Only when you really understand what came before you do you have a chance to do meaningful research.
Without listening to people, you are just one of these lunatics who still think the earth is flat because they listen to themselves instead of building on the things we learned over the last few millenia.
The main reason why research has advanced like crazy over the last few centuries while it was mostly stagnant for the 10 millenia before that is because we figured out how to pool knowledge and research globally. If you invented something 10 000 years ago, your invention would likely just stay in your village, maybe die out, maybe spread super slowly over hundreds of years to the areas around and likely never make it off the continent.
With the advent of cheap permanent records and fast global communication, a discarded research idea from an american oil company can make it into the hands of an UK scientist and a japanese researcher, who together with some helpful ideas from a german chemist manage to create the Lithium Ion battery.
Without listening to other people, this battery would have never happened. None of them would have been able to create it on their own.
There’s a reason every somewhat decent scientific paper has dozens of references. It’s because proper research is, to a large extent, listening to other people.
People who think the Earth is flat listen to others; that’s why it’s regaining popularity as a theory. Even though it’s already disproven. I’m not saying it’s bad to listen to people ever, but they do not listen to themselves most of the time. Because they tune out their own intuition, ideas, and judgment. So those abilities are weak and lacking in them for never using them. If some of you don’t grasp this, you aren’t seeing reality in person. People are mimics, replaying the ideas of others. No original thoughts. I was trying to keep my post shorter, but next time I will go into maximum detail. Also, my emphasis was on people listening to incorrect people. Someone said there’s a difference between authorities and experts. A NASA scientist would be an “expert,” and they (governments, corporations, and universities) use experts as authorities in the field to push the idea or message, but that NASA expert is usually a lying shill for their masters or just incorrect.
People who listen to noone but themselves (ergo have no education and no outside resources to rely upon) will come to the conclusion that the earth is flat, because the concept of a round earth needs quite a bit of understanding to even come up with that idea.
But you are shifting your point now. Now it’s not about whether listening to people is good or bad, but about which people to listen to. You are not acknowledging that you are shifting your point but claim that this was your point all along.
That argumentative tactic is called the motte-and-bailey fallacy:
- You start with a sexy, controverisal, but hard to defend position (the “bailey”): Listening to people is bad. People should listen to themselves.
- When you see that you can’t defend that point, you switch to a more easy to defend position (the “motte”), but claim that it’s the same argument: Well, people should actually listen to the right people, and sometimes use intuition, especially to discern who to listen to.
These two points are wildly different. The first one is plain nonsense, the second one is close to a tautology.
And that’s the point of this strategy: If people agree to the second position, you claim that this is just a rephrase of your original position, even though that’s really not true.
It’s a commonly used strategy (Jordan Peterson has practically built his whole career on that strategy), but that doesn’t make the style of argumentation valid.
You fake intellectuals are stupid beyond belief, I’m not switching anything I always thought it was bad to listen to people. I was saying from the beginning people listen to others more than themselves. Also I never said listen to NOONE. You are just taking it to the extreme because you missed the first point in the first place. Also this isn’t an argument this is you all not getting that you can be a free thinker while primarily listening to your own instincts, intuition, and utilizing common sesne. Which was my complaint (people seldom do it) but that doesn’t mean listen to no one in the whole world. That’s why in my original post I never mentioned that extreme position.
Ignorance is not something to be proud of. Really not.
This cracks me up. There is a difference between authority figures and experts. AI, celebrities, and politicians is far different than doctors but really they all can be used. AI for search (providing it gives references), celebrities for entertainment things, politicians for political things (believe it or not some of them know a lot about law and history), and doctors for medical things. In addition it totally makes sense to get advice for people you respect but you should know the things they are more knowledgable on and where you are. Also advice is not do my homework for me, its give me a perspective. I have a brother I ask about certain things and another about other things although for some things I will see how both of them feel about it. Ill ask the fediverse. Ill watch youtube videos. If I want advice about a sword I love those nerds from australia. If I lived close by I would totally hang with them if they would have me (likely not half the time as they would be making youtube videos but the inbetween discussion. Sure.)
It’s old problem, Schopenhauer described it
When we come to look into the matter, so-called universal opinion is the opinion of two or three persons; and we should be persuaded of this if we could see the way in which it really arises.
We should find that it is two or three persons who, in the first instance, accepted it, or advanced and maintained it; and of whom people were so good as to believe that they had thoroughly tested it. Then a few other persons, persuaded beforehand that the first were men of the requisite capacity, also accepted the opinion. These, again, were trusted by many others, whose laziness suggested to them that it was better to believe at once, than to go through the troublesome task of testing the matter for themselves. Thus the number of these lazy and credulous adherents grew from day to day; for the opinion had no sooner obtained a fair measure of support than its further supporters attributed this to the fact that the opinion could only have obtained it by the cogency of its arguments. The remainder were then compelled to grant what was universally granted, so as not to pass for unruly persons who resisted opinions which every one accepted, or pert fellows who thought themselves cleverer than any one else. When opinion reaches this stage, adhesion becomes a duty; and henceforward the few who are capable of forming a judgment hold their peace. Those who venture to speak are such as are entirely incapable of forming any opinions or any judgment of their own, being merely the echo of others’ opinions; and, nevertheless, they defend them with all the greater zeal and intolerance. For what they hate in people who think differently is not so much the different opinions which they profess, as the presumption of wanting to form their own judgment; a presumption of which they themselves are never guilty, as they are very well aware. In short, there are very few who can think, but every man wants to have an opinion; and what remains but to take it ready-made from others, instead of forming opinions for himself?
Since this is what happens, where is the value of the opinion even of a hundred millions? It is no more established than an historical fact reported by a hundred chroniclers who can be proved to have plagiarised it from one another; the opinion in the end being traceable to a single individual. It is all what I say, what you say, and, finally, what he says; and the whole of it is nothing but a series of assertions
… ordinary folk have a deep respect for professional men of every kind. They are unaware that a man who makes a profession of a thing loves it not for the thing itself, but for the money he makes by it; or that it is rare for a man who teaches to know his subject thoroughly; for if he studies it as he ought, he has in most cases no time left in which to teach it
Its not about listening to themselves, they just don’t think deeply. is it not that they don’t trust their product, they don’t have their own product, their reasoning skills are garbage
And it is probably related to our habit of web browsing things first. We should reflect on question first. and nothing should go unanswered like if someone believes “everyone have same value” then they should have reason why?
And I suggest people to read Schopenhauer essays on thinking & related topics in order to understand why people are not so smart. This is good start
