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i5heutoday at 11:30 AM9 repliesview on HN

"common sense" is common sense because it is not "specialised sense" or "expert sense"

So if politicians base their decisions on "common sense", they confess to not being able to use experts that refine their knowledge and position about a topic.

A "common sense" strategy is therefore what is most popular and on the basis of the understanding of laymen without deeper understanding or knowledge.


Replies

blaze33today at 12:05 PM

For at least a few years, "common sense" has been hijacked by populist politicians, now it just means whatever simplistic idea that fits their worldview, even when it's not complicated to see that said idea is clearly misguided. The original meaning seems lost to me.

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smoldertoday at 12:35 PM

"Common sense" might also mean "do the simple thing" which, given how cheap it is to invest in renewable energy sources like solar farms, and how much room we have to build daytime capacity that way without large scale storage, might mean installing a lot more solar.

Don't pretend the current US admin is anything but corrupt and stupid.

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latchtoday at 11:41 AM

"common sense" is common sense because it is the "sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts" (1).

Maybe what you meant to say is that the position isn't, in fact, "common sense", that it is neither sound or prudent?

(1) https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/common%20sense

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StilesCrisistoday at 11:42 AM

In politics, "common sense" just means that they don't have a real justification. You can just apply it to anything and your base will accept it.

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gadderstoday at 1:27 PM

There will always be a place for common sense - the Greeks used to call it phronesis or "practical wisdom".

You also need to distinguish between expert opinion and elite opinion. The two are not the same.

scotty79today at 11:37 AM

Common sense is the sense of commoners. The entirity of science if a fight against common sense.

In Poland the closest phrase to "common sense" is "na chłopski rozum" which means "according to villager's mind/smarts".

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xtiansimontoday at 1:16 PM

> “… without deeper understanding or knowledge.”

Ha! Like the common sense to dam migratory river systems to make hydroelectric power. Good idea at the time, and who cares about salmon. I have a toaster, and a percolator, and a new fangled “ice” box (formerly chilled by ice, now a maker of ice).

S/ My common sense says 1.2B compensation to not do something we otherwise need is bananas as opposed to the common sense—pound salt response. Good thing I’m not in government, yeah. /s

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bs38today at 11:56 AM

You dont need deeper understanding of knowledge for everything. Ask Grandma whether she needs a chemical engineering degree to bake apple pie.

Then there is the Theory of Bounded Rationality which tells us expertise may exist but resources, time, energy, info, attention etc etc may not therefore bounds and limits of expertise alone must be recognized and solutions reached are satisficable rather than optimal. Aiming for optima when other factors havent been sorted just creates new problems.

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