Common Sense

I would argue that common sense is neither "common" nor individual but somewhere in between.I'd like to refer to an experiment I ran into while I was in college many centuries ago. In the experiment, the students are asked to roll a ball across a table in a path that the ball would not touch the rails on either side. The rails are curved. Student after student (we're talking about college students here) tried to roll the ball in a curved path before it entered in between the rails hoping the ball would continue to roll in a curved path. The physics students were the ones that noticed the rails were far apart enough that you could just roll the ball in a straight line to get it to go through without touching the rails.The moral of the story is this. To the physics students, it was common sense for them that a ball will go in a straight line no matter what kind of path you set it to go before you let go. To other students, it was common sense for them that the ball could be manipulated to continue to roll in a curved path.The real moral of the story is common sense depends on the mentality of certain groups of people. It's common sense for folks like myself to seek answers through skepticism. It's common sense for folks like buzsaw to seek answers through prayers. Ultimately, trying to apply common sense from one group to the other is futile and a complete waste of time.

Just a thought off the side.I believe the one true reason why science exists is because of human curiosity. The more we find out about things, the more questions we have. The more questions we have, the more we want to find out. For example, after humans discovered the existence of the solar system, we began to try to find out what's beyond. For me, it's just common sense that life is only worth living if we try our best and give everything we have to figure out what's out there. The universe is a vast place beyond imagination. The distances between stars are just ridiculous.Then there are the religiously motivated whose common sense tell them to not be curious and pray for answers... and prepare for judgement day. For them, common sense tells them life is worth living only because they have to prepare themselves to meet their creator. Nevermind all the wonderous things out there in the universe waiting to be discovered.

If you want to put it this way, sure. I see common sense and common sense conclusion to be the same thing.

What are you talking about? I haven't said anything even close to foolish or whatnot. All I've said is people have different ways at viewing things that influence their common sense. You people pray for things to happen while I try to make things happen. May be I'm the foolish one.

This is the same conclusion the ancient Greek philosophers came to. In this case, we are looking at the type of common sense derived from everyday experience.

Not necessarily. I'd say that common sense is enough for me to believe gay people deserve happiness just like the rest of us no matter what christian liars and christian bigots say. I don't care what kind of scientific evidence you bring to the table contradicting this.

Sorry for snapping at you like that. I've been having high blood pressure for what the christian bastards have been doing to my country and my fellow citizens. I'll shut up now.