Do you think Common Sense is important?

very important. my husband is super smart but not alot of common sense and sometimes i want to punch him

I know several educated people who are lacking common sense. Common sense is taught at home, or learned as we grow….if we are paying attention….it isn’t taught in school.

Common sense is very important, and I do believe the most intelligent people are the ones with common sense, whether they have a formal education, or not.

I don’t think that common sense makes someone more creative….I’ve known a few extremely creative people who were also lacking common sense.

Common sense is something you develop as you grow older, I suppose, while education is obviously taught to you.

It makes sense.

My husband is also super smart, but somewhat lacking when it comes to practical matters. i do not think the two go together at all necessarily.

Common sense is good to have, but not mandatory.

When I saw the question, I thought you were asking about Thomas Paine’s excellent 18th century political tract.
This is perhaps a bit “off topic” but issues of “common sense” can be a real problem to people in the autism spectrum, especially Aspergers Syndrome. The idea that people “pick up” common sense, nonverbal social cues and social behavior through some process of osmosis while growing up does not apply to us. Such things have to be explicitly taught and learned by rote memorization and pattern recognition. The stock character of “the nerd” or “the absent-minded professor” may be amusing in films; but it is certainly no fun to be one.

What is common sense though? What might be common sense to one person might not be to the other. The word logic is also thrown around quite often, not just on this site but others, I find it to be rather subjective too. I don’t think logic comes naturally, in my opinion it takes years to master the skill for most people.

You can have all the education available and tons of degrees—but common sense doesn’t necessarily come along with that.

I’ve heard the phrase “educated idiot” which is fitting in the case of someone who is highly educated, but has a hard time functioning in society. Common sense is just that – a “sense”—something more innate than acquired. It helps you determine what to do with all your education in a lot of cases. So actually it is very important to make a well rounded individual.

To me common sense is knowing when something is worth the risk or not.
Being able to figure out what your capabilities and limitations are without always suffering first. I think I learned this as a young Child.
LOL my Sister In Law and Brother In Law always consult my Husband first. They are well educated.
My Husband always knows. His gut reaction is always right. I usually get it right.

@HumourMe – I agree completely! My mate and I often disagree on what we both think is logical and common sensical!

That aside, I think it is extremely important to have some type of common sense or else you probably won’t last long in the real world.

I think common sense is more important than anything. I have a very good friend that has a genius IQ but about zero common sense. Its irritatingand funny all at once. How could someone be so smart and so dumb all at once?

How do you define common sense? And more importantly how do you define intelligent people?

There are lots of intelligent people that fail to be successful because they can not put their intelligence to use in transforming reality. If you see these people as lacking common sense then maybe the answer to your question is yes.

There are also very intelligent people that fail to get along with other people, but still manage to affect the real world.

There are also lots of simple or naive people that manage to have a profound effect on their surroundings.

Intelligence in my opinion has (atleast) three aspects:
1. Ability to see patterns, understand logic and draw conclusions.
2. Ability to use your intellect to affect the real world.
3. Ability to interact with other people successfully.

If any one of these three is lacking, the use of intellect is very limited.

As is, your question is very vaguely phrased and does not specify what you mean by the terms common sense and intelligence, and can be interpreted in lots of ways, and therefore unanswerable.

it’s the basic rule of thumb for the manual of life. Without it we are condemned to need the assistance of others for basic things or decisions. It happens from life experiences and from other people’s experiences we learn from. I have noticed that people who grew up without a father figure tend to struggle with this. Now if dad also had no common sense then the kid might be doomed. Also if people are cloistered in a book heavy learning environment they tend to suffer to some extent. Or those who have soooo much money they just pay others to handle situations so they don’t have to have CS. But if they ever become broke they may well suffer. These are of course all generalizations. This is a good question. Anyone with any common sense will understand it perfectly:)

I think common sense is very important —no, crucial in our everyday living in order to survive even. Sometimes things don’t come with labels, instructions or suggestions and we have to make educated guesses (or uneducated guesses) about how to proceed. I think sometimes people get kind of lazy about using their brain on simple issues. I have a relative I want to shake by the shoulders sometimes when she asks me really basic questions which require only a moment’s thought, yet she decided not to exert that one required brain cell to figure it out herself.

“Smart but dumb” is a good way of describing Aspergers Syndrome. Especially those of us who grew up long before such things were recognised, diagnosed or treatment even thought of. We grew up in a world that ridiculed us (being a nerd was not fashionable in the 60s and 70s) and we generally gave up on attempts to socialize and either accepted bullying or learned to use violence as an all-purpose solution to enforce our chosen isolation.

There are a range of treatments availble now to children and teens diagnosed with AS but none are know to be effective for those diagnosed later in life, The condition is incurable, a few people are claiming that autism is reversible but they are generally considered to be peddlars of false hope. The condition is not like a correctable “software problem” but is a difference in the hardwiring of the brain, a “hardware problem” that can be worked around to some degree but not correctable short of scrapping and replacing the hardware. A solution not available with human brains.

Naaahhh…...

i don’t believe in the term, “common sense”

do you agree that it is “common sense” to know that fire is hot enough to burn? someone had to find out.

the first person may have seen fire, and touched it, but would you consider him an idiot? in retrospect, yes but not during that time.

at the beginning of fire, obviously it wasn’t common knowledge that it could injure you, and one would have to find out one way.

do you think it’s common sense to give someone tea at the end of their supper? do you think it’s common sense to check the plates under the oven? would it be common sense to say that mousse isnt made of moose?

i have high disregard and low respect for people who force their common sense on one. I used to work at a japanese restaurant and it was fricken aggrivating. i was constantly harrassed on not understanding “common sense” and the entire restaurant was based on “common sense.” i was told to give rice to everyone who had a meal. i gave rice to a person who ordered chickenwings, and i got raged on. like fk, would you consider chickenwings as a meal? i do, cause in my home, its “common sense” to eat meat with rice.

if i told you that force is equal to mass times acceleration is common sense, would you agree? if you have ever taken one high school physics class, you would KNOW that is simply “common sense”, in terms of innately knowing it.

I believe in knowledge in areas, but not common sense. one can know how japanese food is served, and force the idea that that is common sense to give someone rice when they eat steak, but not chicken wings. To say that fire can injure one resides in the knowledge area of fricken physical injury category mind folder.

fuck the term common sense, ill learn what i need to know over time.

There is nothing common about common sense!

People who resent or deny the value of a broad and deep education, speak of common sense as if it were a virtue above all others – something magically endowed on those who refused to become educated about anything in favour of remaining ill-informed and without the ability to learn from experience or observation.

There are some things that become part of a body of knowledge among those who have acquired experience across a wide range of day to day situations, whether they have a formal education or not. This knowledge is common among those who are intelligent, curious, observant and who apply the benefits of their experience in making decisions in their lives. This can be done with or without formal education. The combination of these attributes are not common but they contribute to making sensible decisions.

i really wonder about these long winded replies dealing with the obvious discontent towards the common person doing well in common problem solving vs. the time, trouble, and high expense that those who needed to get this so called higher education thinking that will be good enough…..because they put in the time, etc. Those with the attributes of basic common sense will provide short concise answers and be done. Those with maybe not so much C.S. will feel the need to over explain more. This has been sort of a culture clash between those who went on with their lives early, mostly out of necessity, and those who had different situations where they had the resources to go to college. Its easy to see the angst from both sides.

okay, im chill.

@Dr_Lawrence that dawg has it right on the dot ;p

@woodcutter: i dont think you had enough common sense to answer the question stated above. (jokes, i know whatchu up to and i agree with what you said).

so, to concise my “long winded” reply, imo:

common sense is simply a douche(read stupid) way to say you’re stupid, and it hurts my feelings to be called stupid

edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought-terminating_clich%C3%A9

@warribbons no, common sense is not an insult unless it is taken as one. Common sense is basically the bare minimum of life skill expected of us without much maintenance or training, that’s all. Some have the ability to just work mundane problems out. Some have the ability to overcome some of the more esoteric problems….using reasoning gained from the mundane and applying it. Sometimes it’s just plain flying by the seat of our pants using a little courage to fill the gaps of the unknown. There is a finite number of problem situations that we will run into in our lives, all being a variation of another. That is the reason common sense comes easy for the majority without heavy training. That makes it well….common. If common sense was this unattainable saintly coveted climb to a distant mountain top guru in Tibet, we would all be screwed…..millenniums ago.

@woodcutter alright. fair enough. not everyone has the same common sense.

i still hate people who ostracize others for not having “common sense”

I accept that I have no “common sense” and I no longer consider it an insult if someone tells me that. I have learned that my “uncommon sense”, especially my ability to spot patterns and make connections others have missed, can be extremely valuable. It’s just “common” things, like how to make “small talk” or remembering to wear socks, that throw me for a loop.

Everybody has common sense..Everybody. Nobody on the face of this earth is born stupid. Animals, humans and even plants have common sense. When you place a plant in a dark area and there is only a little light coming in, the plant would bent toward the light. Its just that we dont always use our common sense because of our self esteem. Common sense to me is Listening, Thinking and Paying Attention. Once we do these three things we are using our common sense. Its very important because without it its very hard to achieve anything including academic studies. A person who uses their common sense during class is more likely to succeed that a person who just sits behind the class and only takes notes.

@cornbird: I couldn’t have said it better. Thanks for writing that.

Without it you are lost. Doesn’t matter if you are a member of Mensa , if you can’t pour piss out of a boot if the instructions are on the heel, you and your high IQ are going to pour piss on your feet.

I agree Silhouette. Thks for making LOL .

@Silhouette Thanks for the entertaining answer. +GA

wonder how much common sense Paris Hilton has?

@woodcutter LMAO!!! I don’t wonder.

sometimes.