The everyday knowledge , unreflected and untested, that we acquire through the repetition of experience and culture, from generation to generation, is known as common sense . The characteristics of common sense knowledge do not guarantee that it is true or valid knowledge, but neither do they attest to the contrary.
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Common Sense Characteristics
The Italian philosopher and theorist of anarchism Antonio Gramsci, in addition to political issues, he dedicated himself to studying issues of human knowledge. The philosopher saw in common sense the composition of popular knowledge , which guarantees this type of knowledge a positive factor. Everyone produces popular knowledge, everyone can issue their verdicts on lived experiences and everyone can issue their opinions and positions, which can result in a range of new knowledge, often correct and that give strength to the people.
Furthermore, Gramsci recognizes that the most reliable knowledge, such as that arising from Science and Philosophy, comes from the rudimentary experience of common sense.
Marilena Chaui , Emeritus Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, Letters and Human Sciences at the University of São Paulo and author of one of the best-selling philosophy manuals in Brazil, the book Invitation to Philosophy , establishes that common sense is an obstacle to the acquisition of secure knowledge, when we analyze modern rationalist philosophers, such as Descartes, and ancient philosophers, such as Plato .
Chaui compares common sense to Plato's cave speaks in his Allegory of the Cave , present in book VII of The Republic , the greatest Platonic philosophical work. The cave, for Plato, is the opinions and limitations left by the belief and the limitation of our body and our senses. The only way to escape this is to reach the true knowledge that is given by reasoning and by the ability to look in philosophy for a more secure knowledge.
In this sense and in agreement with Plato, Chaui says that in order to arrive at true knowledge, it is necessary to abandon everything that comes from common sense, such as customary beliefs, tradition, unsubstantiated opinions etc.
For Silvio Gallo , Brazilian philosopher and philosophy professor at Unicamp's Faculty of Education, common sense can be a good starting point to arrive at safer knowledge, but that there is also the production of sentences and common sense opinions that often take shape and gain space in society, which are prejudiced.
If we stop to think about it, the origin of racism, xenophobia, misogyny and homophobia lies in common sense. These retrograde forms of intolerance they arise from the mixture of hatred for the different and the repetition of old social structures passed on in a hereditary way in the social chain. This attests that there is also a negative characteristic of common sense .
According to Gallo,
“[...] common sense is often harmful and feeds prejudice and injustice. The structure of patriarchal societies and the depreciation of women, always relegated to a position of inferiority in relation to men, are examples of this. The maintenance of this prejudice is supported by the common belief that women are more fragile, do not have the same skills or the same intelligence, they were born to serve men and, for this reason, they cannot have the same rights, and must remain subordinate.”
Common sense knowledge can formulate and disseminate prejudices, it can be wrong and it has no scientific validity and certainty. However, this does not mean that popular knowledge formulated by common sense will always be wrong. There are, for example, techniques medicinal ancient ones based on popular wisdom. We can mention as examples the popular phytotherapy and the ancient acupuncture.
Common sense and science
Although they have different procedures, common sense and Science are not summarily opposed, there may be a complementarity between the two, according to some theorists. For Gramsci, this complementarity is evident and is proof that popular knowledge is valid.
The positivism by Auguste Comte (French philosopher considered the “father” of Sociology) completely disregards common sense as a source of knowledge . For Comte, the surest source of knowledge would be Science, which is even better than Philosophy in the positivist view. For positivism, human beings only reach a stage of social evolution when they abandon the old ways of understanding the world for other safer and more up-to-date ways. In this way, each way of understanding the world must contain fewer and fewer elements of common sense.
Your Three-State Law classifies three moments in the history of societies:the theological, the metaphysical and the positive. In the theological stage , religion was the only way to explain the universe, bringing the human being closer to common sense by not establishing any rational explanation for the organization of nature.
In the metaphysical metaphysical stage , the human being departs a little from common sense when seeking rational explanations based on philosophy, but he has not yet reached the peak of his ability. The last stage , the positive, would be for Comte the crowning of science as a way to completely and safely depart from common sense and explain the world as it is, without any interference from common sense.
Science is the safest source of knowledge we have . Scientific knowledge is methodically and rigorously tested and verified. However, the validity of common sense, in some cases, is remarkable. Great pharmacology research, for example, started from popular herbal medicine.
Common sense and critical sense
While there is a certain complementarity between Philosophy, Science and common sense, since the first two stem from this, there seems to be no connection between common sense and critical sense. While in the critical sense, distrust, skepticism, criticism and analysis prevail , in common sense, the acceptance of knowledge given and repeated prevails.
A scientist or philosopher can start from common sense, as long as they have a critical view of those elements they are analyzing. In this sense, to remain in common sense is to stagnate , while adopting a critical view (or a critical sense) is advancing towards a deeper knowledge.
Read more: What is the history of mentalities?
Culture and common sense
Culture is based on common sense (and vice versa). There is a mutual relationship between the two elements, as common sense knowledge is culturally spread and strengthened. It is cultural repetition that turns a simple opinion into popular knowledge.
Culture is the main constituent element of common sense (a statement that is also evident in its opposite form, since common sense is one of the main elements of culture). In this sense, common sense and culture are elements complementary.
Common sense examples
Common sense knowledge can establish nexuses causes and formulation of value judgments. The causal links may be true, as many have already passed scientific validation, such as the use of boldo to treat gastrointestinal and liver disorders.
One type of causal nexus affirmed by common sense and not necessarily true is association between cold and flu . That old statement, repeated by our grandparents, which said that if you get cold, you will get the flu, is a false causal nexus. The flu is caused by a virus that can take advantage of the lung fragility caused by the cold, but it is not a valid and true causal relationship in any situation, since the installation of the flu virus in the body depends much more on the person's immune situation.
The statements stereotyped reproduced by common sense that establish value judgments are, for the most part, false. The statements “women are fragile”, Asians are easy to calculate, Muslims are terrorists or Indians are indolent” are value judgments spread by false and prejudiced common sense.
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