Common Sense Tells You ...

[Joytown]

How many times have we heard 9/11 CT'ers say this? We don't need the pesky facts! Common sense tells us it was a CD, there was no plane, it wasn't Islamic Terrorists, it was a new pearl harbor, fill in the blank ...

I just posted this OpEd piece from the L.A. Times over in the Science Section entitiled "Gut Instinct Isn't Science", although I think it has equal application in the Forum as well.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=2744732#post2744732

Cheers,

-jon

 

[CHF]

If common sense were enough to understand engineering and demoltions....no one would go to school to learn how to do it.

 

[Arus808]

if common sense was all we needed then why do we go to school to become doctors? lawyers? police officers? fire fighters?

why do we pay these people money when all we have to do is apply common sense?

common sense told us that we could never fly
common sense told us the world was flat

 

[CptColumbo]

In another thread I wrote:

I was listening to a lecture by Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson on NPR today, and he said something interesting. He is an astrophysicist (he is one of those responsible for Pluto being downgraded) and was talking about the begining of the universe. "The Universe being small enough to fit on the head of a pin may not make sense to some people, but the universe doesn't care if it makes sense.[sic] Common sense has nothing to do with reality, it only has to do with your experiences." In the context of the twoofers who reject scientific findings over what they preceive, it is very funny.

 

[T.A.M.]

That quote is very applicable to the truth movement. Common sense does come from ones experiences, which is why, to the truthers, who see the world through the matrix movies, Tom Clancy novels, and "V" for Vendetta, it all makes "common sense" that 9/11 was an inside job.

TAM

 

[Thunder]

Common sense...said the world was flat. Common sense...said there is a father-figure God who lives in the sky who throws down lightning bolts when he is mad and pretty snow flakes when he is happy. Common sense says that human beings will never fly. Common sense says that man cannot walk on the moon, let alone travel into space. Common sense says that mankind cannot harness the power of the sun. Common sense says that the Arabs will defeat the Jews in 1948.

Screw common sense. It is meaningless. Facts are all that matter.

 

[Mobyseven]

I think it was in The God Delusion that Dawkins reproduced the following exchange, attributed to Wittgenstein. Of course, I'm paraphrasing:

Wittgenstein: Why is it that people thought for so long that the sun revolved around the Earth?

Wittgenstein's Friend: Because it looks like the sun goes around the Earth!

Wittgenstein: And what then would it look like if the Earth was orbiting the sun?

 

[Minadin]

"Common Sense" can be a powerful tool for explaining otherwise complicated subjects and complex systems to non-experts, if used properly - my favorite method is to use an analogy to help people picture something that they can relate to on a more simple level. The trick is to make certain that your simple, understandable model is still accurate enough to represent the science behind it.

Moby's example above is a good one for helping people visualize something that would otherwise not be obvious.

 

[Beleth]

Well, then, we'd feel the really strong wind the Earth's movement would make.

(I know, I know.)

 

[MortFurd]

"Common sense" tells me "common sense" don't know jack about uncommon events.

 

[Unfit4Command]

Common sense tells me that a building struck by a 767 at 440+ MPH shouldn't collapse after enduring massive fires. It just doesn't make sense. However, it does make sense that explosives were planted in the impact zones, survived the impact and fires, then went off when the NWO decided the bowing of the perimeter was severe enough to make people believe that's what caused the collapse.

Oh yeah, common sense also tells me that the NWO accidentally planted bombs in the basement of the North Tower, and accidentally set them off before Flight 11 struck. Whoops!