Common sense plays a vital role to make life smooth and safe living. Common sense cannot be defined as such. It is seen that common sense is not common among commoners. Common sense cuts through all boundaries of geography, religion, language, education and even I.Q. levels. It has no special affinity for commoners. It is not necessary that a genius has common sense because his mind is preoccupied with complicated questions.
It is believed that Isaac Newton made for his cats two swing doors at the bottom of the main door of his house. The big door was for the big cat and the small door for the small cat. We know that some so-called uneducated persons can display amazing common sense under certain situations to solve tricky problems. If a rubber ball falls into a deep tube, it can be retrieved by pouring water in the tube to make the ball float up. This solution requires common sense and no extraordinary common sense.
Common sense is sometimes related to creativity. Creative persons can solve problems using methods very different from set procedures, and once widely known, these solutions can become a matter of new common sense. When presented with a most complicated rope not, and the prophecy that whosoever could open the knot would conquer the world, Alexander the Great simply cut it open with his sword.
Common sense and logic both get distorted in a mob. Logic and common sense get clouded also during situations including love and war. Our epics have numerous stories to illustrate it. Bhishma decides to stay a bachelor to make his father happy. Even a noble warrior like Rama kills Bali from behind a tree without a fair battle. To have common sense, knowledge and wisdom have also no role to play. Common sense is actually a faculty which combines natural instinct, observation and experience to find workable solutions for various situations without using too much of brain power.
Common sense is useful everywhere, especially in social interactions. If the common sense can be non-uniform within a single society, then obviously it can change with place and community. An Eskimo can make use of his common sense during snow storms at the North Pole. But he cannot have the necessary common sense to find his way through the Howrah Station in Calcutta. Every community quite often makes fun of a stranger precisely because of this reason. The stranger appears to lack in common sense because he cannot conduct himself as conveniently and comfortably as others do. To have and use common sense is a two stage process. Firstly one has to size up a situation quickly and then one has to act. The first requires perception and the second some smartness. Judgement and action during a puzzling situation need common sense. So to be geared for success, it may be advisable to develop exercises to improve common sense also by compelling individuals to face puzzling situations and find solutions.
Common sense is a faculty of mind that requires a lot of brain power.
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