What is common sense? As George Bernard Shaw impressively stated: “Common sense is instinct enough of it is genius“. Or as Merriam Webster defines: “Sound and prudent judgment based on simple perception of the situation or facts“. In other words, common sense is “the knowledge and judgement that we all need to help us live in a reasonable and safe way“.

I see four main groups of people in our World today: educated with common sense (gifted), uneducated with common sense (street smart), educated without common sense (book smart), and uneducated without common sense (hopeless).

First Group:

Educated with common sense (gifted) is characterized by individuals who have the ability to apply their instinct and knowledge acquired through life experiences or learned through education into decision making process – they follow reason and logic to form their own opinion about life.

Second Group:

Uneducated with common sense (street smart) gather knowledge from their own experiences or experiences of others. They possess instinct and are able to make good decisions in life.

Third Group:

Educated without common sense (book smart) acquire knowledge through education but sometimes are unable of making sound decisions in life. They possess theoretical knowledge but lack instinct therefore having hard time applying what they have learned into real life situations.

Fourth Group:

Uneducated without common sense (hopeless) has no ability of logical thinking. People in this group do not usually form their own views and are unable of making sound decisions. They adopt other’s opinion and blindly believe in something they have heard or have seen without understanding it – reason why mass media and propaganda works so well in today’s World. You have to be aware of people in this group – they are characterized by intolerance and are easily offended if you challenge their acquired believes or point of view. It is sad to say, today this group is on the rise and dominates our World population.

Obvious exception to the rule is making decisions under very stressful situations, usually life threatening, where no matter what group you belong to – it is possible to make irrational choices.

“It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense“. ~ Robert G. Ingersoll