Like every young person, arguably every living person, I’m still learning. I learn new things every day. A thing that’s been hitting me a lot lately is the difference between common sense and common knowledge and, more importantly, how uncommon both are. I find myself surrounded by friends who meet my standards of both and when I come across people who don’t, I admit, I’m a little disappointed. Which is probably a little messed up, but I can’t really help it.
I am fortunate enough to have gotten a fairly decent education, so I often mistake common sense for common knowledge. Common sense is, generally, stuff you don’t need to be taught, while common knowledge is stuff everyone is taught. The problem comes in when you forget that you were actually taught some things because you talk about them so often that they become common knowledge between yourself and your core group. This can vary from group to group. It can be concerning anything from a TV show to Napoleon Bonaparte’s reign over the French.
Today’s common knowledge consists of memes and twitter feuds, which is not something I’m bashing at all, but it’s definitely interesting to note the historical trends of common sense and common knowledge. We hear from generations before us how times have changed and how right they are. Common knowledge used to be the position of the North Star, don’t talk to strangers, listen to adults--any and every adult was right, don’t disrespect your elders. Common sense was concerning newspapers and the press would confirm or bust rumors, not start them. If we go way back, we can even explore not eating something before you know what it is.
Many would claim that these changes in both common knowledge and common sense prove a disconnect between today’s society and reality. One could argue, however, that, on the contrary, it proves progress of society as a whole to connect with a different reality. Which is OK. A new reality isn’t a bad thing, nor should it be. It’s not exactly exciting for us now, but the world is changing a lot faster than it used to and, it may be an abstract thought, but future anthropologists are going to lose their minds over stuff like this.
I’m still learning not to take either my common knowledge or common sense for granted and I think I can say I’m not alone when I get a little frustrated sometimes when I have to stop my speaking (which is, admittedly, faster than strictly necessary) to explain something I know offhand. As I said, none of this is to bash today’s common knowledge (what the latest is on the new most popular show) or today’s common sense (don’t bring up politics at the dinner table). But there is something admirable to be said for progress when people alive today can focus on finding the most reputable news source for a story instead of how long, exactly, one has to boil water before all the bacteria is gone.
