Jul172009
commonsense - a philosophical view
Filed under Life etcetera, et al, Navel-gazing by The Soaplady at 10:44 am on Jul 17 2009
I should be working … 
however, the need to express myself, properly, has brought me here, to my PC …
I am truly *glad* for all of those whose lives have been made easier by Sunday sailings - my own sister will be coming here on the sunday ferry soon, and I shall be so glad to see her … I can now go to the Summerisles, and stand a chance of getting back home at the weekend … This is good …
I am, in no way, going to confine myself to a dark room, going ‘ochone, ochone’ and bewailing anything - I am perfectly happy with the decision …
What I am *not* too happy about, is the way that ‘A victory for commonsense’ has been decreed … and that’s what I want to talk about here … Not the ferries, or anything associated with them … But the way that ‘a victory for commonsense’ makes me feel …
Commonsense is in the eye of the beholder … It is mine, and it is yours, and the two may not be the same …
There is no global, correct, ‘I got the answer right then’ body of shared commonsense out there, floating in its own perfumed pink cloud of correctness, waiting for us to intelligently recognise and espouse it …
People with polarised and totally different bodies of commonsense on the same issue, often based upon considerations which do not match each other at all, and consequently cannot be matched at all, point for point, can still both claim to hold valid views can’t they …?
By claiming ‘a victory for commonsense’, you are negating and denying the commonsense of the other view …
A philosophical view perhaps … Semantics also maybe comes into it …
But you really do need to take on board that offence may be caused when you speak in these terms, however unintentionally …
That was all I wanted to say …
1 Nicon 17 Jul 2009 at 11:54 am
The written word carries much more power than the spoken word. Possibly because it comes with no intonation, or indication of sarcasm or irony, which are much more obvious with spoken words. There will be few regular IBers who haven’t caused offence to their readers, when they had absolutely no intention of doing so, because their writing skills and vocabulary allowed their words to be interpreted in another way.
I want everyone who moves to Britain to respect, and take on board what I consider fundamental British attitudes, including sexual equality, the rule of law and respect for other people. I don’t mind if you think Guy Fawkes was a traitor and a terrorist or a freedom fighter and a martyr, but he is part of British heritage, and belongs to everybody who lives here.
There are many non-European cultures who have better records than us on things like respect and care of the elderly, or hospitality to strangers but to embrace those parts of other cultures would mean taking on less attractive bits as well. To give older people’s opinion more weight would mean young people being listened to less.
On Coll we have a (newish) ferry service on Thursday which allows day trippers from Oban to visit Coll, Coll folk to visit Tiree for the day (the Co-op is a principal attraction) and a direct link between Barra and Coll and Tiree. All these things are a good thing (in my opinion) and it is a busy ferry, but sometimes, occasionally, I miss the quietness of Thursdays before we had a ferry everyday of the week. It seems to me that every gain carries a loss within it, what is needed is to find the gains in what appears to be a loss only situation.
2 Flying Caton 17 Jul 2009 at 1:59 pm
That’s why I like the sometimes loathed smilies…they take stings out of tails. Not that I’ve ever commited such a crime…perish the thought
Dear Soaplady surely you should be slaving over hordes of happy visitors instead of waxing all philosophical in here? Tcha!
I find myself agreeing with you
3 paton 17 Jul 2009 at 2:03 pm
A very interesting post, which makes one stop and
think.
4 Ferrymanon 17 Jul 2009 at 7:45 pm
I think your point is well worth making and duly noted….. I loathe and really detest those smiley things in emails and have just begun to use LoL as an ice-break but I thoroughly agree with FC that it might put a different slant on a post…maybe
Respectfully…..FM and clan
5 TheCrofton 17 Jul 2009 at 9:25 pm
Immanuel Kant believed common sense was simply an “appeal to the opinion of the multitude” while Joseph Priestley concurred that it “was for persons of middling capacities”.
Neither of these groups seem particularly well placed to produce sound judgement…
Just saying.
6 taddoeon 19 Jul 2009 at 11:24 am
Sorry,I can’t really comment on this as philosophy was never a favourite subject of mine at school
7 Flying Caton 20 Jul 2009 at 7:13 pm
Well if you kant then you just kant karol…
8 taddoeon 20 Jul 2009 at 8:08 pm
can - carnéade more like
9 Flying Caton 01 Aug 2009 at 5:31 pm
Blimey taddoe that was tres intéressant. I went here
http://www.cosmovisions.com/Carneade.htm and am very taken with ’scepticisme mitigé’.
Was the Diogène de Babylonie the Diogenes in the Barrel who told Alexander the Great to stop blocking the Sun?
My brain now hurts and I blame that taddoe…