Has anyone ever said to you "come on that's common sense"? Well they may be right, there are a lot of things that are common sense, but when analyzing situations and psychology simply using your common sense may not always lead you to a reasonable solution. Although many people believe that it would be easier to trust your common sense to get the correct answer on things it may possible lead them in the wrong direction. Take the saying "absence makes the heart grow fonder," most people will agree that this is a true statement. From experience from long distance relationships I would agree that you do feel more appreciative towards people when you are not with them everyday. Then look at the saying "out of sight, out of mind." Again, most would agree that when you are not seeing or doing something everyday, it does tend to be on your mind less often then when you are constantly around it. I took a survey of 7 people and I asked them to tell me whether they agreed or disagreed with each saying when they looked at them separately and these were my results:
"Absence makes the heart grow fonder" - Agree: 5, Disagree: 2
"Out of sight, out of mind" - Agree: 4, Disagree: 3
After I had them look at each of the sayings separately, I told them to look at them together and see if they noticed anything. Now, many of them did not catch it right away until I made it aware to them that the two sayings are contradicting each other. I was surprised, and so were they, when we realized that a few of us had agreed with both of the sayings. This should help us realize that sometimes out common sense can lead us to believe a lot of things, even if those things go against each other. Native Realism - the idea that we see the world as it is or "seeing is believing vs believing is seeing" is what common sense can be based around. We need to remember that sometimes common sense can catch us in a tough battle of contradictions and strictly trusting that common sense may not always be the best idea.
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