Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread

[EricHiggin]

vivster said:

EricHiggin said:

Common sense isn't as common as it used to be. One man's common sense today, is another man's crazy conspiracy theory.

I've been through my fair share of leaders in my career, and more than a few of them did a bang up job in terms of leading by example, though the examples they were setting were terrible much of the time. Now luckily, and with some better advice from others, many of the apprentices had enough brains to leave those crews or companies when those type of 'common sense' leaders were in charge, while many new greenhorns ended up staying once the correct leadership was finally put into place by management. Those companies profits also grew vastly as a result just by chance.

It's part of the reason why the American political system is set up as it is for example. Simply allowing the popular vote to be the end all be all, could lead to disastrous results. The majority isn't always necessarily right, and shouldn't always be allowed to rule with an iron fist. Even if it works the overwhelming majority of the time, all it takes is one major mistake and years if not decades of progress can be halted if not reversed. 'Simply always side with the majority', is not a logical answer.

Now what if your life partner, with a professional career, who you had been with for decades, was telling you what was best in a certain situation they had expertise in, though the majority were saying something quite different, if not the complete opposite? Who to believe? What would common sense suggest?

In terms of intelligence/IQ, what percentage of our smartest people are at a genius level? If it had to side with the majority of the brightest, or the few Einsteins, who would common sense choose?

Again, it's not hard. You just take the least biased source. The two best ways to decide if something is biased is either looking at peer reviews or using your own common sense to determine if the person making a claim would benefit from incorporating their own bias. Science is mostly unbiased and it is set up to be as least bias as possible. You don't trust politicians, you just trust the science. Science is the best way to determine truth, it is in itself perfect. The failings of science are the failings of humans making mistakes. But that's why there is a huge scientific community keeping checks on everyone.

In the end it's not about making the correct decision all the time, it's about making the best possible decision given the information at a time. If that turns out later to be less optimal then it's gonna be that way, it's still better than indecision or being contrarian and doubting everything. Since it is impossible to have perfect information it is natural and prudent to just choose whatever seems the most solid answer at that time. And when it comes to science majority consensus is ALWAYS the correct way to go, even in the rare cases where it turns out false in the end.

"Choice. The 'problem', is choice."