Philosophy and the critique of 'common sense'

Every tool builds a conceptual box. This cognitive box means a situation within which the tool is useful. Outside of that context, that particular conceptual box, the tool ignores everything else. Thus, it is useless in its ability to guide you in thinking and exploring outside of that contextual and conceptual box. To believe that you can successfully use that tool outside of the circumstance for which it has its use is to become tool trapped. The very tool you are supposedly the wielder of, will, if used out of context, wind up metaphorically wielding you. This is what being tool trapped means.
Our most important conceptual tool is common sense logic. Where does that logic come from and what are its limitations?
This paper explores the trap create by common sense logic and thus how to avoid being trapped within its limiting box.

Article paru dans la Revue de métaphysique et de morale, N°3, septembre 2017.
Abstract : Dans la philosophie la plus contemporaine, essentiellement dominée par la revendication de « réalisme », « l’idéaliste » apparaît, en de multiples occurrences, comme celui qui, niant la réalité du monde extérieur, se confondrait, dès lors, avec un subjectivisme débridé, qui immanquablement déboucherait sur un relativisme généralisé. Or, aucun philosophe idéaliste n’a jamais soutenu ce type de position. Ce qui ne laisse pas d’étonner. Comment une doctrine, que nul n’a jamais soutenue dans l’histoire de la philosophie, peut-elle faire l’objet d’une telle unanimité dénonciatrice (des Encyclopédistes  à certains types de marxisme, de la « Réfutation de l’idéalisme » par Moore au réalisme le plus contemporain) ? A quelles conditions cette figure de l’idéaliste en négateur de monde extérieur a-t-elle pu naître (bien avant que Kant ne revendique le terme), et sur quel terreau philosophique a-t-elle pu prospérer ? C’est l’origine de cette ombre portée sur la signification de l’idéalisme ainsi que sur sa prétendue opposition à son supposé contraire absolu (le réalisme), que je voudrais prendre ici comme objet d’analyse. Suivre l’évolution sémantique du terme « idéalisme » de sa naissance en 1702 aux années 1780 (genèse), me permettra de revenir aux actes conceptuels (structure) qui ont présidé à la création de ce cliché, que l’on pourra, au terme de ces analyses, considérer pour ce qu’il est, à savoir l’un des contresens les plus spectaculaires, mais aussi les plus intéressant, de l’histoire de la philosophie.
In most contemporary philosophy, essentially dominated by realism, the idealist often appears as one who denies the reality of the external world, and is therefore thought of as a subjectivist and/or a relativist. But no idealist philosopher has ever supported such a position. How can a doctrine which no one has ever supported in the history of philosophy be subject to such denunciatory unanimity (from the Encyclopedists to different varieties of Marxism, from the "Refutation of Idealism" by Moore to the most contemporary realism)? Under what conditions could this image of the idealist as denier of the outside world have been born and on what philosophical ground has it been able to prosper?
This is the origin of the shadow cast on both the meaning of idealism and its alleged opposition to its supposed absolute antithesis, realism, which I would like to consider here as an object of analysis.
To follow the semantic evolution of the term idealism from its birth in 1702 to the 1780s (genesis) will allow me to return to the conceptual acts (structure) that presided over the creation of this cliché.
At the end of this analysis we can consider this cliché for what it is, namely one the most spectacular but also the most fascinating misinterpretations in the history of philosophy.

This essay argues that both Jonathan Swift's corrosive narrative satire A Tale of a Tub (1704) and Laurence Sterne's exuberantly experimental novel Tristram Shandy (1759-67) stage a play-off between common sense and self-reflexivity - with different overall results. While it has often been noted how much Sterne is indebted to Swift with regard to the use of ironic wit and disruptively digressive story-telling, the overall function of self-reflexive discursive strategies in both texts is ultimately different. Their difference consists in the value they place on common sense as a rational faculty. To put it bluntly, A Tale of a Tub affirms it, Tristram Shandy subverts it. In order to show this, first the question of genre shall be reviewed and both texts will be read as satires, with a special focus on the function of contemporaneous discourses of common sense. As a next step, A Tale of a Tub and Tristram Shandy shall be approached as metaliterature with specific self-reflexive (metafictional) techniques. As the opposition between common sense and madness is a highly illuminating one in this context, this essay shall highlight the entanglement of 'mad' self-reflexivity and 'sane' common sense in two of the seminal works of eighteenth-century English literature.

Es gibt unzählige wissenschaftliche und philosophische Anthropologien zwischen Materialismus und Idealismus. Fast alle liefern triftige - monistische – Einsichten in Aspekte des Menschseins.
Dialektische Anthropologie besteht darauf, dass es eine unauflösbare Einheit der Einheit und Nichteinheit von kausalem Determiniertsein und absoluter (aus dem Nichts ableitbarer) Kreativität gibt

Th e topics of language and subaltern social groups appear throughout Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks. Although Gramsci often associates the problem of political fragmentation among subaltern groups with issues concerning language and common sense, there are only a few notes where he explicitly connects his overlapping analyses of language and subalternity. We build on the few places in the literature on Gramsci that focus on how he relates common sense to the questions of language or subalternity. By explicitly tracing out these relations, we hope to bring into relief the direct connections between subalternity and language by showing how the concepts overlap with respect to Gramsci's analyses of common sense, intellectuals, philosophy, folklore, and hegemony. We argue that, for Gramsci, fragmentation of any social group's 'common sense', worldview and language is a political detriment, impeding eff ective political organisation to counter exploitation but that such fragmentation cannot be overcome by the imposition of a 'rational' or 'logical' worldview. Instead, what is required is a deep engagement with the fragments that make up subaltern historical, social, economic and political conditions. In our view, Gramsci provides an alternative both to the celebration of fragmentation fashionable in liberal multiculturalism and uncritical postmodernism, as well as other attempts of overcoming it through recourse to some external, transcendental or imposed worldview. Th is is fully in keeping with, and further elucidates Gramsci's understanding of the importance of eff ective 'democratic centralism' of the leadership of the party in relation to the rank and fi le and the popular masses.

This paper explores the problems that derive from the misuse of the conceptual tool of Abstract words. It explores the error that results from applying rigid oppositional logic as the only means to understand Abstract terms.
The article uses a 2012 discussion by Atalia Omer and Robert McCutcheon to illustrate the Tool Trap of using strict Aristotelian Logic that fails to allow the Middle Ground. The paper offers an alternative to the oppositional form of thinking and way to avoid falling into that form of Conceptual Tool Trap by realizing the true nature of Abstract Terms.

How do philosophical accusations of talking nonsense relate to the layperson’s notions of meaning and meaningfulness?  If one were to explain carefully what philosophical nonsense was supposed to be, would one be greeted with incredulity?  How do people react to being accused of talking nonsense themselves?  Is anything analogous to an illusion of meaning recognised in everyday life?  In dream-reports perhaps?  Or in the utterances of schizophrenics or those under the influence of drugs?  Or in certain jokes and hoaxes?  Are contradictions felt to be meaningless?  I argue that, though it is clear that experimental philosophy could shed some light on these questions, their subject matter creates special difficulties.  First, it is more difficult than usual to formulate questions and produce ‘vignettes’ that do not subtly encourage certain responses at the expense of others.  Second, the fact that philosophical nonsense is a metaphilosophical concept ensures that its investigation is going to be more indirect than would be that of knowledge or intention, for example.

Abstract: Peirce calls philosophy “Cenoscopy”, that is, a view of the general. By that, he means that its aim is to provide a general view of the positive facts of human life and experience. Thus, cenoscopy begins its inquiries scrutinising everything experience shows us that is universal and pervasive, general and evident. The method of cenoscopic inquiry, as its very name says, rests upon the careful observation of all manifestations of usual and common experience, limiting itself to what can be inferred from it: our common-sense experiences constitute the positum of philosophical inquiry. So the biggest difficulty in philosophical inquiry is to cope with the certainties of common-sense, which are extremely vague and general, such certainties as expressed in propositions such as “fire burns”. Such experiences inform our world view, before any scientific world view, and as such it does not occur to us we can doubt them – they acquire the indubitable status of instinctive beliefs. In fact, common-sense beliefs are the very ground of our rational certainties, thus constituting the inevitable hic et nunc from where to start any philosophical and scientific inquiry. This paper aims at presenting Peirce’s main tenets of commonsense in relation to his conception of philosophy.
Resumo: Peirce chama a filosofia de “Cenoscopia”, ou seja, uma visão do geral. Com isso, ele quer dizer que seu objetivo é uma visão geral dos fatos positivos da vida humana e da experiência. Assim, a cenoscopia começa suas inquirições pelo escrutínio de tudo que a experiência nos mostra de universal e difuso, geral e evidente. O método da inquirição cenoscópica, como seu próprio nome diz, baseia-se na observação cuidadosa de todas as manifestações da experiência comum e corriqueira, limitando-se ao que pode ser inferido dela: nossas experiências do senso-comum constituem o positum da inquirição filosófica. A maior dificuldade, então, da inquirição filosófica, é lidar com as certezas do senso-comum, as quais são extremamente vagas e gerais. Essas certezas são expressas em proposições tais como “o fogo queima”. Essas experiências informam nossa visão de mundo – elas adquirem o estatuto indubitável de crenças instintivas. De fato, crenças do senso-comum são o próprio chão de nossas certezas racionais, constituindo, assim, o inevitável hic et nunc de onde começar toda inquirição filosófica e científica. Este escrito almeja apresentar os principais temas da filosofia do senso-comum de Peirce com relação a sua concepção de filosofia.

Britain in the 'long eighteenth century', after the trauma of civil war and under the influence of Enlightenment philosophy, was a breeding ground for discourses of common sense. These centred on the idea of an intuitive, pragmatic human faculty for reasonable and socially consensual behaviour. Since then, to be endowed with an abundant share of common sense has been one of the most persistent national stereotypes about Britons. In this article, an overview shall be given of the emergence of 'common sense' discourse in Britain, from its gaining currency in the late seventeenth century to its critical revision by the Romantics. Common sense discourse develops into a potent force in philosophy (from English empiricism to the Scottish "common sense" school), politics (in both internal and external affairs), and literature from early 'Augustans' like Pope and Swift to Johnson and Sterne, with a final glimpse at Coleridge). In Michel Foucault's terms, common sense discourse reveals itself here as a 'principle of exclusion': it promotes identity and homogeneity over difference and heterogeneity.

ABSTRACT:  The term bodyscape encourages thinking about representation of bodies at multiple scales—from different bodies as they move through space to the microlandscape of individual bodily differences. A hegemonic bodyscape's representations tend to idealize and essentialize bodies’ differences to reinforce normative ideas about a society's socioeconomic organization. But, a dominant bodyscape is never absolute. Bodyscapes that depart from or subvert hegemonic representations may simultaneously exist. In Western society, the biomedical bodyscape predominates in scientific understandings of bodily difference. Its representation of sex differences conveys heteronormative notions about gender and sexuality. Because the biomedical bodyscape frames studies of ancient bodies, investigators need recognize how their considerations of labor divisions, familial organization, and reproduction may situate modern (hetero)sexist representations deep within antiquity. To innovate analyses of socioeconomic relations, queer theory allows scholars to interrogate human nature. Doing so produces alternative bodyscapes that represent the diversity of past peoples’ social and sexual lives. [Keywords: bodyscape, heteronormativity, queer theory, bioarchaeology, paleoanthropology]

The starting point of every kind of knowledge is our immediate experience or common sense. This experience is the minimum knowledge of reality which everyone acquires. Aristotle considers it to be a dark and evident knowledge about sensible things, from which we progress in knowledge. The referent of this common sense knowledge is that things are, and that they exist in a certain way. These are the sensible, compounded things that are somehow known to be according to their nature. While Ross identifies this starting point with our intellectual and sensible experience of things, Trendelenburg asserts that it is by means of the common sense that we know it to be true. However, Mansion considers that Aristotle goes beyond evidence when he includes the notion of nature within common sense. This is not exact, since Mansion is talking about the notion of nature that Aristotle presents in the Physics, which is a scientific and clearly explained one. This notion must be distinguished from that on which it is founded: a dark, confusing and evident notion of nature, belonging to common sense and barely pointed out on that treaty.

One of the curious consequences of the application common sense to philosophy is that we end up with something apart from the thing we say whenever we say something. It seems that “common sense” is a formula for instantiating something called reality that may be protected, perhaps, from our baser natures—our denial, perhaps, of its existence. This is probably Descartes’ fault, or the fault of any Philosophy Department that thinks that Descartes is a good place to start when thinking about anything. Or the fault, perhaps, of Philosophy Departments that think that thinking about thinking provides a good start to thinking about thinking about thinking. At any rate, it is philosophy’s answer to derivatives, or latterly, “synthetic CDOs”, and it should be shorted at the first opportunity.