Wikipedia defines common sense as “knowledge, judgement, and taste which is more or less universal and which is held more or less without reflection or argument”
Try to avoid using this topic to express niche or unpopular opinions (they’re a dime a dozen) but instead consider provable intuitive facts.
The harder it is to pull a bow, the faster the arrows.
Isn’t that true, all other things being equal?
Depends.
Compound bows are designed such that you put in a LOT of energy where your mechanical advantage is high (at the start of the draw) then less as your mechanical advantage diminishes (at the end of the draw).
This makes the bow very “light” to pull and easy to hold drawn, but the energy with which the arrow will be fired is higher than almost any other design, save some cross-bows.
So, correct me if I’m wrong, but wouldn’t that also change the way that the arrow is accelerated by the bow? Like, it starts a little slower, and then has increased acceleration until the string returns the the starting position? Whereas a long or recurve bow is going to have the hardest acceleration at the very start, since that’s where the most energy is stored?
And if that’s true, how does that affect the flight of the arrow? I know that with stick bows, the arrow bows as it’s being accelerated, and then wobbles slightly before stabilizing a few feet in front of the bow. Some of that is likely because the arrow has to bend around the bow stave. But do you see less of that with a compound bow?
A modern compound bow will fire the arrow in a straight line, directly forwards, as the bow will have a section that allows the arrow to be shot through the space that would be occupied by the stave on a traditional bow. While the bow must obviously be gripped in line with the tension, the rest of the center section is offset to allow the archer to both shoot and sight directly along the line the arrow will travel.
How much firing then causes the arrow to bend would depend entirely on the stiffness of the arrow, but the resulting total energy being imparted is not going to be different just because the acceleration curve is different. If the arrow bends, then yes, you’d lose some energy to that.
But if anything, starting off slow and then accelerating harder as you go is the gentler and more efficient acceleration curve when accounting for that.
If everything is equal, the arrow gets out of tune. If you tune the arrow it becomes heavier.
In a traditional long bow yes. In a modern compound bow, not necessarily.
the sky is blue
an unbiased perspectiveMore abstract concepts that generally trouble the intuition of many:
the irrelevance of laminar to turbulent flow
time and gravity are related
magnetism is not magic
entropy precludes perpetual motionThe sky isn’t blue in many cultures. It’s been shown that words for blue only occur in a language after that culture has discovered a blue dye. And that limitation in available words also contains how you see and think about the world.
This is covered in Guy Deutscher’s book The Unfolding of Language, which is an excellent read.
I was going with Rayleigh scattering, but that works too
Pretty much anything related to statistics and probability. People have gut feelings because our minds are really good at finding patterns, but we’re also really good at making up patterns that don’t exist.
The one people probably have most experience with is the gambler’s fallacy. After losing more than expected, people think they’ll now be more likely to win.
I also like the Monty Hall problem and the birthday problem.
One of my favourite pages on wikipedia:
The thing about that is that it’s a little too complete. How can there be both negativity bias and normalcy bias, for example?
To make any sense, you’d need to break it down into a flowchart or algorithm of some kind, that predicts the skew from objectivity based on the situation and personality tendencies.
I think they probably appear in different types of situations, not all at once. And maybe different types of people/thinking are more prone to some than to others.
Exactly. I feel like just listing them out is of limited use because of that.
It’s extremely useful, because it’s an index to all the known things that might be useful in a given situation. The point is not to assess all of them, the point is to not miss ones you’re unfamiliar with that may be important in your situation.
I imagine psychologists can do more with it, but in practice the main thing I see formal fallacies used for is as something to shout during a debate, and it never seems to convince anyone.
If you can catch yourself using one, that’s good I guess.
I work in the risk assessment space, so they are kind of critical to be aware of, for me :)
Related to gambling: being “pot committed”
Pot committed is more a math reality with a small amount of sunk cost fallacy. There’s always a non zero chance someone is bluffing. A 99% chance to lose $11 is better than a 100% chance to lose $10 if you can win $100 on that 1%.
The gambler’s fallacy is pretty easy to get, as is the Monty Hall problem if you restate the question as having 100 doors instead of 3. But for the life of me I don’t think I’ll ever have an intuitive understanding of the birthday problem. That one just boggles my mind constantly.
Lemme try my favorite way to explain the birthday problem without getting too mathy:
If you take 23 people, that’s 253 pairs of people to compare (23 people x22 others to pair them with/2 people per pair). That’s a lot of pairs to check and get only unique answers
Really? The birthday problem is a super simple multiplication, you can do it on paper. The only thing you really need to understand is the inversion of probability (
P(A) = 1 - P(not A)).The Monty hall problem… I’ve understood it at times, but every time I come back to it I have to figure it out again, usually with help. That shit is unintuitive.
My favourite explanation of the Monty hall problem is that you probably picked the wrong door as your first choice (because there’s 2/3 chance of it being wrong). Therefore once the third door is removed and you’re given the option to switch you should, because assuming you did pick the wrong door first then the other door has to be the right one
Thanks for the help, it was easier this time 😅
I view it as a thought terminating cliché people use when they’re too lazy ti fully explain themselves. It can be useful for things that are truly obvious, like if you try touching something fresh out of the stove without protection you’ll get burned, it doesn’t really add anything to bother explaining it.
Common sense itself.
Some people put way too much stock in “common sense” as some blanket assumption and insult to lob at anything and everything they don’t like.
They internally define what they believe to be “common” and everything that deviates is outside of that. They use it to fuel their own sense of self satisfaction and smugness, while additionally fueling negativity and hatred for others.
It fuels their toxicity and comes to define their view of everything, which is typically grossly oversimplified for their own needs.
Precisely.
“Bigger is better”
The most vulnerable will be hit the hardest.
- Countries are rich because they have free markets.
- Tariffs are a good thing and competition is for losers.
- Being spied upon by your government or foreign governments whom I worship is okay, because what’s there to hide.
- Anyone that sells goods that can be used this way outside of the above should be barred from all markets forever.
- If you feel threatened by another country, a pre-emptive strike should be allowed.
- You don’t mess with the sovereignty of a nation. It’s sacred and should be left intact.
- Police should always be allowed to use overwhelming force and their actions should be lauded
- You should have the right to protect yourself using firearms against tyranny as governments in general are never to be trusted.
Is the goal to point out contradictions in the pairs you gave?
Pressing the crosswalk button over and over will make the light change faster.
The buttons are intended to be placebo except in some places.
I’m in one of those places. In Utah, many crosswalk lights won’t turn on at all unless you press the button, and the button can completely change the light timing and ordering (e.g. a protected left turn light activates at the end of a cycle instead of at the beginning).
Traffic engineers here are sometimes allowed to do some fairly interesting things.
In my experience it’s only automated in the cities and most of the lights are manual everywhere else.
Same goes for most “close door” buttons in elevators btw. 😁
I think we know it doesn’t help, but we do it anyway.
Serious question, why? Stress relief of button-pushing? Thinking it might work and that it can’t be slower than doing nothing?
I just don’t feel any urge to push the button.
There’s no rationality to it. I don’t get out my calculator and graph paper to plot out the best possible course of action. I just push the button a few times. And sometimes I push it a few more times.
Surely there’s some reward or motivation, whether it’s rational or not. Would you feel any different if you didn’t do it?
If I didn’t do it then I’d be thinking about doing it.
I’ll interrogate my inner experience next time I’m standing at the lights, and I’ll report back if I discover anything interesting (unless it’s really damning information).
Sometimes buttons don’t work the first time you press them.
Apparently some are wholly disconnected, but not all, leading to some pedestrians just standing there through multiple traffic cycles because they read a cracked article in 2010 that said the buttom doesn’t do anything. Pressing a second time definitely doesn’t do anything but provide stress relief though.
Related is elevator close-door buttons. I hold them down for a long time which seems to work well, but for some elevators it doesn’t.
Well it finally changed the 8th time I pressed it, so checkmate.
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush?
That means you ahould take the immesiate payoff or be happy with what you have instead of spensing a bunch of time trying to get more.
Hehe ok I’ll wear those down votes. I didn’t understand the reference as I heard it first on The Two Ronnies as ‘a bird in the hand is worth two in the shepherd’s bush’ which I think think might be a carry-on reference.
I didn’t see why l would want a bird in my hand in the first place.
PS - what happened to your D key?
I switched keyboards on android, new one doesn’t have autocorrect or swipe, but it doesn’t connect to the internet. I don’t always proofread posts.
it also means don’t risk everything you have for a somewhat opaque promise of something better
Is common sense just an earlier, naive label for confirmation bias?
A key aspect is that it doesn’t even require confirmation.
To tilt your head back if you have a blood nose.
This is no longer recommended advice, because you end up drinking the blood which causes vomiting.
- Probably initially said by someone concerned about their carpet.
Way to stop them is put ice over the back of neck, plug nose with tissue and clear clots each 2 mins.
Any reason not to just let it run? If not on blood thinners.
You can let it run.
I find it clots better by using tissues to plug the flow.
Less tax is better.
No saying that taxation as it currently exists it optimal, but any decent assessment of how to improve things requires a lot of nuance that is nearly never considered by most people.
I’m not mad at the huge amount I pay in taxes. I’m mad about what I get in return.
Yeah, that’s fair, for sure, to some degree. For instance large fractions of policing funding should be redirected into various social services, and military spending can get fuck off all together.
But also, wealthier people paying more than an equal share of tax is a good thing too, and provides lots of intangible benefits (e.g. better education systems and fewer people in extreme poverty and desperation leads to lower crime rates)
Nuance is boring, voting and/or complaining is easy.
I mean, people are right about slimy politicians too, but they never seem to consider that it’s them that keeps electing those people.
but they never seem to consider that it’s them that keeps electing those people.
How so?
If one doesn’t vote, a slimy politician still gets elected.
If one does vote, in most elections they can only choose from a small group of people who probably fail to represent them, and even if there is a reasonable option, they probably won’t win the vote anyway.
The system is rigged, when it comes to voting there usually* isn’t a correct option. Our political voice must exist outside of elections.
(I say usually, because a few elections are better than other, but generally speaking at a federal level, it’s slime no matter how you vote)
and even if there is a reasonable option, they probably won’t win the vote anyway.
See, this is it right here. Anyone can run, but nobody can win without being slick and two-faced. The idiot vote is the largest block. If you get involved it’ll be obvious pretty fast.
(I say usually, because a few elections are better than other, but generally speaking at a federal level, it’s slime no matter how you vote)
So, you’re assuming we’re all American here. This applies to every democracy, including my own. In America, just add a probably terminal deadlock problem in on top of that.
but nobody can win without being slick and two-faced
And don’t forget ‘rich’, or more importantly, supported by the rich. A national-scale campaign requires resources that a typical organization can’t gather, and to win without such a campaign is miraculous in most systems.
So, you’re assuming we’re all American here.
Nah, like you said it applies to most democracies, even if America is an extreme example of these universal trends.
And don’t forget ‘rich’, or more importantly, supported by the rich. A national-scale campaign requires resources that a typical organization can’t gather, and to win without such a campaign is miraculous in most systems.
Well, in countries like mine there’s donation limits (with teeth). Middle class people are the ones you pursue for financing. That’s not really the issue so much as the majority of voters that barely know what they’re voting for - and soundbites or a personal hearty hello at a local event work wonders on them, while actual honesty or competence has little effect.
Well, in countries like mine there’s donation limits (with teeth).
Refreshing to hear!
That’s not really the issue so much as the majority of voters that barely know what they’re voting for
I haven’t looked into this but I’m tempted to believe that immediately. Election awareness is amazingly low, even among people who do have strong political beliefs.
Oh man, I’ve knocked on so many doors where people named the party they were definitely voting for, but didn’t know which level of government the election was on for. Like, they think they’re voting for mayor when it’s actually a federal election, for example.
That’s kind of extreme, but the fact it’s not rare shows you the level of actual engagement there is. I’ve come to consider public elections as more of a safety valve for when things veer into actual corruption, and am not so sure direct democracy is a good idea at all, anymore.
Common sense isn’t just “not so common,” it is a fundamentally broken concept at its core and a crutch that people use to hoist themselves above others they feel they are better than.
Cold Air will make you sick.
There are plenty of studies debunking it, and yet I still hear about it all the time.
In Germany, people are very concerned about Zugluft, i.e. draft from opening multiple windows.
This is a common argument in our house.
I’ve been hearing it for years, always argued against it.
“Survival of the fittest”
bitch, explain cows
Fittest for the purpose of being chosen by farmers to participate in breeding.
Cows are the most fit for their environment. Their environment being a useful and sustainable food source for humans to cultivate.
In all of my ecology classes they were super specific about re-framing that concept as “survival of the fit enough”
You don’t actually have to be the best example of something to have your traits carried along, just good enough to consistently make it to reproductive age and then procreate.
It helps explain a lot of weird survival mechanisms - it doesn’t have to be the best way to do things but if it consistently works, then it’s good enough. Like the old saying “if it’s stupid, but it works, then it’s not stupid”
Bulls seem like they are capable of herd defense, they are kept isolated for a reason. Same with roosters and chickens.
Lol a better example would be “bitch, explain humans” we’re the biggest anomaly to this statement. In ecology we refer to our evolutionary perseverance as “survival of the collaborative”
