December 29, 2014

Common sense is worse than misleading

Comment on Lars Syll on 'The riddle of induction'

Blog-Reference

“... it is precisely the task of science to supersede crude common-sense notions by critical analysis, and further that it is the unsatisfactory state of the foundations beneath the common-sense surface which is the most serious and crippling deficiency of contemporary economic science, ...” (Hutchison, 1960, p. 18)

“The truth is, that common-sense, or thought as it first emerges above the level of the narrowly practical, is deeply imbued with that bad logical quality to which the epithet metaphysical is commonly applied; and nothing can clear it up but a severe course of logic.” (Peirce, 1992, p. 113)

More about the relationship between common sense and nonsense on this web page.

Egmont Kakarot-Handtke


References
Hutchison, T.W. (1960). The Significance and Basic Postulates of Economic Theory. New York: Kelley.
Peirce, C. S. (1992). The Fixation of Belief. In N. Houser, and C. Kloesel (Eds.), The Essential Peirce. Selected Philosophical Writings., Vol. 1, 109–123. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. (1877).