Blog Fodder #5 - Intelligence vs. Common Sense
"Which is more important, intelligence or common sense?"
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This topic is dreamed of by Karen.
As I was reading this weeks topic, I thought I blinked and landed in a beauty pageant land. "Hello there, Ms. BookWorm" says a very handsome not-Billy-Crystal host as he twinkled his question to me. "which is more important, intelligence or common sense?" he said.
After which we were sent inside a locked glass cabinet while each of us contestant give our answers. This is to insure that we don't cheat and copy each other's idea. Do you get that feeling?
I love beauty pageant when I was growing up. Those were the only nights the sleep-Nazi, aka my BookMama, allowed us to sleep late. Very, very late. Beauty pageants never aired earlier than 9 PM in my Asian country.
I believe that Albert Einstein is an intelligent person, and so is Stephen Hawking. (I have to say, for a long, long while, I thought he's the same one as Steven Hawkins of Stephen King movies!). We all know that. What is not so common was how he was sadly missing common sense.
Common sense is defined by some dictionary as "sound judgment not based on specialized knowledge; native good judgment." I don't think Einstein have it. His marriage sucks. I am a firm believer that if you were to have a good marriage, then you must have common sense. Lots of it.
Of course, a small amount of intellect goes a long way towards this common sense.
Is this begging the question of whether one is mutually exclusive of the other? Is this like saying which is better, inhaling or exhaling? That would probably lead down to a long and winding road of discussion which I don't feel up to right now.
Intelligence is defined as the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge;the faculty of thought and reason; superior powers of mind. I think they should go hand in hand. How can one have common sense if they don't have the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge?
For example a person sits on a bus stop bench. Then the rain started pouring. His intellect will identify that's it's raining and it's going to get him wet. He knows all about the chemical identity of water. As he was thinking of this, he's getting soaked through the skin. And right now, it's not really the best time to get soaked in water because we're having freezing temperatures. If he possessed common sense, at the first droplet, he'd have high-tailed it out of there and find the nearest shelter.
If I could only have one, though I'd prefer to have both, I'd side with intelligence. Common sense might just follow if I deemed it important enough to acquire.
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