Does common sense exist?

@parados,

It does seem that we are in he presence of some great teachers

0 Replies

@parados,

parados wrote:

Quote:
Trouble is, there is what is called, "blank verse", and blank verse is poetry that does not rhyme.

Of course there is blank verse. Much of Shakespeare is blank verse.

There is no requirement that poetry rhyme to be poetry. Common sense should have told you that too but it appears when it comes to poetry you have no common sense.

Common sense should have told you not to try to instruct me in poetry when you know so little. I find it interesting how your actions seem to prove what you said wasn't true. It is clear that "common sense" is different from person to person or you wouldn't have tried to school me in blank verse while not being familiar with it's history.

So what is now your point (supposing you have one). Hamlet says, "Nothing is good or bad except thinking makes it so". You say that is not poetry, but prose. But why do you say that when you also say that much of Shakespeare is blank verse. Can you be saying that blank verse is not poetry but prose? But why, since you also say that rhyming is not a necessary condition of poetry? In fact, you seem to be contradicting yourself. And that is commonsense.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

Just to clarify for you kenneth

Shakespeare uses blank verse, rhyming verse and prose.
It is easy to tell which is which. There is little blurring between them other than the changes in pronunciation has changed some of the rhymes.

"Come, tears, confound!
Out, sword, and wound!"

And the criterion by which you determined that the Hamlet line I quoted is not poetry but prose is....?

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

Verse is written in lines which are iambic pentameter. (Some exceptions to pentameter such as Pyramus' speech I quoted earlier which is comic for play within play.)
Prose is written in paragraphs.

Marcellus speech from Hamlet Act 1, scene 1

Quote:

Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy,
And will not let belief take hold of him
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us:
Therefore I have entreated him along
With us to watch the minutes of this night;

The lines are written with 10 syllables per line - pentameter

Hamlet from Act 2, scene 2

Quote:

Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing
either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me
it is a prison.

Not 10 syllables per line. Iambic would need to be forced on the phrasing.

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

Quote:

But why, since you also say that rhyming is not a necessary condition of poetry? In fact, you seem to be contradicting yourself. And that is commonsense.

Rhyming is not a necessary condition for all poetry however there are other conditions.

Sonnets require rhyming.
Haiku doesn't have to rhyme but the number of syllables must be exact.

In the case of Shakespeare, he used iambic pentameter for his verse structure, a defined number of syllables with a specific rhythm of stressed and unstressed syllables.

Could you point out where you think I contradicted myself? So far you are only emphasizing the fact that you aren't being prudent or rational about poetry and ignorant of Shakespeare. Common sense would be to not pretend you know more than you actually do when it becomes readily apparent to others that you don't know what you are talking about.

But then maybe you are making an argument for common sense not existing at all.

0 Replies

@parados,

parados wrote:

Verse is written in lines which are iambic pentameter. (Some exceptions to pentameter such as Pyramus' speech I quoted earlier which is comic for play within play.)
Prose is written in paragraphs.

Marcellus speech from Hamlet Act 1, scene 1

Quote:
Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy,
And will not let belief take hold of him
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us:
Therefore I have entreated him along
With us to watch the minutes of this night;

The lines are written with 10 syllables per line - pentameter

Hamlet from Act 2, scene 2

Quote:
Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing
either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me
it is a prison.

Not 10 syllables per line. Iambic would need to be forced on the phrasing.

Verse is written in lines which are iambic pentameter.

You cannot mean that all of verse in written in iambic pentameter, but that all of Shakespeare's verse is.

So I imagine your argument is something like:

1. All of Shakespeare's verse is in iamibic pentameter.
2. But those lines from Hamlet are not in IP.

Therefore, 3. Those lines from Hamlet are not in verse.

But, 4. if it is not verse, then it is prose.

5, It is not verse.

Therefore, 6. those lines are prose.

If I am not misrepresenting your argument, then since you seem (or certainly you claim) to know such a great deal about Shakespeare, is 1. indeed true? Is it clear that 2. is true, and is it clear that 4 is true? If your answer is yes to all three of these questions, then your conclusion, 6. is true.

All the above is elementary logic, and if elementary logic is commonsense, then all the above is commonsense.

Your turn.

2 Replies

@kennethamy,

This is beginning to be interesting and I hope that I am not the only one who learns something from this!

0 Replies

@kennethamy,

Quote:

All the above is elementary logic, and if elementary logic is commonsense, then all the above is commonsense.

Your turn.

Which would mean you displayed no common sense or else your definition of common sense is different from mine because my knowledge is different.

1 Reply

@parados,

kenneth, There is no relationship between logic and common sense. "Common sense" is often applied to groups, but not all groups think all issues will be agreed upon. Logic, on the other hand, is based on a statement that is coherent and consistent with intelligent reasoning that can be agreed upon by all groups.

1 Reply

@Fido,

Boggee man? Actually, its bogeyman and he's Scots.

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

kenneth, There is no relationship between logic and common sense. "Common sense" is often applied to groups, but not all groups think all issues will be agreed upon. Logic, on the other hand, is based on a statement that is coherent and consistent with intelligent reasoning that can be agreed upon by all groups.

It is commonsense to use logic because using logic is the best way of arriving at truth, and it is commonsense to want to arrive at truth.

3 Replies

@kennethamy,

No. You still have it wrong. Common sense is group think. Depending on the issue, it may include logic, but not necessarily the basis for group think.

3 Replies

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

No. You still have it wrong. Common sense is group think. Depending on the issue, it may include logic, but not necessarily the basis for group think.

The definition of "commonsense" is (and the one we are using) is "prudent sound judgment" You must have forgotten. And it is a judgment which is prudent and sound to use logic, for the reasons I have already given.

2 Replies

@kennethamy,

Wrong again, kenneth. Common sense, or group think, is not "prudent sound judgement." GW Bush and his gang of criminals lied to the world, and started his illegal war - through "group think." Do you really believe that was "prudent sound judgement?"

0 Replies

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

No. You still have it wrong. Common sense is group think. Depending on the issue, it may include logic, but not necessarily the basis for group think.

How can it be that common sense is group think, when one philosopher said there was nothing common about common sense??? It may be common sense to ask for directions rather than wander around lost... If men think to do so humiliating, or unmanly, they are correct, and so, drive many thousands of extra miles in the course of their lives in the support of pride since one lost may be found, but no one can live without their pride, or so it seems... How many times in the solving of life's little problems do we think outside the box, expecting the masters of the game, fate, God, or government to be smarted than ourselves demanding the highest intelligence for us to master...What if most problems, even philosophical problems have simple answers, for the most part??? Common sense would suggest that it is best to take each problem by itself, as itself, but is this what the group does....Consider that doctor in England who traced an outbreak of illness to a single pump used by an entire neighborhoon... The authorities asked what might be done, expecting a demanding answer... Instead, the Doctor said: Take the handle off the pump... The disease was contained because the doctor spotted the weakest link...Prudent and sound, but hardly common...

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

So you are saying you weren't using common sense when you tried to tell me that prose could possibly be verse? I know you weren't using logic.

But now you are arguing that you lack both logic and commonsense.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

So you are saying you weren't using common sense when you tried to tell me that prose could possibly be verse? I know you weren't using logic.

But now you are arguing that you lack both logic and commonsense.

Aristotles poetics covers all manor of presentations... Was it all verse??? There is a reason most speech is framed with a certain rythem, why alitertation is is used, why common behavior is framed as heroic or classic... Look for example at the Gettysburg address, which is a masterful example of prose, that yet goes beyond prose to prayer, or incantation, to invocation...

Is it prose, or poetry??? I see little difference between good prose and good poetry... It is hard for me to believe that I ever was an English major, or that I aspired to be a writer when I must now confess I know so little of my tongue... The closest I came to an education was the nutting of the dean's daughter who surely deserved it... I knew her well enough, But of English I know not, for I would use it to destroy all the English are about...

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@Fido,

Who would be asking for directions? If it's common sense, wouldn't people already know how to get to their destination before they take off? Or does one study the map after driving for hours on end?

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

Who would be asking for directions? If it's common sense, wouldn't people already know how to get to their destination before they take off? Or does one study the map after driving for hours on end?

A lot of folks think they know where they are going... I was sent to jobs on occasion by business agents who gave absolutely terrible directions to places they only vagely remembered... Go down such and such a road down by Jackson drive for about 15 minutes and look for a boom in the air, and etc... A lot of times people set out for a place they knew well only to find developments, neighborhoods, strip malls where before there was cornfields... I once spent time looking for a place in Atlanta on Peachtree... That is the info I had, and a number only to find out that even with a map that Atlanta has a lot of streets, avenues, courts, circles what have you named Peachtree...Of course, I was born before map quest..People probobly never get lost now if they have any common sense...

You remind me of that story about the two amoeba's who walked out of a bar... The first asked the second: Is that the Sun, or the Moon??? And the second answered: I don't know; this isn't my neighborhood...

I trust that many people, for many reasons, loose their sense of direction...Not all fogs are internal..

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@plainoldme,

plainoldme wrote:

Boggee man? Actually, its bogeyman and he's Scots.

No.. Not from my book... Comes from China Sea, an island called Boki that produced a fearful sort of pirate in the 18 th century...

0 Replies

Does common sense exist?

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