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#9 "Why Common Sense Isn't Very Common" · The Kevin Stone Podcast

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  Speaker 1: The content of this program is where entertainment purposes only,
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  Speaker 2: Were listening to the Kevinstone Podcast, broadcasting to you from
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  Speaker 2: an unknown location.
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  Speaker 1: Customized listener. Let's begin by cleaning those ears.
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  Speaker 2: To am I. I'm a nobody. I just happened to
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  Speaker 2: have a camera and a microphone and an Internet connection,
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  Speaker 2: which makes me a superstar. I have beef anteladas in
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  Speaker 2: the oven. Yes, and you made them? Or are they frozen? Well,
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  Speaker 2: they won't be frozen in about thirty five minutes. All right,
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  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Kevinstone Podcast, the show where I sit
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  Speaker 2: behind a microphone and talk about things that probably won't
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  Speaker 2: change the world if somebody needs to hear them anyway,
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  Speaker 2: So pull up a chair, grab a cup of coffee.
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  Speaker 2: They were talking about something that appears to be disappearing
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  Speaker 2: faster than affordable groceries, privacy or customer service. Common sense.
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  Speaker 2: You remember common sense. Don't you that little voice in
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  Speaker 2: your head that says, Kevin Stove's hot, don't touch it,
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  Speaker 2: or maybe don't stand under a tree during a lightning storm,
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  Speaker 2: or don't send your social Security number to a Nigerian
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  Speaker 2: prince who just emails. Apparently that little voice is gone
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  Speaker 2: a wall. Everywhere I look, I see people doing things
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  Speaker 2: that maybe stop and think, how did some of these
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  Speaker 2: people make it past their teenage years? So today we're
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  Speaker 2: asking the important questions, why isn't common sense very common anymore?
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  Speaker 2: What exactly is common sense? Common sense isn't knowing everything.
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  Speaker 2: You don't need a college degree, You don't need to
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  Speaker 2: understand quantum physics. You don't need to know how to
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  Speaker 2: rebuild a transmission. Common sense is simply the ability to
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  Speaker 2: look at the situation, think about what might happen next,
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  Speaker 2: and make a reasonably intelligent decision. That's it. See a
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  Speaker 2: wet floor, walk carefully, see smoke coming from your engine,
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  Speaker 2: pull over. Get an email saying you I've won fourteen
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  Speaker 2: million dollars in a lottery you never entered. Maybe you
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  Speaker 2: shouldn't send them your bank information. These aren't advanced ideas.
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  Speaker 2: Nobody needs to hold a seminar there shouldn't be a
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  Speaker 2: PowerPoint presentation needed. Yet somehow, somewhere somebody is saying, well,
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  Speaker 2: I click the link. Of course you did want proof
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  Speaker 2: that common sense is struggling. Read a warning label somewhere
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  Speaker 2: on a product. You'll find instructions telling you not to
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  Speaker 2: do something as you wouldn't have thought about doing in
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  Speaker 2: the first place. Yet there's a reason that warning exist,
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  Speaker 2: which means at some point somebody probably looked at something
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  Speaker 2: and thought, what happens if those may be the most
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  Speaker 2: dangerous words in the English language. What happens if I
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  Speaker 2: put this in a microwave? What happens if I stand
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  Speaker 2: on this chair? What happens if I pour gasoline on
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  Speaker 2: this fire? You know what happens? Nothing good? And somewhere
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  Speaker 2: an attorney is already preparing paperwork. Here's what makes it
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  Speaker 2: even stranger. We have access to more information that at
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  Speaker 2: any point in time in history. We carry phones containing
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  Speaker 2: access to practically the entire accumulated knowledge of civilization. Need directions,
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  Speaker 2: Grab a phone, need a recipe, grab a phone. Need
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  Speaker 2: to know how to replace a garb its disposal, Grab
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  Speaker 2: a phone, Need to know whether the strange mushroom grown
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  Speaker 2: behind your shit is poisonous, don't eat it, grab a phone.
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  Speaker 2: We have all this information available instantly. We've become incredibly
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  Speaker 2: good at finding information. But finding information and thinking aren't
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  Speaker 2: necessarily the same thing. Google can give you information, Artificial
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  Speaker 2: intelligence can give you information. Social media can definitely give
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  Speaker 2: you information, although sometimes that information came from somebody's cousin's
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  Speaker 2: neighbor who heard it from a guy at a gas station.
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  Speaker 2: But eventually you still need to think, and naturally we
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  Speaker 2: have to talk about social media. Nothing demonstrates humanity's decision
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  Speaker 2: making skills better than giving everybody a camera and an
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  Speaker 2: internet connection. Years ago, if somebody had a terrible idea,
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  Speaker 2: maybe four people knew about it. Now they live stream it. Hey, everybody, today,
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  Speaker 2: we're going to see what happens when new stop right there.
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  Speaker 2: Whatever comes after that sentence probably requires medical attention. Then
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  Speaker 2: something goes horribly wrong, and somebody watching the video says,
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  Speaker 2: who could have predicted this? Everybody? Everybody predicted it. Your
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  Speaker 2: dog predicted it. A squirrel watching from the fence predicted it.
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  Speaker 2: Oh noight. The grocery store is another excellent place to
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  Speaker 2: study common sense. Someone parks are shopping cart sideways in
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  Speaker 2: the aisle and walks ten feet away to examine cereal
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  Speaker 2: while six people are trying to get around them, And
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  Speaker 2: somehow the person blocking the aisle looks surprised, like, oh am,
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  Speaker 2: I in your way. No, we're just standing here because
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  Speaker 2: we wanted to watch you. Compare cheerios. Or people who
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  Speaker 2: stop right inside the door. They walk through the automatic
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  Speaker 2: doors and stop why. I don't know. Maybe they're overwhelmed
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  Speaker 2: by the produce section and everyone behind them was piling
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  Speaker 2: up like rush hour traffic. And then driving deserves its
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  Speaker 2: own category. Nothing reveals a person's relationship with common sense
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  Speaker 2: better than putting them behind the wheel of a vehicle
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  Speaker 2: you're driving seventy miles an hour down the interstate. Dudes
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  Speaker 2: three feet from your bumper Apparently they believe tailgating will
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  Speaker 2: somehow make traffic move faster. Or the person who's about
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  Speaker 2: to miss their exit, and instead of going down to
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  Speaker 2: the next exit and turning around, they cross three lanes
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  Speaker 2: of traffic like they're qualifying for NASCAR, because apparently missing
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  Speaker 2: an exit is worse than death. Here's some free advice
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  Speaker 2: if you miss this your exit. Interstate system has additional exits.
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  Speaker 2: They built several of them. You'll be okay, can I rive? Then?
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  Speaker 1: Would you won?
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  Speaker 2: All right, we're going to take a quick break, and
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  Speaker 2: when we come back, we're going to discuss something even
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  Speaker 2: more dangerous than having no common sense. Having no common
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  Speaker 2: sense while being completely convinced that you're the smartest person
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  Speaker 2: in the room. That's a powerful combination. We'll be right back.
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  Speaker 2: Did you know that if you become a paid subscriber
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  Speaker 2: to this podcast, you'll get a commercial free experience and
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  Speaker 2: exclusive content that nobody else gets. Welcome back to the
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  Speaker 2: Kevin Stone Podcast. Today we're talking about why common sense
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  Speaker 2: isn't very common. Before the break, we discussed bad decisions.
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  Speaker 2: But there's another problem. Sometimes people don't know something, and
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  Speaker 2: that's normal. Nobody knows everything. The problem is when somebody
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  Speaker 2: doesn't know something, yet they're absolutely certain they do. We've
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  Speaker 2: all met this person. You can bring in electrician with
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  Speaker 2: thirty years of experience and you know who says, well,
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  Speaker 2: I watched a YouTube video fantastic and him the screwdriver
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  Speaker 2: and let's see where this goes. Experience used to matter.
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  Speaker 2: There was a time when people learned from experience. You
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  Speaker 2: made a mistake, something went wrong, you thought, well, I'm
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  Speaker 2: never doing that again. That's how common sense develops. You learn,
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  Speaker 2: you just you become slightly less stupid than you were yesterday.
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  Speaker 2: It's called progress. But sometimes people make the same mistake
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  Speaker 2: over and over again and act surprised every single time,
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  Speaker 2: like I can't believe that happened again. I can, everybody can.
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  Speaker 2: We've been watching you do it for six years, and
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  Speaker 2: at some point in time it's no longer bad luck.
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  Speaker 2: It's a subscription service. Here's the part people don't always like.
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  Speaker 2: Common sense requires responsibility. Sometimes you have to admit I
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  Speaker 2: screwed up. Not the government, not your boss, not Facebook,
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  Speaker 2: but you. You made a bad decision. Congratulations, Welcome to humanity.
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  Speaker 2: I've made plenty of them. The question isn't whether you
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  Speaker 2: made a mistake, it's if you learned anything from them.
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  Speaker 2: Wisdom is basically a collection of mistakes you finally got
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  Speaker 2: tired of repeating. Sometimes failure is the best teacher you'll
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  Speaker 2: ever have. That's something hot you learn. It's been to
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  Speaker 2: your entire paycheck three days after pay day. The next
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  Speaker 2: two weeks teach you something. Ignore the gas gage because
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  Speaker 2: you're sure you can make it another forty miles and
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  Speaker 2: you're standing on the side of the road, holding a
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  Speaker 2: gas can, thinking about your life choices. Some lessons need consequences,
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  Speaker 2: not catastrophic consequences, but enough of an inconvenience to make
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  Speaker 2: you remember. There's nothing quite like walking two miles to
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  Speaker 2: a gas station to improve your understanding of the letter E.
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  Speaker 2: Common Sense isn't about being smart. It isn't intelligence. I've
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  Speaker 2: met highly educated people who couldn't figure out which end
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  Speaker 2: of a screw driver to use. And I've met people
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  Speaker 2: without college degrees who go walk into a room, look
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  Speaker 2: at a problem for thirty seconds and say, well, here's
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  Speaker 2: what we need to do. Common Sense is practical. It's observation, experience, judgment,
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  Speaker 2: and sometimes it's simply asking, if I do this, what
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  Speaker 2: happens next? Question alone could prevent about half the stupidity
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  Speaker 2: on the internet. Before posting something angry, what happens next?
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  Speaker 2: Before spending money you don't have. What happens next? Before
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  Speaker 2: arguing with the stranger in the Walmart parking lot. What
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  Speaker 2: happens next? Probably nothing that improves your day. Maybe we
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  Speaker 2: need to slow down. Part of the problem may simply
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  Speaker 2: be that everyone moves too fast. We react before we
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  Speaker 2: think someone posts something. We respond someone says something, we
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  Speaker 2: get angry, something happens, we immediately form an opinion. Maybe
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  Speaker 2: common sense needs something that's becoming increasingly rare. A pause,
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  Speaker 2: a few seconds between what happens and what we do
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  Speaker 2: about it. Ask yourself, is this necessary? Is this smart?
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  Speaker 2: What happens afterwards? And perhaps the most important question, am
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  Speaker 2: I about to become the reason somebody has to put
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  Speaker 2: a warning label on this? If the answer is yes,
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  Speaker 2: reconsider maybe common sense hasn't disappeared. Maybe we're simply surrounded
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  Speaker 2: by too much noise and we don't listen to it anymore.
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  Speaker 2: Somewhere inside most of us is that little voice saying
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  Speaker 2: it's probably it and a good idea. The problem is
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  Speaker 2: that another voice says, yeah, but it'll be fine. That's
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  Speaker 2: the voice you need to watch out for, because those
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  Speaker 2: words have preceded some of the worst decisions in human history.
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  Speaker 2: It'll be fine five minutes later, the fire departments pulling
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  Speaker 2: up on scene. So here's my challenge. Use your head,
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  Speaker 2: pay attention, think about what happens next, learn from your mistakes,
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  Speaker 2: and occasionally listen to that little voice telling you, Kevin,
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  Speaker 2: I don't think you need to do that, because common
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  Speaker 2: sense may not be very common, but there's absolutely no
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  Speaker 2: reason why we can't bring it back. That's going to
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  Speaker 2: do it for this episode of the Kevin Stone Podcast.
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  Speaker 2: If you enjoyed the show, share it with somebody. If
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  Speaker 2: you know someone who desperately needs more common sense, maybe
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  Speaker 2: you don't need to show them this episode directly, just
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  Speaker 2: casually post it somewhere they might see it. We don't
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  Speaker 2: need to start a family argument. Thanks for listening. I'm
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  Speaker 2: Kevin Stone, and until next time, think before you click,
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  Speaker 2: think before you speak, and for the love of everything holy,
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  Speaker 2: put your shopping cart back