John the Baptist, who will not agree to Herod’s lies and speaks out against the wealthy ruler’s corruption, has “been arrested.” Jesus goes beyond John’s practices and starts gathering a new “Community.” It will help people to have greater common knowledge, especially about how rulers operate by lying about and corrupting common knowledge.
Aristotle is thought to have first coined the term ‘common sense,’ or “sense of the common things.” He was writing of the benefit of five senses and their integration enabling our increased perception of the world. We integrate our five senses via our thought process, our intellect, sometimes called ‘the soul’ by Aristotle, through dialogue and reason. We thus move beyond personal perception of the world and live with shared, accurate, common knowledge of the world. Voltaire famously asserted that “Common sense is not so common,” suggesting shared sound senses of the common things and shared sound reasoning about them was not so prevalent as needed. In January of 1776, writing two years prior to Voltaire’s death, Thomas Paine wrote a pamphlet titled Common Sense. In it, he was proposing a critical change, independence from monarchical rule, and wrote, “In the following pages I offer nothing more than simple facts, plain arguments, and common sense.” He thought people would see the sense of his argument and thus agree to the change. Agreement is an element in recent researchers work from the University of Pennsylvania who published a study on common sense in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. They concerned themselves with “how much agreement there is between people on a topic.” Perhaps problematically so, they refer to that agreement as being equivalent to common sense which they describe as “things we know to be true without really knowing why.” But it is the ‘knowing why’ that is the vital element in the common sense – having taken in with our senses information that is then processed through thought, reason, dialogue. Lacking that vital knowledge element, it makes sense that there is less ‘sense of the common things’ in U.S. culture, for example, climate change. Decades of information gained across the senses and confirmed through thought, dialogue, and reasoning, while additionally undergoing peer review, is consistently presented by environmental scientists about the dangers of Global Warming. Over that same time frame information gained through anecdotes and confirmed through bias, in group chats, and wishful thinking, while additionally being paid for by wealthy rulers of fossil fuel companies, is consistently presented by right-wing writers about the hoax of Global Warming. With increased abuse and violence directed toward health care professionals and toward scientists, environmental scientist Michael Mann has decided to sue for defamation two right wing writers. Mann sued Rand Simberg at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who compared Mann to a convicted serial child molester, and Mark Steyn, a National Review blogger who repeated Simberg’s ‘child molester’ comparison and called Mann’s climate research “fraudulent.” The wealthy rulers of the Charles Koch Foundation are among the many fossil fuel corporations who operate via lies and corruption. They spread ignorance – a lack of common sense – thus hindering our ‘knowing why’ our environment is in crisis. Climate scientists will keep spreading knowledge – a plethora of common sense – thus expanding our ‘knowing why’ we need to take action to care about our environment in crisis.
“The Rulers wield their silver shields, wear golden coronets while wardens guard the prison yard, boast brazen bayonets and unicorns flaunt ivory horns defending martinets. While Bankers beam Their self-esteem (bailed out of broker’s debts), and Bureaucrats grow rich and fat in six-star luncheonettes, the deep, devout and down and out survive as silhouettes. The Press take pains to wash our brains, Their words have mesmerized. So, mild and meek, we fear to speak in worlds they’ve polarized… and TV skews the evening news ensures we all agree… Behind the scenes, behind the screens, the rules are fixed, arranged (contorted smiles conceal Their wiles – Their goals have never changed). When upside-down, a grin is frown and common sense deranged. Dead colonies of humble bees, a ravaged hornets’ hive, rain forests, dales and minke whales soon nothing left alive… a world laid waste is to their taste, as long as they survive.” (New World Order – Terry O’Leary)
Prayer: Spirit of Life, I am willing to know why.
Question: How is my common sense?
January 21, 2024 Gospel Mark 1:14-20 Third Sunday in Ordinary Time