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How stable is common sense psychology and can it be transcended? Reply to Valsiner
Author(s) -
SMEDSLUND JAN
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
scandinavian journal of psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.743
H-Index - 72
eISSN - 1467-9450
pISSN - 0036-5564
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9450.1986.tb01191.x
Subject(s) - common sense , psychology , negation , intelligibility (philosophy) , sense (electronics) , social psychology , set (abstract data type) , epistemology , philosophy , computer science , linguistics , engineering , electrical engineering , programming language
Common sense is defined as the set of implications that all members of a given culture take for granted. The stability of common sense as a necessary condition for the maintenance of human relationships and societies is emphasized. Changes may and do occur. However, they can only take place in a very slow and piecemeal fashion in order to maintain intelligibility at all times. Transcendence of common sense by scientific psychology is difficult to envisage, since the phenomena studied are structured by that same common sense, and since communication about them also presupposes common sense. llanscendence through direct negation literally makes no sense.