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common sense
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English Dictionary: common sense by the DICT Development Group
4 results for common sense
From WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006) [wn]:
common sense
n
  1. sound practical judgment; "Common sense is not so common"; "he hasn't got the sense God gave little green apples"; "fortunately she had the good sense to run away"
    Synonym(s): common sense, good sense, gumption, horse sense, sense, mother wit
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]:
   Sense \Sense\, n. [L. sensus, from sentire, sensum, to perceive,
      to feel, from the same root as E. send; cf. OHG. sin sense,
      mind, sinnan to go, to journey, G. sinnen to meditate, to
      think: cf. F. sens. For the change of meaning cf. {See}, v.
      t. See {Send}, and cf. {Assent}, {Consent}, {Scent}, v. t.,
      {Sentence}, {Sentient}.]
      1. (Physiol.) A faculty, possessed by animals, of perceiving
            external objects by means of impressions made upon certain
            organs (sensory or sense organs) of the body, or of
            perceiving changes in the condition of the body; as, the
            senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch. See
            {Muscular sense}, under {Muscular}, and {Temperature
            sense}, under {Temperature}.
  
                     Let fancy still my sense in Lethe steep. --Shak.
  
                     What surmounts the reach Of human sense I shall
                     delineate.                                          --Milton.
  
                     The traitor Sense recalls The soaring soul from
                     rest.                                                --Keble.
  
      2. Perception by the sensory organs of the body; sensation;
            sensibility; feeling.
  
                     In a living creature, though never so great, the
                     sense and the affects of any one part of the body
                     instantly make a transcursion through the whole.
                                                                              --Bacon.
  
      3. Perception through the intellect; apprehension;
            recognition; understanding; discernment; appreciation.
  
                     This Basilius, having the quick sense of a lover.
                                                                              --Sir P.
                                                                              Sidney.
  
                     High disdain from sense of injured merit. --Milton.
  
      4. Sound perception and reasoning; correct judgment; good
            mental capacity; understanding; also, that which is sound,
            true, or reasonable; rational meaning. [bd]He speaks
            sense.[b8] --Shak.
  
                     He raves; his words are loose As heaps of sand, and
                     scattering wide from sense.               --Dryden.
  
      5. That which is felt or is held as a sentiment, view, or
            opinion; judgment; notion; opinion.
  
                     I speak my private but impartial sense With freedom.
                                                                              --Roscommon.
  
                     The municipal council of the city had ceased to
                     speak the sense of the citizens.         --Macaulay.
  
      6. Meaning; import; signification; as, the true sense of
            words or phrases; the sense of a remark.
  
                     So they read in the book in the law of God
                     distinctly, and gave the sense.         --Neh. viii.
                                                                              8.
  
                     I think 't was in another sense.         --Shak.
  
      7. Moral perception or appreciation.
  
                     Some are so hardened in wickedness as to have no
                     sense of the most friendly offices.   --L' Estrange.
  
      8. (Geom.) One of two opposite directions in which a line,
            surface, or volume, may be supposed to be described by the
            motion of a point, line, or surface.
  
      {Common sense}, according to Sir W. Hamilton:
            (a) [bd]The complement of those cognitions or convictions
                  which we receive from nature, which all men possess in
                  common, and by which they test the truth of knowledge
                  and the morality of actions.[b8]
            (b) [bd]The faculty of first principles.[b8] These two are
                  the philosophical significations.
            (c) [bd]Such ordinary complement of intelligence, that,if
                  a person be deficient therein, he is accounted mad or
                  foolish.[b8]
            (d) When the substantive is emphasized: [bd]Native
                  practical intelligence, natural prudence, mother wit,
                  tact in behavior, acuteness in the observation of
                  character, in contrast to habits of acquired learning
                  or of speculation.[b8]
  
      {Moral sense}. See under {Moral},
            (a) .
  
      {The inner}, [or] {internal}, {sense}, capacity of the mind
            to be aware of its own states; consciousness; reflection.
            [bd]This source of ideas every man has wholly in himself,
            and though it be not sense, as having nothing to do with
            external objects, yet it is very like it, and might
            properly enough be called internal sense.[b8] --Locke.
  
      {Sense capsule} (Anat.), one of the cartilaginous or bony
            cavities which inclose, more or less completely, the
            organs of smell, sight, and hearing.
  
      {Sense organ} (Physiol.), a specially irritable mechanism by
            which some one natural force or form of energy is enabled
            to excite sensory nerves; as the eye, ear, an end bulb or
            tactile corpuscle, etc.
  
      {Sense organule} (Anat.), one of the modified epithelial
            cells in or near which the fibers of the sensory nerves
            terminate.
  
      Syn: Understanding; reason.
  
      Usage: {Sense}, {Understanding}, {Reason}. Some philosophers
                  have given a technical signification to these terms,
                  which may here be stated. Sense is the mind's acting
                  in the direct cognition either of material objects or
                  of its own mental states. In the first case it is
                  called the outer, in the second the inner, sense.
                  Understanding is the logical faculty, i. e., the power
                  of apprehending under general conceptions, or the
                  power of classifying, arranging, and making
                  deductions. Reason is the power of apprehending those
                  first or fundamental truths or principles which are
                  the conditions of all real and scientific knowledge,
                  and which control the mind in all its processes of
                  investigation and deduction. These distinctions are
                  given, not as established, but simply because they
                  often occur in writers of the present day.

From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]:
   Common \Com"mon\, a. [Compar. {Commoner}; superl. {Commonest}.]
      [OE. commun, comon, OF. comun, F. commun, fr. L. communis;
      com- + munis ready to be of service; cf. Skr. mi to make
      fast, set up, build, Goth. gamains common, G. gemein, and E.
      mean low, common. Cf. {Immunity}, {Commune}, n. & v.]
      1. Belonging or relating equally, or similarly, to more than
            one; as, you and I have a common interest in the property.
  
                     Though life and sense be common to men and brutes.
                                                                              --Sir M. Hale.
  
      2. Belonging to or shared by, affecting or serving, all the
            members of a class, considered together; general; public;
            as, properties common to all plants; the common schools;
            the Book of Common Prayer.
  
                     Such actions as the common good requireth. --Hooker.
  
                     The common enemy of man.                     --Shak.
  
      3. Often met with; usual; frequent; customary.
  
                     Grief more than common grief.            --Shak.
  
      4. Not distinguished or exceptional; inconspicuous; ordinary;
            plebeian; -- often in a depreciatory sense.
  
                     The honest, heart-felt enjoyment of common life.
                                                                              --W. Irving.
  
                     This fact was infamous And ill beseeming any common
                     man, Much more a knight, a captain and a leader.
                                                                              --Shak.
  
                     Above the vulgar flight of common souls. --A.
                                                                              Murphy.
  
      5. Profane; polluted. [Obs.]
  
                     What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.
                                                                              --Acts x. 15.
  
      6. Given to habits of lewdness; prostitute.
  
                     A dame who herself was common.            --L'Estrange.
  
      {Common bar} (Law) Same as {Blank bar}, under {Blank}.
  
      {Common barrator} (Law), one who makes a business of
            instigating litigation.
  
      {Common Bench}, a name sometimes given to the English Court
            of Common Pleas.
  
      {Common brawler} (Law), one addicted to public brawling and
            quarreling. See {Brawler}.
  
      {Common carrier} (Law), one who undertakes the office of
            carrying (goods or persons) for hire. Such a carrier is
            bound to carry in all cases when he has accommodation, and
            when his fixed price is tendered, and he is liable for all
            losses and injuries to the goods, except those which
            happen in consequence of the act of God, or of the enemies
            of the country, or of the owner of the property himself.
           
  
      {Common chord} (Mus.), a chord consisting of the fundamental
            tone, with its third and fifth.
  
      {Common council}, the representative (legislative) body, or
            the lower branch of the representative body, of a city or
            other municipal corporation.
  
      {Common crier}, the crier of a town or city.
  
      {Common divisor} (Math.), a number or quantity that divides
            two or more numbers or quantities without a remainder; a
            common measure.
  
      {Common gender} (Gram.), the gender comprising words that may
            be of either the masculine or the feminine gender.
  
      {Common law}, a system of jurisprudence developing under the
            guidance of the courts so as to apply a consistent and
            reasonable rule to each litigated case. It may be
            superseded by statute, but unless superseded it controls.
            --Wharton.
  
      Note: It is by others defined as the unwritten law
               (especially of England), the law that receives its
               binding force from immemorial usage and universal
               reception, as ascertained and expressed in the
               judgments of the courts. This term is often used in
               contradistinction from {statute law}. Many use it to
               designate a law common to the whole country. It is also
               used to designate the whole body of English (or other)
               law, as distinguished from its subdivisions, local,
               civil, admiralty, equity, etc. See {Law}.
  
      {Common lawyer}, one versed in common law.
  
      {Common lewdness} (Law), the habitual performance of lewd
            acts in public.
  
      {Common multiple} (Arith.) See under {Multiple}.
  
      {Common noun} (Gram.), the name of any one of a class of
            objects, as distinguished from a proper noun (the name of
            a particular person or thing).
  
      {Common nuisance} (Law), that which is deleterious to the
            health or comfort or sense of decency of the community at
            large.
  
      {Common pleas}, one of the three superior courts of common
            law at Westminster, presided over by a chief justice and
            four puisne judges. Its jurisdiction is confined to civil
            matters. Courts bearing this title exist in several of the
            United States, having, however, in some cases, both civil
            and criminal jurisdiction extending over the whole State.
            In other States the jurisdiction of the common pleas is
            limited to a county, and it is sometimes called a {county
            court}. Its powers are generally defined by statute.
  
      {Common prayer}, the liturgy of the Church of England, or of
            the Protestant Episcopal church of the United States,
            which all its clergy are enjoined to use. It is contained
            in the Book of Common Prayer.
  
      {Common school}, a school maintained at the public expense,
            and open to all.
  
      {Common scold} (Law), a woman addicted to scolding
            indiscriminately, in public.
  
      {Common seal}, a seal adopted and used by a corporation.
  
      {Common sense}.
            (a) A supposed sense which was held to be the common bond
                  of all the others. [Obs.] --Trench.
            (b) Sound judgment. See under {Sense}.
  
      {Common time} (Mus.), that variety of time in which the
            measure consists of two or of four equal portions.
  
      {In common}, equally with another, or with others; owned,
            shared, or used, in community with others; affecting or
            affected equally.
  
      {Out of the common}, uncommon; extraordinary.
  
      {Tenant in common}, one holding real or personal property in
            common with others, having distinct but undivided
            interests. See {Joint tenant}, under {Joint}.
  
      {To make common cause with}, to join or ally one's self with.
  
      Syn: General; public; popular; national; universal; frequent;
               ordinary; customary; usual; familiar; habitual; vulgar;
               mean; trite; stale; threadbare; commonplace. See
               {Mutual}, {Ordinary}, {General}.

From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]:
   Common sense \Com"mon sense"\
      See {Common sense}, under {Sense}.
No guarantee of accuracy or completeness!
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