It’s “the revolution of frequent sense,” President Donald Trump introduced in his second inaugural handle.
And so it’s. The most recent installment of that assertion got here in his Jan. 30, 2025, press convention concerning the Potomac aircraft crash. When requested how he had concluded that variety insurance policies had been accountable for a crash that was nonetheless underneath investigation, Trump responded, “As a result of I’ve frequent sense, OK?”
“Frequent sense” is what’s identified to students as a “lay epistemology,” or how common individuals make sense of the world. We don’t depend on statistical proof or skilled analysis whereas we’re shopping for lettuce or driving in site visitors. As an alternative, we’re guided by direct expertise, feelings and instinct.
As a result of it comes from common individuals and never establishments that some individuals deem to be “corrupt,” champions of frequent sense recommend it results in a purer type of reality.
But it’s exactly as a result of it comes from private observations and instinct that analysis reveals frequent sense is steeped in bias and sometimes leads us astray.
Populist leaders like Trump generally have fun frequent sense and assault experience and proof. Populism is much less about being liberal or conservative than it’s a means of interesting to the general public. These appeals are based mostly on an ethical separation between the corrupt, dangerous individuals with cultural energy and the great, pure individuals who maintain the suitable values – like religion in frequent sense over experience and proof.
And with the brand new Trump administration, the elevation of frequent sense as a advantage has been fast and broad.
Dusty boots vs. elite credentials
In his affirmation listening to for the place of secretary of protection, Pete Hegseth pointed to “mud on his boots” as proof of his {qualifications}, in distinction to the elite credentials of previous protection secretaries, who’ve typically been Washington insiders.
Hegseth couldn’t title members of the Affiliation of Southeast Asian Nations, an alliance of nations enjoying an important function in international safety. However he did present that he knew the diameter of the rounds that match within the journal of an M4 rifle.
That was proof that he was, in his phrases, “a change agent. Somebody with no vested curiosity in sure firms or particular packages or permitted narratives.”
Even Meta’s announcement that it could roll again skilled fact-checking on its U.S. social media platforms displays a “lay epistemic” shift.
Meta defined that fact-checkers, “like everybody else, have their very own biases and views” and that these biases had made fact-checking “a software to censor.”
As an alternative, the corporate would embrace a neighborhood notes mannequin the place customers might present extra info on posts, which Meta argued could be “much less liable to bias.”
“We’ve seen this method work on X,” wrote Meta’s Chief World Affairs Officer Joel Kaplan, “the place they empower their neighborhood to resolve when posts are doubtlessly deceptive and wish extra context, and other people throughout a various vary of views resolve what kind of context is useful for different customers to see.”
This coverage change might be much less of a shift in Fb founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s rules than a change made out of necessity. Given Trump’s penchant for falsehoods, I think about Meta’s earlier coverage would quickly have proved financially and politically inconvenient.
Regardless, the result’s a populist’s dream: the demotion of formal experience in favor of “frequent sense.”
Frequent sense is ideological
For the previous 20 years, the rise in social media, mixed with declining belief in formal information organizations, has democratized information: the sense that nobody individual or establishment has particular entry to reality – not students with many levels, not consultants armed with scientific proof or information, and positively not journalists.
In a 2020 examine of public sentiment throughout 20 nations, Pew Analysis Middle discovered that the overwhelming majority of these surveyed, 66%, reported trusting individuals with “sensible expertise” to resolve issues over consultants. Solely 28% trusted the consultants to resolve issues.
If establishments and consultants are perceived as corrupt and ideological, the one reality that we are able to belief is what comes from our personal eyes and our personal minds.
However does frequent sense deliver us to reality? Typically, sure. It’s additionally interesting: Since our observations of the world are knowledgeable by our values and beliefs, we regularly see what we would like – corresponding to diversity-hiring initiatives often called “DEI” inflicting a aircraft crash, for instance.
And our instinct hardly ever tells us we’re fallacious. This helps account for the existence of affirmation bias, which is our tendency to see and bear in mind issues that inform us we’re proper. That is additionally why, even in these uncommon cases when details change minds, they hardly ever change hearts. If we do replace our information with appropriate info, analysis has proven that our intestine will nonetheless inform us our general view of the world was proper.
Sarcastically, research additionally present that the extra an individual trusts frequent sense, the extra possible they’re to be fallacious.
My analysis has proven that the individuals most certainly to imagine misinformation about COVID-19 and the 2020 election had been those that positioned extra belief in instinct and emotion, and fewer belief in proof and information. As well as, the extra individuals appreciated Donald Trump, the extra they valued instinct and emotion – and rejected proof and information.
So, frequent sense is ideological.
When our pathway to information is restricted by our experiences and instinct, we’re not truly in search of reality. We’re proud of no matter solutions can be found, together with conspiracy theories or explanations that make us really feel good and proper.
We blame people – particularly individuals we don’t like or determine with – for their very own misfortune. We are inclined to assume “these individuals needs to be higher and take a look at tougher” as an alternative of in search of public coverage options to issues corresponding to poverty or drug dependancy. With out proof and information summarizing massive traits – corresponding to most cancers charges tracked by way of Nationwide Institutes of Well being funding or ocean temperatures tracked by Nationwide Science Basis funding – we’re restricted to what we are able to see by way of our personal eyes and biases.
And our restricted observations merely reinforce our underlying beliefs: “My neighbor most likely has breast most cancers from taking that medication I don’t like” or “Immediately might be only a randomly sizzling day.” We’ll both overgeneralize from or downplay these restricted examples relying on what our “frequent sense” says.
So, when populists elevate frequent sense as a advantage, it’s not simply to have fun how common individuals perceive the world. It’s to advertise a worldview that rejects verifiable details, exaggerates our biases, and paves the way in which for much more propaganda to return.
Supply hyperlink
