Common sense Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun sound practical judgment
    gumption; mother wit; horse sense; good sense; sense.
    • 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

WordNet

Definitions
  1. . (a) A supposed sense which was held to be the common bond of all the others. Obs. Trench. (b) Sound judgment. See under Sense.
Definitions
  1. according to Sir W. Hamilton: (a) "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." (b) "The faculty of first principles." These two are the philosophical significations. (c) "Such ordinary complement of intelligence, that,if a person be deficient therein, he is accounted mad or foolish." (d) When the substantive is emphasized: "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."

Webster 1913