Logic vs common sense

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I was told that logic and common sense are the same thing, but I read somewhere that Aspies are logical but lack common sense, so how can that be?

Maybe that person was thinking of a very loose and vernacularish use of the term "logic." The formal definition of logic shows that it is quite different than common sense.

Logic is about the rules of reasoning, and common sense is about the context or content in which you reason, so in that sense, common sense is more like the opposite of logic. Most of the information that is common sense has to be learned through experience, and learning from that experience requires some intuition, especially social intuition. That's where the difficulty with AS comes in.

To quote the 2nd Doctor Who (Patrick Troughton):

"Logic, my dear Zoe, merely enables one to be wrong with authority."

(Wheel in Space)

The answer to your question is that whoever told you that "logic", and "common sense" are the same thing was illogical, and very wrong, and in fact rather naive.

"Common sense" is just that: "sense": the most common forms of instinct, and gut feeling. Intution.

Logic is just that: "logic" ( calculation based upon analyzing data).

Logic can yield the same conclusions as does common sense, or logic can yield conclusing that oppose common sense.

For example if you cruising down the highway in the middle of nowhere in the desert, and you notice that your gas tank is near E you might use "common sense" and start to drive faster to get the nearest gas station as fast as you can. But if you used "logic" you might calmly reason that "a car uses less fuel the slower if it goes so if I slow down it will extend my gas mileage, and therefore improve my chances of getting to a gas station"- and you then slow down. Common sense would dictate "get outta this situation as fast as possible", but "logic" would dictate driving slow.

A sociology professor I had told us about someone who ran a computer program simulating the economy of a city. They tested what would happen if the government provided low cost housing. When they ran the computer program it showed that if the government did that it would reduce the amount lost cost housing in the city, instead of increase it. Common sense would dictate that if the government provides something you then have more of it. But when the data was crunched "logic" showed that the opposite is the case in that particular instance.

If you always followed "common sense" you would think that the sun was smaller than the earth, and that the earth was flat.

I'm still confused.

The driving fast part through a desert is more stupid than common sense. Lot of people do stupid things because they don't have the common sense to know to not do it. Lot of people are not street smart. Things that are obvious to me are not obvious to everyone. Also common sense can be common sense for someone but not for someone else. Like I was shocked to learn on Reddit that not everyone knew dryers had lent filters so they just thought the dryer quit working because they never cleaned the filter per load. Also not everyone knows how to work a lawn mower when all you have to do was hold the thing down and pull on the thing hard and it runs. But this is all based on personal experience and if you have never done a load of laundry in your life because you were never taught and if you grew up without a yard, you would have no experience with a lawn mower because you never saw your parents using one in your life time and no one you knew had a yard.

Also many people believe going fast gets you somewhere quicker but this logic is flawed. From my personal experience, when you go fast other cars you have passed still catch up to you and I always laugh when a car speeds in front of me to make the green light but by the time they have finished their turning, I am already driving by them and did they really save any seconds or minutes?

And here is another example of common sense. I have told this story numerous times on here about my ex boyfriend. I had to go get some gas for my car but he wanted to go to the store to get some Mountain Dew so I told him he could go across the street to the store but he was worried he would get hit by a car and what if a drunk drive came and hit him. I was like "oh for god's sake" and just dropped him off at the store anyway and went cross the street and got gas and then went back across the street and picked him up. Then he goes "Oh you meant that street, I thought you wanted me to cross that street" and he points to the highway. The gas station and the store were on the same side of the highway. Common sense would tell you what street to cross because why would you need to cross the highway and back to get to the gas station if they are on the SAME SIDE OF THE HIGHWAY. Now that my friend was an example of him lacking common sense. It would have been better if he would have just said "I was stupid so I don't know why I thought that" or go "My bad, I wasn't thinking" than blaming it on me saying I wasn't specific enough because I didn't tell him what street to cross. But that really did grind my gears and I will never forget it. Now I wonder if it was part of his undiagnosed schizophrenia at the time or was just being a jerk? I read that schizophrenics have cognitive impairments so it affects their reasoning and stuff and memory if I remember correctly. Maybe he was too sick to realize he made the mistake but I don't know. But back then he just came off as stupid so I thought this was all a joke but he was actually serious so I was going around telling everyone about this because I was so pissed at him for blaming it on me and not accepting it was his bad. Who the hell doesn't know what street to cross to get to the store if they are right next to each other? Common sense right there.

Logic: Looking people in the eye makes me feel weird, and I forget what I'm trying to say. Best to avoid it.

Common sense: Eye contact is super duper important. Because... it just is.