Does the "common man" know that he's common?

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Few people would view being called "average" as a compliment. The term "common" carries, perhaps, more respectable connotations than "average", but it still sounds like the sort of thing said by someone looking down from above on someone below his or her station (or by slumming politicians). If for no other reason than his immense personal fortune, it's hard to consider Dennis Tito "common". (The dream of spaceflight for the common man will thus have to be realized by others.)

But even if we accept the idea that we're commoners simply because we don't have any titles that might give us claim to some sort of royalty, most of the mileage that the term gets seems to come from people who might be willing to be part of a crowd only if they're leading it. At an historic distance, Copland's sentiments seem too much like posturing from above.

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Go to: Are crowds really that smart?