Why we should think critically?

Humans are equipped with simple minds living in a complex universe. Our brains use several tools to make sense of this complex universe. However, as these tools consume a lot of energy, our brains try to take shortcuts. These shortcuts are often useful, but not always. So, we need to be aware of when our brain uses shortcuts, and when we need to force ourselves to think instead. Logic is a way to help us reach logical conclusions by combining ideas in a more energy-efficient way. Logic has a structure that we must follow or otherwise we will reach wrong conclusions. We need to be very careful in following the rules of logic, or wrong conclusions will be reached.

Our arguments are sometimes affected by the person who brings up these arguments. So, we need to differentiate between who a person is and what he/she is saying. We should not build our arguments based on whom we trust. We turn to experts when we're looking for good advice. However, we need to ask questions to better understand and validate their logic. There are patterns everywhere around us, and our brain is very good at recognizing them. However, it is important to remember that not everything happening around us follows some patterns. We use science to prove if patterns exist or not, which will help us avoid reaching wrong conclusions based on non-existing patterns.

Critical thinking as defined by Dr. Linda Elder who is an educational psychologist and a prominent authority on critical thinking. She is also President of the Foundation for Critical Thinking and Executive Director of the Center for Critical Thinking. Dr. Elder has taught psychology and critical thinking at the college level and has given presentations to more than 50,000 educators at all levels. She defined critical thinking as follows:

“Critical thinking is self-guided, self-disciplined thinking which attempts to reason at the highest level of quality in a fair-minded way. People who think critically consistently attempt to live rationally, reasonably, and empathically.?They are keenly aware of the inherently flawed nature of human thinking when left unchecked.?They strive to diminish the power of their egocentric and sociocentric tendencies.?They use the intellectual tools that critical thinking offers – concepts and principles that enable them to analyze, assess, and improve thinking.??They work diligently to develop the intellectual virtues of intellectual integrity, intellectual humility, intellectual civility, intellectual empathy, intellectual sense of justice, and confidence in reason.?They realize that no matter how skilled they are as thinkers, they can always improve their reasoning abilities and they will at times fall prey to mistakes in reasoning, human irrationality, prejudices, biases, distortions, uncritically accepted social rules and taboos, self-interest, and vested interest.?They strive to improve the world in whatever ways they can and contribute to a more rational, civilized society.?At the same time, they recognize the complexities often inherent in doing so.?They avoid thinking simplistically about complicated issues and strive to appropriately consider the rights and needs of relevant others.?They recognize the complexities in developing as thinkers and commit themselves to life-long practice toward self-improvement.?They embody the Socratic principle:??The unexamined life is not worth living, because they realize that many unexamined lives together result in an uncritical, unjust, dangerous world”.??(Taken from Richard Paul and Linda Elder,?The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking Concepts and Tools,?Foundation for Critical Thinking Press, 2008)

?????????I am very impressed with Dr. Elder’s definition of critical thinking. From my point of view, she focused on the human aspect when she defined it. She mentioned that critical thinking is self-conducted, self-controlled thinking which tries to aim at the utmost level of excellence in an unbiased way. She goes on after that and elaborates on how people who think critically do it. From my point of view, I think she did a great job in describing them and giving us, as a reader, the opportunity to think deeper about them and to look into our minds if we think critically or not. I love her last statement when she mentioned, “The unexamined life is not worth living, because they realize that many unexamined lives together result in an uncritical, unjust, dangerous world”. I think by mentioning this statement she summarized the importance of thinking critically and how if we think critically it would help us live in a better world away from the unreasonable way of living.

To summarize my point of view, I believe people who use critical thinking (I consider myself one of them) are the ones who say things such as, 'How do you know that? Is this conclusion based on evidence or gut feelings?' and 'Are there any alternative possibilities when given new pieces of information?'. Additionally, critical thinking can be divided into the following three basic skills:

1. Curiosity?is the desire to learn more information and seek evidence as well as being open to new ideas.
2. Skepticism?involves having a healthy questioning attitude about the new information that we are exposed to and not blindly believing everything everyone tells us.
3. Finally,?humility?is the ability to admit that your opinions and ideas are wrong when faced with new convincing evidence that states otherwise.

In 2018, my final project was refuting “The 2015 State of the Union Speech by President Obama”. It was a great way for me to look at the speech with a critical thinker’s eye and diagram the main topics and then refute the arguments highlighted under those topics. For example, President Obama mentioned the following in his speech:

1.????The Pentagon says that climate change poses immediate risks to our national security. (Fallacy) (The pentagon is not involved in weather research)

2.????As Americans, we respect human dignity. (Fallacy) (Generalization)

3.????We reject offensive stereotypes of Muslims - we do these things not only because they are right, but also because they make us safer. (Fallacy) (No relation between stereotyping and safety)

Fast forward, today May, 10th 2022, I think I learned again from my psychology project that everything in our life needs more deep thinking, curiosity, healthy questioning about new information, and especially in psychology. We need to be curious more about our surroundings and how we perceive things. Definitions of critical thinking, its elements, and its associated activities fill the educational literature of the past 100 years. Critical thinking has been described as an ability to question; acknowledge and test previously held assumptions; recognize ambiguity; examine, interpret, evaluate, reason, and reflect; make informed judgments and decisions; and clarify, articulate, and justify positions.