Definition: critical
thinking
1. Examining accuracy, credibility and validity through
consideration of merits and faults
2. An attitude of meticulously challenging
assumptions, conclusions and viewpoints
As with many
quasi-religious sects there is a lack of critical thinking, reason and
questioning our own views in animal rights groups.
·
Go out of your
way to hear dissenting opinions and the questions that might go unasked in your
social circle [1]
·
Seek out
information direct from both sides of the issue.
·
Don’t believe
something just because you are told it; avoid misinformation, exaggeration,
pseudoscience and folklore by scrutinising primary source evidence.
·
Don’t accept
beliefs just because they seem comfortable or superficially reasonable [2]
·
Question any
belief you find appealing; employ thorough scientific scepticism - the first
thing you should ask yourself is, 'How might I be wrong?'
·
Investigate
opposing viewpoints with an attitude of interest and understanding.
·
Keep an open mind
that there may be things we have not thought of.
·
Never have such a
strong level of certainty that you close yourself off to new ideas.
·
We should
constantly question our beliefs, especially when we think we are right.
To become a critical thinker, you have to be willing to accept the
fact that your own ideas might be wrong[3]
In order to do that, you have to be a secure person.
An insecure person feels threatened when questioned.
A secure person is interested in hearing why they are being
questioned.
Read on to the next page to begin...
[1]
“A good way of ridding
yourself of certain kinds of dogmatism is to become aware of opinions held in
social circles different from your own...diminishing the intensity of insular
prejudice. If you cannot travel, seek out people with whom you disagree, and
read a newspaper belonging to a party that is not yours”
[2]
"Common sense is the
collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen"
Do not look for arguments
from authority.
Avoid apotheosis; be wary
of quoting authority figures (eg. Gandhi) as if they were a commanding,
infallible visionary. Placing the weight of your argument upon the words of one
man can come back to bite you.
[3]
“you go to a great school
not so much for knowledge as for arts and habits; for the habit of attention,
for the art of expression, for the art of assuming at a moment's notice a new
intellectual position, for the art of entering quickly into another person's
thoughts, for the habit of submitting to censure and refutation, for the art of
indicating assent or dissent in graduated terms, for the habit of regarding
minute points of accuracy, for the art of working out what is possible in a
given time, for taste, for discrimination, for mental courage, and for mental
soberness”
The essence of the
independent mind lies not in what it
thinks, but in how it thinks
