Critical thinking
Template extended from Mr RIP Doc
What¶
- Wikipedia: - “Critical thinking is the analysis of facts to form a judgment”
- The subject is complex, and several different definitions exist, which generally include the rational, sceptical, unbiased analysis, or evaluation of factual evidence.
- Critical thinking is self-directed, self-disciplined, self-monitored, and self-corrective thinking. - It presupposes assent to rigorous standards of excellence and mindful command of their use.
- It entails effective communication and problem-solving abilities as well as a commitment to overcome native egocentrism and sociocentrism.
- The Foundation of Critical Thinking (short definition by Linda Elder, September, 2007)
- 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, 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.
Why¶
Why it is important for the individual - Improve your thinking quality - Improve your arguing skills - Structure your knowledge - Protects you from fake news and propaganda - Better quality of life
Why it is important for society - Civilized public discussion. - Better Politics. - Totalitarianism (or other -isms) Prevention. - Peace?
- Obviously it’s not black/white, not a “matter of kind” but “a matter of degree”.
- If I had to pick one battle, a single battle, I’d spend my life exposing high school students to Critical Thinking
How¶
- Migliorare le capacità argomentative: non parlo di persuasione e seduzione ma di logica
- Logical fallacies (wikipedia, Poster/Cheatsheet, https://fallacydetected.com/list , logically fallacious, Mark Manson, Immanuel Casto (more), Visual Capitalist)
- Straw Man
- Correlation vs Causation, Magical thinking
- Ad hominem
- Slippery Slope
- False Dichotomy
- Appeals (authority, probability, pity, tradition, wealth, )
- Faulty Generalization
- The “Fallacy” Fallacy
- How to disagree (paul graham)
- Steelman (Peterson vs Harris, Farnam Street)
- Rationality (read the sequences, 12 virtues, checklist)
- “It is better to debate a question without settling it than to settle a question without debating it.” — Joseph Joubert
- Costruire la propria Knowledge Base
- Skepticism / Data Driven / Evidences (Critical Thinking Cheatsheet) / Uncertainty (Socrates)
- Why?
- Literacy (“Literacy of any sort gives you the power to recognize and unambiguously label things that the illiterate can easily ignore as noise, fads and bullshit”)
- Wisdom
- Input selection (The Garden and the Stream, The Holiday Paradox, The TV Paradox)
- Intentionality, Quantity, Kind (audio, video, written), Quality, Diversity, Always Evolving
- Curate what you’re exposed to. Avoid junk, learn how to navigate digital information, but also avoid Echo chambers.
- Tools: RSS (feedly), Subscriptions, read/watch later, bookmarks, long form, depth, commitment to consume some input every day..
### Mental Models (Farnam Street)
- The Map is not the Territory
- First Principle Thinking (Wait But Why: the cook and the chef)
- Second Order Thinking (Nat Eliason’s Level 3 Thinking)
- Against “Short Termism”
- Ask yourself ”And then what?”
- Worst Case scenario
- https://fs.blog/thought-experiment/
- Black Swan / Antifragility
- Bayesian integration / Probabilistic Thinking / Learning / Knowledge Retention
- More to That’s Information Lifecycle
- Thinking in Bets (Talk at Google, Rational Reminder)
- Learning how to Learn (coursera, Scott Young)
- Listening (Active Listening, Resonance)
- Asking Questions (Farnam Street)
- Bloom Taxonomy (wikipedia, image, teachthought)
- Cognitive Biases
- Visual Capitalist infographic (very good)
- Charlie Munger’s Psychology of Human Misjudgement (video)
- Kevin Simler’s Crony Belief (also: The Elephant in the Brain - video)
- Dan Ariely TED Talks
- Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow
- The Cognitive Bias Codex (awesome)
- Cognitive Biases examples
- Blind Spot and Cognitive Dissonance
- Confirmation (cherry picking)
- Survivorship (xkcd)
- Arrival Fallacy (more)
- Dunning-Kruger and Impostor Syndrome
- Exploration: Curiosity
- Umberto Eco’s Antilibrary
- Vsauce’s TED Talk
- Feynman’s Why
- Mercadini: Come Imparo Le Cose e Il Paradosso Della Scuola
- Exploitation: Practice & Depth
- Deliberate Practice (Cal Newport’s 99u Talk, So Good They Can’t Ignore You, Deep Work - more, Farnam Street: deliberate practice)
- Iterations (Jason Fried)
- Find the right mix of Exploration vs Exploitation.
- Research: how to search for information in an abundant world. Googling is a skill!
- Knowledge Retention and Organization:
- PKM (Commonplace Book, Ryan Holiday’s “Notecard System”, Luhman’s Zettelkasten, Derek Sivers’ “Thoughts On”)
- How to Read
- How to take notes (Progressive summarization)
- Building a Second Brain
- Having Opinions (The work required to have an opinion)
- Output
- Create! (More to That’s Release Ratio, Altucher’s Idea Machine, Altucher’s Idea Sex)
- Write! (paul graham, jordan peterson (more, more), Perell (more), more to that)
- Note: not talking about persuasion, manipulation, copywriting.. Even though knowing those “weapons” can make you a better writer, thinker, debater.
- Learn by Teaching (Feynman Technique)
- Decision Making…
- Planning… TimeBlocking
- Productivity… GTD, PARA
- Measuring… Time Tracking
- Attention Economy / Digital Minimalism…
graph TD
CT[Critical Thinking] --- |"Enhances"|SI[Self-Improvement]
SI --- |"Facilitates"|CT
CT --- |"Develops"|A[Analytical Skills]
CT --- |"Improves"|L[Logical Reasoning]
CT --- |"Cultivates"|E[Evaluation]
CT --- |"Promotes"|R[Reflection]
SI --- |"Directs"|GM[Goal Setting]
SI --- |"Encourages"|LL[Lifelong Learning]
SI --- |"Fosters"|SM[Self-Motivation]
SI --- |"Increases"|A2[Adaptability]
A --- |"Essential for"|PS[Problem Solving]
L --- |"Guides"|DM[Decision Making]
E --- |"Requires"|OT[Open-mindedness]
R --- |"Develops"|MC[Metacognition]
GM --- |"Leads to"|AT[Action Taking]
LL --- |"Results in"|CG[Continuous Growth]
SM --- |"Builds"|DP[Discipline]
A2 --- |"Strengthens"|RC[Resilience]
PS --- |"Informs"|DM
OT --- |"Supports"|RC
MC --- |"Drives"|CG
AT --- |"Reinforces"|DP