This lesson describe CT in brief.

CT (What)

CT is a subject that equips actors (people and groups) to consistently make the best decisions (find truth) and to justify their findings to themselves and to others.

Best means ethical plus the most rewards and the fewest drawbacks in a holistic sense for the aruger.

The “arguer” is the actor making the decision.

Critical in the context of “critical thinking” means careful as in careful not to make a mistake.

Why

CT is worth learning because it provides actors with the highest payoffs; that is the most rewards and the fewest drawbacks in a holistic sense.

How

Framework

Repetitions: Repeat the following actions until the quality of the decision is high enough for the context (surrounding circumstances).

1. Key Question: Ask the most useful question.
2. Research: Get high quality information relevant to answering the question.
3. Logic: Use the information (facts) to reveal the best answer to the key question.
4. Argument: Give your answer to the key question and your reasons (facts) that justify why you or anyone else should accept your answer.
5. Assessment: Gauge the quality of your argument and figure out the best ways to improve it.

Tips

Critical Thinking (What)

Critical thinking (CT) is the subject that equips actors (individuals or groups) to do three interdependent things: make the best decisions, get an accurate view of reality (find truth), and justify their findings.

Here is a breakdown of the key points.

Critical

In this context, critical means careful, as in careful not to make a mistake or a suboptimal choice. In addition to “careful thinking,” we can also use the label “effective thinking” because CT is about getting the most rewards with the fewest drawbacks in a holistic way.

Subject

A subject is a set of ideas and aligned skills that can be learned, taught, applied, and improved. Most subjects, including CT, are explained in multiple textbooks.

Actor

An actor is a person or a group of people. CT is especially useful for groups: husband and wife, family, project team, sports team, company, university, government, and so on.

Best Decision

The “best decision” refers to the most rational and defensible conclusion based on the evidence at hand. It’s about maximizing the likelihood of getting the highest payoff: that is, the most rewards with the fewest drawbacks calculated holistically.

Truth

In simple terms, something is true if it corresponds with reality, that is, the way things are. However, determining absolute truth is not always possible, and so CT focuses on determining what is most likely true.

Justify

Justifying your findings means carefully laying out the reasons why you or anyone else should believe your conclusions and also addressing counterarguments and concerns. Justifying involves logic, citations, definitions, and such.

Purposes of CT

Here are several ways to describe the purpose of CT

1. Figure out the best action or actions to take.
2. Figure out if something is likely true or not.
3. Get an accurate view of reality.
4. Determine if you should believe something or not.
5. Determine if you should take an action that another actor (person or group) is advocating for.

Rationale for CT

The obvious reason for becoming skilled with CT is that it equips you and your groups to maximize your payoffs. A payoff is the rewards minus the drawbacks in a holistic sense of a set of ethical actions.

Here are some other reasons.

1. Peace of mind: You know you have done your best to arrive at the optimal decision. No need for stress. You feel confident in your decisions.

2. Power: You have a way to proceed or move forward when faced with difficult choices. You have a game plan. You have a solid way to explain to others why a given decision makes the most sense.

3. Minimize Mistakes: When you are in a professional role (medical doctor, engineer, lawyer, architect, carpenter, mechanic, teacher, …) you will minimize mistakes and thereby best serve your clients, customers, and so on. Similarly, in personal life you will minimize mistakes with those people who you care the most about.

4. Truth: For example, the Pythagorean theorem was proven to be true thousands of years ago. It is still true today. CT is a valuable tool for pursuing truth.

5. Essential for Life Skills: CT is essential for effective problem solving, learning, leadership, research, collaboration, organization, and such.

6. Accurate View of Reality: You will see things more clearly and be less likely to be influenced by groupthink, advertisers, manipulators, frauds, con artists, scams, cults, and such.

7. Safety: When actors who disagree with you attack, you will have the skill sets to defend yourself while minimizing harm to them. This is like having a black belt in the martial arts.

8. Metamorphosis: You will continually grow in ways that are transformational. This is like changing from a caterpillar to a butterfly. This is like going from a “black and white” movie to color. These changes will give your life extraordinary meaning.

There are also reasons not to learn CT.

1. Decision making is natural like breathing. We don’t need to learn how to breathe because we are already good at it. Similarly, many people believe they are already good at decision making. However, a hallmark of skill with CT is that skilled people would not claim to be good at decision making because immersion into CT reveals how hard it is to effectively make good decisions. A person skilled in CT might describe themselves as a learner of CT because learning CT progresses throughout life; it is not mastered.

2. Skill with CT can cause one to be an outlier in most groups. You will not fit in as well, and you may cause a lot of friction. You may be highly frustrated with the choices made by most groups. You may be seen as a pain in the ass.

3. Learning CT takes a long time and a lot of practice. Just like learning piano, calculus, writing, or most other things. No one is naturally or innately good at CT.

Facts about CT

• CT can be applied anytime any actor (person or group) has questions, concerns, choices, or similar. This means that each of us has the chance to practice CT hundreds of times per day. If one engages in practice with feedback (aka, Deliberate Practice) then one will continually grow their CT skills.

• CT can be applied in any context: personal life, sports, relationships, university, job, profession, well-being, learning, and so on.

• Applying CT can take minuscule amounts of resources (time, effort, cost, and such) or it can take huge amounts. Skilled practitioners apply CT such that the benefits far exceed the drawbacks. This keeps one from spending too much time on a decision.

• Anyone can start learning and applying CT today. You don’t need to wait until after you have taken a course or read a book. Just pay attention to your day-to-day decisions and start being systematic. Here is a simple framework:

  • Issue: State the concern you are addressing as a simple question.
  • Conclusion: State the conclusion you have reached after you have gathered information.
  • Reasoning: Give the reasons that justify why you or anyone else should accept this conclusion.

• Students in universities can apply CT to every homework and test problem they encounter.

  • This will dramatically increase your learning of your subjects.
  • This will also grow your skills in CT.
  • Thus, you will get more payback.

Method: How to Apply CT

Framework

Here is how to apply CT when you are the decision maker.

Repetitions: While quality is improving, take the following actions:

1. Issue: Figure out the most useful topic to address. Frame this topic using a simple question called the “key question.”

2. Research: Get high-quality information relevant to answering the key question.

3. Logic: Select the best type of logic for the issue at hand and skillfully apply it.

4. Argument: State the answer to the key question and list the reasons why you or anyone else should agree with the answers.

5. Assessment: Gauge the quality of your argument. If it needs improvement, repeat the previous actions. Otherwise, stop.

You can also use this framework to gauge the quality of a decision made by another actor (person or group). I’ll explain the details of this in later lessons.

Tips

1. Purpose: Always strive to make the best possible choice. Avoid striving to “be right.” That is, figure out what is right.

2. Value: When you apply CT, strive for the best decision with the fewest drawbacks (stress, cost, time, conflict, efforts, hassles, and such) and the most auxiliary rewards (satisfaction, wonder, enjoyment, learning, and such).

3. Affect: Emotions and feelings strongly influence decision making and they cannot be turned off or effectively ignored. However, through time and practice, one can learn how to productively harness affect.

4. Receiver Role: These same actions often apply when you are in the arguer role. However, there are some other actions that I’ll describe in later lessons. For example, a skilled responder typically asks probing questions using a method called “Socratic questioning.”

5. Details: There are many details I’ve left out because I don’t want to overwhelm my audience. I’ll fill these in in later lessons.

6. Repetitions: Repetitions (aka, an iterative approach) involve doing something over and over while improving quality as you go. Reps are commonly used for problem-solving, design, writing, learning, and a host of other things.

Summary

CT is a method for making the best decisions and getting an accurate view of reality and justifying your findings.

CT is done using repetitions that involve five main actions: issue, research, logic, argument, and assessment.

CT is worth learning and applying because the best decisions maximize the well-being of individuals and groups.