Critical Thinking
- Consists of rational problem solving
- Includes understanding of discipline-specific techniques
- Requires skepticism and tolerance for ambiguity
- Is linked to individuality, culture, and historical time
- Is situated in a community and to service
Modified: 2019-11-20
Liberal Education
- Politics have made "liberal" a bad word
- Watch TV this election season to see this phenomenon.
- Liberal education is defined as:
- Becoming a critical thinker involves:
- Losing credulity
- Learning how to learn more about specific information
- Changing your point of view when necessary
- Becoming skeptical
- Knowing your own biases and beliefs
- Collaboration helps critical thinking
- Working with others exposes you to other points of view
- Committees are a good thing
- However, watch out for groupthink
- Employers (and graduate schools) are looking for (adapted from NACE Job Outlook Survey):
- Oral communication skills (presenting your ideas)
- Interpersonal skills (interacting with peers, instructors, research participants, and the public)
- Analytical skills (analyzing results)
- Teamwork skills (working with peers and your instructor)
- Flexibility (dealing with unexpected events)
- Computer skills (word processing, graphing, and data analysis)
- Proficiency in field of study (possessing deep knowledge in one field)
- Written communication skills (writing well and easily)
- Leadership skills (working with others in a leadership capacity)
- You should have all of these in four years!
- Critical Thinking Steps (WARNING!!!)
- Is information true?
- Does information support conclusion?
- Is it too early to decide?
- Are you being rational or emotional?
- Are there any other explanations?
- What work remains?
Good and Faulty Reasoning
- Types of Thinking
- Abstract-the big picture, generalization
- Creative-finding new solutions
- Systematic-being sure all angles have been examined
- Communicative-explaining thinking to others orally or in writing
- Logical Fallacies
- Attacking person, not the idea (ad hominem)
- Coercion
- Begging
- Authority
- Popular opinion
- Lack of negative evidence
- False causation
- Hasty generalization
College and Critical Thinking
- Doonesbury on college teaching (not critical thinking!)
- Everything I say is correct, right? After all, I am a college instructor.
- Students should never question their instructor, right?
- Instructors should never challenge their students' thinking, right?
- "The more you know, the more you know you don't know." (probably Socrates)
- Good description of college and critical thinking
- When you graduate, you should think you know less that you do now
- Open-ended thinking
- Critical thinking demands personal change
Evaluating the Information from the Internet
- The Internet and Google (and other search engines) have made information gathering easier
- Users of the Internet and other sources must evaluate information using critical thinking
- Questions you should ask:
- Credibility
- Authorship
- Unbiased
- Peer review
- Peer review helps ensure the creation of unbiased information
- Advocacy
- Some information is produced by people with a conflict of interest
- Be cautious when using such information
- Understanding URLs
- Authority-who published the information
- Currency-how up-to-date is the information
- Transfer protocol: http, ftp, gopher, and news
- Server
- File path
- Domains-.com, .edu, .gov, .org, .net, .mil, country domains (.us is default), .biz, .info, .name, .pro, .aero, .coop, and .museum
- Good Examples:
- Bad Exampls
and Cures
- Evaluating Internet Sources
- Content analysis
- Credible?
- Copyrighted?
- Citation
- Continous?
- Moderated? Censored?
- Internet Only?
- Know your search context
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