Flawed Thinking

A Quick Guide toOvercoming Obstacles to Clear Thinking

1.      Avoid confusing personal taste with critical judgment. Critical judgment is based on a clear set of criteriathat we can articulate. Personal taste is simply what strikes our fancywhat weenjoy. Education and experience can refine and enrich our taste so that webegin to enjoy what our critical judgment says is excellent, but we can oftenenjoy things for reasons other than their excellence. Time spend persuading othersto have your taste is wasted.

2.       Avoiddefensive reasoning. The temptationto defend or champion something just because it is ours is sometimesoverwhelming. But no idea is right just because we have always thought it.Rationalizing seeks to justify things we suspect are wrong or in error.Sometimes we take a side just because we dislike the people on the other side,not because we actually believe it to be true.

3.       Avoidarguing that something is right just because it is old or new. Traditionalists say something is right because we havealways done it or believed it. Rebels say something is right because it is newand change is always good. Critical thinkers say lets judge this idea on theevidence. Traditions can be foolish, even evil, and change can be disastrous,and also evil. The revolutionary change that Marxism brought to China, Russia,Cambodia, and North Korea resulted in humanitarian disasters. The desire of thesouth to hold onto the tradition of slavery tore the nation apart. The desirefor change or tradition for its own sake is stupid.

4.       Avoidconformity, conscious and unconscious.  As parents are fond of pointing out, everyonedoing something does not make it right. We also need to acknowledge theunprecedented power of media to saturate our lives with advertising that steersus into a culture of consumerism. It is, however, tempting to deceive ourselvesinto thinking we are nonconformists just because we conformed to the standardsand values of a subculture. When Goths and bikers wear white, they can claim tobe nonconformistsunless they all do it.

5.       Avoidmistaking style, for substance. In aconsumer culture style can become everything. We can easily believe ideas oraccept values that are presented with great flare, moving images, or an aura ofglamour. We can think some ideas right just because a celebrity we admire holdsthem. Advertisers, musicians, or clever comedians can get us to accept ideasthat would look idiotic written on a 3×5 card.

6.       Carefullyexamine the hidden assumptions of yourself and others. Often the real source of disagreement is rooted infundamental differences in basic assumptions. If, for instance, someone assumesthe only source of knowledge is empirical science, it will be hard discuss thenature of shamanism. If we assume people are basically good and will choosegood one they know it, every social problem can best be solved by education.But what if that assumption is wrong, and people choose what is wrong even whenthey know what is right?

7.       Make thediscovery of truth the goal of all education and argument. It isnt about us. Its not about us defending ourturf or winning an argument. It is about discovering, presenting, and weighingthe evidence to identify what is true and what is good.

8.       Reject thesilly claim that everything is relative, we all have our own truth, that truthis constantly changing. If we allhave our own truth, then no persons truth is better than anothers. We may asget our medical opinions from the plumber. Although our perception andknowledge of the truth is always changing, what is true, by definition, isntchanging. The earth didnt begin orbiting around the sun when Copernicusproposed the idea. The truth is out there. These common sentiments wouldactually make all education and research pointless.