Critical Thinking or Opening Pandora’s Box

Critical thinker. Alongside “creative”, it seems to be the ultimate compliment one can receive nowadays with so many other buzzwords invading social media (“leadership, “innovative”, “disrupting” and the sorts).

Let us then dig deeper into this concept to clarify what it means and how it can be applied in the field of education.

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        First, we are not *that*revolutionary in promoting the concept. Actually, we owe much to a quite charismatic and brave Athenian who lived about 2,500 years ago.  Socrates, considered the father of the Western thought and philosophy, taught us what it means to question the world, the words and the relationship between them (see Socratic Questioning techniques). Each century on had its critical thinkers whose work contributed to our understanding of the importance of thinking critically – from Erasmus, Moore, Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning), Descartes (Rules for the Direction of the Mind) to Hobbes, Voltaire, Diderot, Kant (Critique of Pure Reason), Comte, Spencer, Graham Sumner and Ludwig Wittgenstein, we learned that critical thought “is our only guarantee against delusion, deception, superstition, and misapprehension of ourselves and our earthly circumstances” and that “education in the critical faculty is the only education which it can be truly said that it makes good citizens.” (W. G. Sumner, Folkways, p.633).

Conclusion: When we claim to be the first promoters of “critical thinking” (for 21^st century, rolling eyes now) we are wrong, ignorant or arrogant. Take your pick. 

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Secondly, “critical thinking” is subject to numerous definitions – I personally know twenty of them – so it is quite problematic when one tries to define it. Openness of a concept has a two-fold effect: it encourages multiple perspectives and debate (which is beneficial as it makes us think deeper when we defend our position as well as build on others’ ideas), but its ambiguity can also lead to misunderstandings (we  do need to make things “simple but not simpler”). However, there are several characteristics of critical thinking that can be recognizable across these numerous interpretations, and I selected what I think is the most comprehensive definition:

“Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness.”  (Michael Scriven and Richard Paul,  Annual International Conference on Critical Thinking and Education Reform, Summer 1987)

I deliberately underlined or typed some words in bold so we can unpack their meaning. Although there are several approaches to critical thinking (as a “process”, “skill”, “attitude” or as “procedures”), I think “process” is more representative for the complex nature of critical thinking because it is defined as “ a series of actions, changes or functions bringing about a result”.

Further on, one needs to be “skillful” at thinking critically. Two points here:

1. “Skillful” does not imply CT is a transferable skill from one domain to another for one main reason: it connects to KNOWLEDGE so it is domain-specific.
2. “Skillful” involves the notion of quality of thinking. In Fisher’s words,

“Thinking does not count as critical because someone intends it to be, anymore than thinking counts as scientific simply because it aims to be. To be critical, thinking has to meet certain standards – of clarity, relevance etc. – and one can be more or less skilled at it.” (Alec Fisher, Critical Thinking, p. 11, Cambridge University Press 2001)

Although critical thinking is not transferable, it does incorporate core values that “transcend” the various fields or school subjects. Whether we talk about critical thinking in anthropology, evolutionary psychology, sciences or history, meeting these standards is vital:

“clarity, accuracy, precision, relevance, depth, breadth, logic, significance, and (where applicable) fairness.” (Richard Paul, 2004 http://www.criticalthinking.org/  )

*That is another reason criticism should not be mistaken with critical thinking. The former is linked with bias and emotional argumentation, while the latter considers a broad range of evidence and perspectives, it implies reasoning and emotional distance. Along this line, there are many intelligent people in education, politics, or media, who possess strong rhetoric skills and can persuade masses very easily by manipulating or purposefully ignoring information to suit their agenda (progressive or traditional). Sure we admire them, many even “follow” them on social media platforms but the effectiveness of their discourse is brought about by the lack of critical thinking from our side – we should always revert to the criteria above to make an informed choice.

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Back to critical thinking in a particular context, that is education.

1. CT is knowledge-bound. (see my other post, Who Is Afraid of Knowledge?)
2. CT is “effective, novel and self-directed.” (Daniel Willingham, Critical Thinking) – read the article in full.

3. Because CT is so closely connected to knowledge it is an error to create or use “programs” that “teach” critical thinking out of context. Research showed that such programs had little to no effect; moreover, their effectiveness was questioned by academics who reviewed the studies as the students could not transfer their thinking to novel situations (in other words, the outcome measure was too similar to the material in the program).

4. Viewing CT solely as a set of procedures one must follow to become a critical thinker is a mistake. Depth and breadth of knowledge, as well as practice are paramount to thinking well. You cannot think critically about history unless you actually know history. The same applies to any subject.

5. Although heuristics and procedures do not guarantee quality thinking, they are vital in *thinking* about knowledge we gain. Acquiring facts is a necessary step to think well – you need the “what” to think about. However, it is no sufficient. You need to analyze, synthesize and evaluate it and that is done by using different strategies. (see my reply on Twitter below, as well as my reply on this http://knowledgeandheuristics.pen.io/ )

“Teaching content alone is not likely to lead to proficiency in science, nor is engaging in inquiry experiences devoid of meaningful science content.” (National Research Council via D.T. Willingham)

“The educational challenge is, therefore, to equip students with repertoires of procedures they can employ across the range of thinking situations.” (Misconceptions About Critical Thinking)

In other words, knowledge in and by itself is not conducive to thinking well. Nor is inquiry prone to success unless it builds on knowledge. Thinking in “either/or” terms – knowledge vs. skills – is short-sighted and does not move our own thinking nor practices too far.

So I disagree with  @harryweb  who stated “Critical thinking will happen as a result of this knowledge. Taught heuristics are not required.”

6. Heuristics and thinking strategies are not algorithms. An algorithm “is a step-by-step prescription that is guaranteed to accomplish a particular goal” (Misconceptions about Critical Thinking) so it is not applicable to critical thinking – it is a multi-step procedure used mainly in sciences. Most curricular areas do not require the application of algorithms; analyzing a literary piece or interpreting historical events, for instance, involve openness to perspectives and divergent ideas. It is notable though to mention that even in sciences algorithms do not lead to progress – it is questioning, reinterpretation of data, a different approach to a problem that enable breakthroughs, historically speaking.

So yes, thinking strategies are not infallible – nor did anyone claim they are. But they enable you to think critically by applying them within the context of broad knowledge and by maintaining the intellectual standards mentioned before. 

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Further reading:

D. Willingham -his entire website http://www.danielwillingham.com/articles.html

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy  – Informal Logic 

Critical Thinking Organization – Library 

Critical Thinking Web 

Critical Thinking on the Web 

Tags: cognition, critical thinking, heuristics