1. Critical thinking Most of this is taken from Richard Paul’s work on Critical thinking; any errors belong to Brian Holt Part of college, perhaps a large part, is about learning and improving critically thinking. What makes it hard is that often you need a lot of experience in subject matter before critical thinking can even be applied. In psychology, this means getting acquainted with theories as well as the way constructs are defined and researched. Another, perhaps more important aspect of critical thinking is how does one develop a standard to evaluate one’s own thinking, and how can I use these standards to improve that thinking?

2. Critical thinking components Standards Clarity Accuracy Precision Relevance Depth Breadth Logic Fairness Personality(‘ish) traits Humility vs Arrogance Courage vs Cowardice Empathy vs narrow mindedness Autonomy vs conformity Integrity vs hypocrisy Perseverance vs laziness Trust in reason vs distrust of reason/evidence Fairmindedness vs unfairness

3. Clarity-- Could you express your point in an additional way? An illustration? An Example? Clarity is essential for critical thinking. Without clarity, no other standards can be evaluated. Ask yourself: “is what you are writing is ambiguous (can be interpreted to mean more than one thing)?”

4. Accuracy —is what is being said true? How could we check that? How can we verify it? A statement can be clear but lack accuracy. “Most people are 6 feet tall.”

5. Precision —being specific, adding necessary details. A statement can be clear and accurate but lack precision. “Most people are taller than me.” (How much taller? 1 foot? 1 inch? 1/1000 of a millimeter?)

6. Relevance —is what you are saying connected to the purpose of your writing? A statement can be clear, accurate and precise but lacks relevance. “I worked hard so I should get a good grade.” Effort is not necessarily related to quality, and so is irrelevant to your grade.

7. Depth —does your writing address the complexities of an issue? Are you ignoring aspects of the issue? A statement can be clear, accurate, precise, relevant, and lack depth (is superficial). “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” is superficial and avoids many complexities of the issue.

8. Breadth —are there other views that could help? A statement can be clear, accurate, precise, relevant, deep, and lack breadth. Political arguments often have a strong point of view, but the point of view is singular. Looking at an issue from diverse perspectives often leads to discoveries of new information and solutions.

9. Logic —is what being said connected logically? Does one sentence follow from its predecessor? Is there anything implied (hidden) or contradictory to the author’s point? A statement can be clear, accurate, precise, relevant, deep, broad, and lack logic. (though this is difficult to succinctly describe here.) Look for contradictions and unstated assumptions (givens) to arguments. I sometimes like to read my work backwards, sentence by sentence (not word for word) because the logical connection must be obvious for me to see the relationship between the two sentences. Reading them in the normal direction lets my mind insert logical beliefs without actually having to write them, so my logic is jumpy.

10. Fairness —is a good faith effort applied to all viewpoints, in a fair way? Are we distorting information, or making straw-men to justify our beliefs? Strawmen arguments are where someone first describes an opponent’s belief, but does so in such a way to make the argument look weak, as if made of straw. Then that someone can ‘knock over’ that strawman (weak argument) and supplant it with their own, making their position look stronger than their opponent. “No single person can train all of the [educators needed to train our children]…” President Obama (this is from a speech, not a debate— but still—no one believes that a single person could or should educate all the teachers we need).

11. Personality(‘ish) traits Humility vs Arrogance Courage vs Cowardice Empathy vs narrow mindedness Autonomy vs conformity Integrity vs hypocrisy Perseverance vs laziness Trust in reason vs distrust of reason/evidence Fairmindedness vs unfairness