Critical Thinking

What is it to think well? We might begin be trying to articulate the aims of thinking well. In science and philosophy the aims are clear understanding and well supported belief. Thinking well in realms of inquiry aims at knowledge and understanding. So here we want to identify what sorts of reasoning clarifies our understanding and justifies our beliefs.

A reason for believing something can be formulated as an argument, a set of claims including premises that support a conclusion. Some arguments support their conclusions better than others, so thinking well requires methods for evaluating arguments. The links below start with the basic methods for evaluating arguments on the left. More thoughts on critical thinking can be found on the right

   

Arguments

Deduction Worksheet

Induction

Abduction

Analysis

A Quartet of Hypothetical Syllogisms

Fallacies

 

King on Non-violence

Diversity and the Socratic Method

True for you, not for me

Truth

Writing about Arguments

Some senses of "rational"

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