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Why should you invest the time and energy in doing the tough, sometimes thankless job of critical thinking? Well, research shows that you are less likely to be close-minded, xenophobic, prejudiced, or a dogmatic absolutist (Killian, 2007) if you exhibit some of these critical thinking skills. So, here are some tips on how to be a critical thinker.
• Consider that there are multiple ways of viewing a problem, and there may be more than “one correct solution”.
Lots of folks who score low on critical thinking firmly believe that there is one way of doing things, that there is only one right way to solve a problem, and that shades of grey are just a series of dirty books and not a way of viewing the world. Of course, if there is only one correct way of looking at the world, and problems, then you surround yourself with likeminded persons, and seek sources of information that tend to support that singular worldview. I confuse the heck out of my 15 year old sometimes, because I espouse views that are “both/and” rather than “either/or”: I see the benefits of the executive branch of big and local government, and I have also witnessed their excesses and abuses at other times. So, it’s not all black and white, but there are one or two shades of grey in there, somewhere. My 15 year old thinks everything is, and should be, black and white, and like Sergeant Joe Friday from Dragnet, should be about “just the facts, ma’am.” Well, give his brain time to continue to develop (and it will).
• Consider divesting from “objectivity”; social reality is quite subjective.
As Don Fraser once intoned, “A happy home is one in which each partner grants the possibility that the other may be right, though neither believes it.” We have to be willing to grant another person their reality, and that there may be some “truth” (small “t”) in what they are saying given their perspective, and social location (their gender, age, culture, sexual orientation, or even height—I am a foot taller than my spouse). For instance, that darn step that I sometimes trip over in our kitchen floor is a nuisance sometimes, but it’s the only way my wife can reach the top shelf of the cupboards and pantry, so I don’t hide it in the basement or toss it out with the garbage on a Thursday night. “Objectively” it is a stumbling block for me, but serves a purpose for another person whom I live with (and would like to sleep with every night). So, the step in the kitchen is both/and: An object to stub my toes on, and a solution to the problem of being vertically challenged, depending on one's point of view. The same goes for many political issues. The enforcement of laws regarding the wearing of seat belts, or use of child safety seats, in motor vehicles are examples of the government trying to enhance citizens’ safety, or could be construed as examples of big government overreach, and taking away our right to choose to use safety devices (I hope there are very few of you out there who think you can just hold on tight to a baby in the backseat and everything will be fine). We say our position, or opinion, is objectively true, so that we can render it incontrovertible, and unassailable by any other ideas. But it’s really very subjective, and constructed on the basis of our social location as people.
• Be open to multiple sources of information, dialogue, and a spirited exchange of ideas.
“Listen and keep an open mind”: A good idea, and sadly, a key quotation on a Facebook posting shared by Sheriff John Hanlin of Oregon, touting a truther conspiracy theory that some of the grieving parents of murdered Sandy Hook students were really just actors, and a second or third shooter “may have been present” at the scene. “Who can we trust?”, the poster asks. Such posts fan the flames of suspicion, distrust, and paranoia, and influence folks to be less open to multiple sources of information, and the critical consumption of such sources. And yet, the suggestion that something is amiss, that all is not what it seems (Morpheus’s first conversation with Neo in The Matrix, anyone?), is a seductive slide to ride. The folks who promote and perpetuate conspiracy theories are suggesting we remain open to their closed arguments, that we listen and engage in a conversation about how the government is trying to trick us, that they are trying to take away our rights, that we must stockpile weapons for the day that they come in their black copters and go house to house, taking away our guns (um, that’s not going to happen). Ironically, they beckon us to be “open” to the idea of being closed, and to have our minds made up, locked up tight, impervious to counter arguments that can be dismissed as “just your opinion.” Shannyn Moore posted on FB the story of a listener to her radio show who said he didn’t trust the President and that he thought he made the “Sandy Hook shooting happen to get re-elected.” When she explained that Sandy Hook happened after election, she reports that the listener responded, “That’s your opinion.” Quite simply, this is an example of intellectual laziness, and ignorance, and possibly delusional thinking. A quick Google search could show that the date of the Sandy Hook shootings where 20 children and 6 adult staff members were torn apart by bullets, by one shooter, by the way, happened on December 14, 2012. Everyone knows that federal elections are held the first Tuesday in November. So, clearly, this is not a matter of opinion, but a matter of being well-informed, and knowing what the heck one is talking about, instead of drinking the Kool-Aid of persons who insinuate, imply, or obliquely suggest total malarkey.
It would be excellent if we really did keep our minds open, and listened to a variety of arguments and positions, and extended the conversation to persons who did not always agree with us, or urged us to speak “frankly” via diatribes, chauvinism, insults, generalizations, and the omission of social, political and historical contexts for events and phenomena being discussed. Folks, it's a tough job, but someone’s got to do it: Please be critical thinkers.
Kyle D. Killian, PhD is author of Interracial Couples, Intimacy & Therapy: Crossing Racial Borders from Columbia University Press.
References
Killian, K.D. (2007). The psychology of terror: Relationships among xenophobia, zeal, critical thinking and (in)security in the post 9/11 era. In K. Fanti (Ed.) Psychological Science: Research, Theory and Future Directions (pp. 91-98). Athens, Greece: ATINER.
