CHAPTER

1

The Benefit and Manner of Asking the

Right Questions 1

The Noisy, Confused World We Live in 1

Experts Cannot Rescue Us, Despite What They

Say 4

The Necessity of Relying on Our Mind 5

Critical Thinking to the Rescue 6

The Sponge and Panning for Gold: Alternative

Thinking Styles 8

Weak-Sense and Strong-Sense Critical Thinking 10

The Importance of Practice 12

Critical Thinking and Other People 12

Values and Other People 12

Primary Values of a Critical Thinker 14

Keeping the Conversation Going 16

Creating a Friendly Environment for

Communication 19

CHAPTER

2

Speed Bumps Interfering with Your Critical

Thinking 20

The Discomfort of Asking the Right Questions 21

Thinking Too Quickly 21

Stereotypes 22

Mental Habits That Betray Us 23

Halo Effect 24

Belief Perseverance 24

Availability Heuristic 26

Answering the Wrong Question 27

Egocentrism 28

Wishful Thinking: Perhaps the Biggest Single Speed

Bump on the Road to Critical Thinking 29

CHAPTER 3 What Are the Issue and the Conclusion? 33

Kinds of Issues 34

Searching for the Issue 36

Searching for the Author’s or Speaker’s

Conclusion 37

Using This Critical Question 39

Clues to Discovery: How to Find the Conclusion 39

Critical Thinking and Your Own Writing and

Speaking 40

Narrowing Your Issue Prior to Writing 41

Cluing Your Reader into Your Conclusion 42

Practice Exercises 42

Sample Responses 44

CHAPTER 4 What Are the Reasons? 47

Initiating the Questioning Process 50

Words That Identify Reasons 52

Kinds of Reasons 52

Keeping the Reasons and Conclusions Straight 53

Using This Critical Question 54

Reasons First, Then Conclusions 54

Critical Thinking and Your Own Writing and

Speaking 55

Exploring Possible Reasons before Reaching

a

Conclusion 55

Identify Major Publications That Cover Your

Issue 56

Helping Your Readers Identify Your Reasons 57

Practice Exercises 57

Sample Responses 59

What Words or Phrases Are

Ambiguous? 62

The Confusing Flexibility of Words 63

Locating Key Terms and Phrases 64

Checking for Ambiguity 67

Using This Critical Question 67

Determining Ambiguity 68

Context and Ambiguity 70

Using This Critical Question 72

Ambiguity, Definitions, and the Dictionary 72

Ambiguity and Loaded Language 75

Limits of Your Responsibility to Clarify Ambiguity 76

Ambiguity and Your Own Writing and Speaking 77

CHAPTER

5

Keeping Your Eye Out for Ambiguity 77

Practice Exercises 79

Sample Responses 80

CHAPTER

6

What Are the Value and Descriptive

Assumptions? 84

General Guide for Identifying Assumptions 87

Value Conflicts and Assumptions 88

From Values to Value Assumptions 89

Typical Value Conflicts 91

The Communicator’s Background as a Clue to Value

Assumptions 92

Consequences as Clues to Value Assumptions 92

More Hints for Finding Value Assumptions 94

The Value of Knowing the Value Priorities of

Others 95

Using This Critical Question 96

Values and Relativism 96

Identifying and Evaluating Descriptive

Assumptions 97

Illustrating Descriptive Assumptions 97

Common Descriptive Assumptions 100

Clues for Locating Assumptions 101

Avoiding Analysis of Trivial Assumptions 103

Assumptions and Your Own Writing and

Speaking 104

Practice Exercises 106

Sample Responses 108

CHAPTER

7

CHAPTER

8

Are There Any Fallacies in the

Reasoning? 110

A Questioning Approach to Finding Reasoning

Fallacies 112

Evaluating Assumptions as a Starting Point 114

Discovering Other Common Reasoning

Fallacies 116

Looking for Diversions 123

Sleight of Hand: Begging the Question 126

Using This Critical Question 127

Summary of Reasoning Errors 127

Expanding Your Knowledge of Fallacies 128

Practice Exercises 128

Sample Responses 130

How Good Is the Evidence: Intuition, Personal

Experience, Case Examples, Testimonials,

and Appeals to Authority? 133

The Need for Evidence 134

Locating Factual Claims 136

Sources of Evidence 137

Intuition as Evidence 139

Personal Experience as Evidence 140

Case Examples as Evidence 141

Testimonials as Evidence 143

Appeals to Authority as Evidence 145

Using This Critical Question 149

Your Academic Writing and Evidence 149

Practice Exercises 150

Sample Responses 152

CHAPTER

9

How Good Is the Evidence: Personal

Observation, Research Studies, and

Analogies? 153

Personal Observation as Evidence 153

Research Studies as Evidence 154

General Problems with Research Findings 156

Generalizing from the Research Sample 162

Generalizing from the Research Measures 164

Biased Surveys and Questionnaires 166

Analogies as Evidence 169

Identifying and Comprehending Analogies 170

Evaluating Analogies 171

When You Can Most Trust Expert Opinion 174

Research and the Internet 176

Practice Exercises 178

Sample Responses 179

CHAPTER 10

Are There Rival Causes? 181

When to Look for Rival Causes 182

The Pervasiveness of Rival Causes 183

Detecting Rival Causes 185

The Cause or a Cause 185

Multiple Perspectives as a Guide to Rival

Causes 187

Rival Causes for Differences Between Groups 188

Confusing Causation with Association 190

Confusing “After This” with “Because of This” 192

Explaining Individual Events or Acts 193

Evaluating Rival Causes 194

Rival Causes and Your Own Communication 195

Exploring Potential Causes 196

Practice Exercises 197

Sample Responses 199

CHAPTER 11 Are the Statistics Deceptive? 201

Unknowable and Biased Statistics 203

Confusing Averages 204

Concluding One Thing, Proving Another 207

Deceiving by Omitting Information 208

Using Statistics in Your Writing 210

Practice Exercises 211

Sample Responses 212

CHAPTER 12

What Significant Information Is Omitted?

215

The Benefits of Detecting Omitted Information 216

The Certainty of Incomplete Reasoning 217

Questions That Identify Omitted Information 219

But We Need to Know the Numbers 220

The Importance of the Negative View 223

Omitted Information That Remains Missing 225

Using This Critical Question 225

Practice Exercises 225

Sample Responses 227

CHAPTER 13

What Reasonable Conclusions Are

Possible? 229

Dichotomous Thinking: Impediment to Considering

Multiple Conclusions 230

Two Sides or Many? 232

Productivity of If-Clauses 233

The Liberating Effect of Recognizing Alternative

Conclusions 234

Summary 235

Practice Exercises 236

Sample Responses 237

Final Word 238

Index 240