Critical Thinking Discussion

According to Dr. Thomas Land, critical thinking involves knowing how to think rather than what to think. Critical thinking entails understanding when we have reasons that justify why we should believe certain ideas. Critical thinkers do not take claims for granted, even when they are made by reputable people, critical thinkers question whether there are solid grounds for believing something. I have some background knowledge on critical thinking as I took a course on the subject in first year university. This talk was extremely helpful to relearn the many things I had forgotten about the course.

Critical thinking allows one to accept only those ideas that have strong grounds because believing them would mean attaining your aims effectively. It also empowers one by fostering independence as one must “think for himself.” The lecture discusses how critical thinking operates, discussing various ways of acquiring beliefs:

• Through media (requiring an evaluation of their credibility)
• Personal experience (which may be faulty due to biases and other factors)
• Reasoning (which might include fallacies like false dilemmas).

In his lecture, Dr. Land provides examples of how valid arguments can actually be invalid because they start from bad assumptions. Overall, critical thinking is introduced as a method and a set of skills that help one make decisions, reason and understand everything better. After this talk I understand how crucial critical thinking is, especially in the time we are in with AI and media. Being able to see through faulty arguments or logic is extremely important and I hope to continue using these skills to keep sound mind.