What do you regard as the key fundamentals of critical thinking and do you think you always follow them?

I'll put my answer later but I'm curious to see what LFers regard as the key fundamentals of critical thinking and whether they think they always follow them.

If you don't think you always follow them please say when and why. I tend to believe that if you don't always (or at least almost always) follow what you believe to be the key fundamentals - where it is appropriate* - then I'm not sure you can claim to be a critical thinker. I don't think being a critical thinker really allows for turning critical thinking on and off when it suits.

* When I say "appropriate" I mean not coming out with your critical thinking thoughts at times when emotions are high or there's some other kind of delicate situation where tact and diplomacy are required but any other time.

I think the answer to this would take at least one text book :)

I will say that one foundational element is the ability to recognize bias and account for them. This includes motivated reasoning and indoctrination .

Another foundational element is susceptibility to influence . Unfortunately for many, this is largely innate and not easily controlled.

Part 1

Thanks for your responses Bo and ROTE. I believe that the items you put forward as being necessary/need to be watched out for are required for what I put forward so are implicit - it's good to make them explicit too I think but at the same time it's good to look at the absolute fundamentals if they can be so identified.

I believe that perhaps we can boil down critical thinking to two main rules:

• Rule 1 applies generally to the validity of the hypothesis you hold
• Rule 2 applies to the best way to approach evidence in order to get to the truth

I think an overriding understanding that the nature of reality is such that if an hypothesis is correct every single piece of evidence will ultimately at least support if not favour it over any other is an important phenomenon to keep in mind.

Rule 1: Aim to prove your hypothesis wrong
When I came across what Kary Mullis, the Nobel-prize winning inventor of the PCR technique, said in an interview with Gary Null, namely, "The scientist aims to prove their hypothesis wrong," I thought, "Bingo! That's what I do. If ever what I believe is challenged by anyone or anything I review my hypothesis versus the challenging one to see which is supported better, unless, of course, I have a good argument to reject the challenge immediately. Richard Feynman effectively said the same thing in a commencement address at Caltech in 1974.

Some of the logical fallacies that get in the way of doing this are:

• Appeal to authority - we are a species that forms hierarchies which means that we have a tendency to "follow the leader" and tend to dislike challenging the leaders too much because doing that puts us in a vulnerable situation.
• Ad populum - we are also a social species so if the argument is at odds with what the general population believe we reject it.
• Fallacy of the Argument from Intimidation - if the idea is frowned upon we don't want to be associated with it
• Anchoring - humans don't really like chopping and changing their beliefs generally speaking
• Sunk-cost fallacy - Similar issue to Anchoring
• Argument from incredulity / ignorance - if it doesn't fit our paradigm of how the world works we'll reject the challenge
• Cherry-picking - Turned to as a resistance response to the challenge

People's tendencies to lapse into logically fallacious thinking described by the fallacies above is perfectly understood by those in power and they weaponise those tendencies against us.

I'd say the main things people don't do with regard to Rule 1 are:

1. Simply not review their thinking at all or make any move to go out of their way to check that it's correct

2. Cherry-pick - they throw up a possible alternative explanation without considering whether this possible alternative is a better alternative or debunks the challenge. If it doesn't debunk the challenge it has no value. When your belief is challenged you need to do a considered review of all the reasons you hold your belief and whether the reasons put forward for the belief that challenges yours are superior, not just grab at a possible alternative explanation for a particular item.

Rule 2: Confine your argument to the most relevant and unarguable-with data in the first instance
If the nature of reality is that every single piece of evidence will at least support if not favour the correct hypothesis then if all the unarguable-with data supports your hypothesis if not favours it over any other then it's rather difficult for another hypothesis to be correct.

People easily get carried away with red-herring style information which creates confusion and clouds the issue. Even if certain facts are unarguable-with are they necessarily the most relevant? Considering the most relevant and unarguable-with data first sets you on a good path to the truth. It's part of Occam's Razor, shaving away the unnecessary.

While I haven't always followed the two rules above I believe I followed Rule 1 most of the time and when I didn't I'd say it was because I knew no better whereas now I think I follow it all the time. In the case of Rule 2 I probably allow myself to get carried away in red-herring style information but as it's only now I'm clearly identifying that as a rule I think I'll stick to it better - after all, it saves time and energy so why not?

An interesting phenomenon

I state with utter conviction that the evidence clearly shows that 9/11 was, in reality, a glorified anti-terrorist exercise and astronauts did indeed land – an astonishing accomplishment for its time – on the moon.

If I’m wrong, I’m wrong and who cares but if I’m right what does that say about the vast majority’s ability to think critically because as far as I know there’s hardly anyone else who accepts these two statements as facts, including my identical twin – she accepts the first but not the second. There’s a very small percentage of people who accept the first claim as a fact but virtually none of those people accept the second and while obviously a majority of people accept the second claim as true virtually none of them accept the first.

If I’m right and the vast majority has only got one fact of the two right what is it about my thinking that’s so different? All I do is follow the two rules above. Why does virtually no one else?

Perhaps the fundamentals of critical thinking are foundational for solving things (including decisions). For example, in solving a math problem, a critical thinker might want to recall theorems, algebra tricks, and so on, to sort of see where that leads. 

Ex1: A particle moves according to the function f(t) on an interval [t1, t2], f(t) is the height in meters. Find out when the particle attains its maximum height.

The critical thinker might remember a step-by-step process to solve this and recognized that continuous functions attain their max on closed intervals. But there's another question: is the function differentiable? Of course, we need an explicit formula to answer that, but suppose that it is. Then we may perform what is called the closed-interval method by finding critical values and test all cases. There's another question: does f'(t)=0 have finite solutions, if any. And so on.

There are more techniques, like going by cases:

Ex: Find the solution set for |x-1| < 10.

There's also mathematical induction.

Ex: Prove Gauss formula

There's also design in computer programming. I particularly love programming. It's very soothing. There's planning and testing (not a professional but I read about it). You also have the divide-and-conquer strategy in which a whole scheme of planning comes up: decomposition outline or functional decomposition, i.e., abstraction (at least how I understand it).

Philosophy is interesting. We could compare and contrast epistemology with ethics. The commonality, however, is the structured approach to argumentation. Some of the books that I've read, they use this premise-to-conclusion list, a format that I follow when I comment on this website. Ethics could be divided into normative ethics and meta-ethics. Perhaps there's more. A bunch of counter-examples come up to critique theories. Epistemology, well, I don't know much about this one, but you have the classical account for knowledge, Gettier's cases as a critique to the classical account for justification and many more.

What am I getting at? I believe that critical thinking is interdisciplinary. You have all kinds of techniques that you can learn depending on the field. I guess the aim would be to be as successful as possible in those fields and with that said, this reminds me of epistemology. The kind of knowledge that epistemology in interested in is propositional, the kind of knowledge that aims at the truth. Perhaps your question is epistemological in nature. 

One last example: this website is super fun because I like classifying things. Doing that with faulty logic is really cool. I want to add that I do this with respect and love for my neighbor. I do not want to use fallacy knowledge for making someone else feel bad. I think that mentioning "this is a fallacy" kind of puts people on the defense. I guess it's fine but everything with love and respect. 

When do I follow these rules? when I need them. I guess I'll also add "small talk" into the fundamentals of critical thinking. Yes, small talk. It is really hard and takes social skills to do it, I believe. We can also put jokes and getting along with people into the mix. Why not? Delivering speeches, teaching, writing, statistical decisions. There's all these things that can be added. Do I always follow the. Nope. That would be too demanding. 

Then I guess I'll change my answer. The fundamentals of critical thinking are 1. setting a goal, 2. search for the skills that will aid you in obtaining that goal, and 3. learn those skills in the right sort of way.

Part 2

In addition to the two rules mentioned in Part 1, the two guideposts below should always be borne in mind.

1. Every relevant piece of information will at least support if not favour the correct hypothesis
The nature of reality is that every single relevant piece of information will at least support if not favour the correct hypothesis. Any relevant item selected at random will show that it at least is consistent with the hypothesis if not favour it. If not, the hypothesis isn’t correct. Sometimes seeming anomalies might contradict the correct hypothesis but on closer inspection it will be revealed that the seeming anomaly is just that – seeming, it’s not a real anomaly.

2. Internal consistency and consistency with expectations
Where all the evidence is both internally consistent and consistent with expectations of reality, unless a good reason is put forward to doubt we should accept an hypothesis as correct.

Tiny but telling

Imagine opposing hypotheses as opposing kerbs of a road where information on one side of the centre line seems to favour one hypothesis while that on the other side seems to favour the opposing hypothesis. Of course, only one hypothesis can be correct (if either of them are) so all the information must really exist only on one side of the centre line, assuming one of the hypotheses is correct.

To my mind, the information that’s really most important regardless of its seeming size and significance is that which hugs the kerb, the information that is the most difficult to push over the centre line to the other side. A large, seemingly compelling piece of evidence might actually prove to be easy to push over the centre line when it is understood properly (for example, the alleged loved ones of people who've allegedly died in an event can easily be actors) while a tiny, seemingly insignificant piece of evidence might hug the kerb very tightly unable to be pushed away and if indeed this tiny piece of evidence cannot be dislodged from the kerb and cannot make its way over the centre line then in the absence of evidence to the contrary, this tiny piece of evidence essentially acts as proof of the correct hypothesis.

Let’s consider small but telling pieces of evidence for the moon landings and 9/11:

The moon landings – subtlety so utterly consistent with expectations
Images of the moon landings show:

• minute amounts of dust on the landing pads of the lunar module which can only be seen in high-resolution photos with the magnifying tool (click magnifying tool and scroll to left)
• a faint radial exhaust pattern under the lunar module 

These barely detectable elements seen in the moon landing images hug the “we went” hypothesis as tightly as can be – they fit like a glove and – in the absence of evidence to the contrary - on their own they virtually prove the moon landings. Why on earth would images be faked in such a manner? Who would even think of such a thing? If the moon landings were a psychological operation (psyop) as 9/11 was then they were a psyop like no other because an element of psyop fakery is deliberate sloppiness and this level of subtlety is completely alien to psyop fakery and would not be expected even in fakery designed to simulate reality in as dedicated a way as possible.

And, of course, these subtle indications are exactly what are expected according to the lunar conditions and the thrust of the lunar module when it landed. We see perfect internal consistency and consistency with expectations from every angle.

9/11 – journalists “scripted” rather than “speaking candidly”

On the day of 9/11 (or at least it seems as though they were done on that day) there are recordings of reporters alluding to controlled demolition when speaking about the collapse of WTC-7, the third building to come down on 9/11 at the World Trade Centre. I quote four below:

Vince DeMentri, WCBS reporter
“It was almost as if it were a planned implosion. It just pancaked.”

Al Jones, 1010 WINS reporter
“And I turned in time to see what looked like a skyscraper implosion. It looked like it had been done by a demolition crew, the whole thing just collapsing down on itself.”

Dan Rather, CBS News Anchor
“Amazing, incredible, pick your word. For the third time today, it’s reminiscent of those pictures we’ve all seen too much on television before, where a building was deliberately destroyed by well-placed dynamite to knock it down.”

Exchange between Brian Williams, MSNBC News Anchor and David Restuccio, FDNY EMS Lieutenant
“Can you confirm it was No 7 that just went in?”
[“Went in” is a demolition-industry term used in relation to building destruction by implosion that comes from the fact that the buildings fall in on themselves.]

“Yes, sir.”

“And you guys knew this was comin’ all day.”

“We had heard reports that the building was unstable and that eventually it would either come down on its own or it would be taken down.”

9/11 researchers who use these allusions in their argument for cause of destruction of WTC-7 being controlled demolition assume that the reporters are speaking candidly, however, the “speaking candidly” hypothesis doesn’t fit the bare “inside job” hypothesis (or the terrorist narrative) at all well while “scripted” perfectly fits the hypothesis that:

• 9/11 was essentially a glorified anti-terrorist exercise that was completely staged apart from the building destructions, that is, that the planes were faked and death and injury were staged and
• the perps don’t try to hide the fact, in fact, they advertise it in various ways, they simply rely on the extraordinarily trusty Emperor’s New Clothes effect of their propaganda for people not to determine that the 9/11 narrative is preposterous from start to finish.

How the allusions fit “scripted” better than “speaking candidly”.

It is pretty much impossible to explain how Brian Williams’ use of a demolition-industry term in relation to WTC-7’s collapse on the afternoon of 9/11 fits the “speaking candidly” hypothesis:

• By the afternoon the terrorist narrative was in full swing so why would a journalist use a term that incriminates the government in such a casual fashion - and we see other journalists doing the same?
• One would wonder how he would know the term “to go in”, it’s not used much at all outside the industry
• The whole dialogue between him and David Restuccio seems very strange for "speaking candidly" with seeking of confirmation that it was known the building might come down and David Restuccio's reply including "it would be taken down". Why would anyone have a suspicion that it might come down when fire had never brought down a high rise steel-frame building in the past and the fires in the building were very modest in any case? And why would there be mention of it being "taken down"?

On the other hand, “scripted” fits the hypothesis perfectly:

While a journalist as an individual wouldn’t choose to say something so incriminating those in power have – with very good reason – complete confidence in the Emperor’s New Clothes effect. They know that all these surprising allusions will be waved away and explained away later by the majority of people if they’re even aware of them. They also know that those who recognise 9/11 as an inside job generally find it too counterintuitive to think that the perps would deliberately incriminate themselves in this manner and that's where the disbelievers of the 9/11 narrative display a lack of understanding of the complete confidence the perps have in the Emperor's New Clothes effect - it obviously has limitless elasticity because the 9/11 narrative is preposterous from start to finish and does not meet expectations of reality in any shape or form:

1. There are zero expectations of such a catastrophic failure of the military and intelligence infrastructure of the world's mightiest nation and this failure has not been explained

2. Planes disappearing into buildings is against the laws of crash physics

3. High rise steel frame buildings don't come down by fire  ... and so many other expectations of reality not met