Critical thinking losing favor in schools, culture, politics

[Dardedar]

The Morning News: Living

Critical thinking losing favor in schools, culture, politics

This article was published on Saturday, January 26, 2008

By Steven Kalas

I recently published a reader's question that provoked in me a discussion of fundamentalism. But this discussion just won't let me go. Let's pick it up from this line: "Fundamentalism is not the same as conviction wrought from the marriage of abiding values and the willingness to think critically."

Ah, the willingness to think critically. A crippled understatement, actually. It's more than willingness. We have to know how to think critically.

I know these two teens. A brother and sister, 17 and 15. Of all the extracurricular activities available to modern high-schoolers, they have chosen debate. Spend five minutes with either of these kids, and you'll know you're not in the company of your average, everyday American teenager.

A debate team teaches you to be a relentless researcher. On a debate team, you will hone the skills of great oratory. But more than anything else, debate teaches critical thinking.

Rules of inference and logic, fallacies of logic, the burden of proof, parsimony, empiricism, teleology, utilitarianism, epistemology, tests for validity, specious arguments -- this is the big leagues, folks. The language of critical thinkers. There is nothing more important an education can provide a child than to foster a hunger to think critically and the tools to know how.

I can't be the only American who fears that critical thinking is no longer the central agenda of our schools. Read Allan Bloom's book "The Closing of the American Mind" (1987), in which he bemoans the decline of critical thinking in America. He says it's worse than no longer being taught how to think critically, and worse than not knowing how. He observes that critical thinking is no longer an abiding value in our culture. Just not that important. The winner of "America's Next Top Model"? That's important!

And I'm here to tell you it might be worse than that. George Orwell's novel "1984" was all the rage when I was in college. Quite the fad, and I felt really hip to have read it. But today, Orwell's book is starting to freak me right out.

I look around and wonder if we don't actually prefer not to think critically, because the conclusions of critical thinking connote an unbearable responsibility. I look around and tell myself I notice styles and patterns of leadership - educational, religious, political, familial - that appear to seduce, enchant and bewitch. Turn our brains to oatmeal. Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Wish I could remember who said this, but I can't say it any better: "There have always been men of arrested development who, dreading reality, found psychological protection in the art of incapacitating the minds of others."

And I'm not even a conspiracy buff.

Today you can actually garner folks' admiration if you tag every utterance with "in my opinion." See, today, in a world absent much critical thinking, such words pass as humility. But it's a dodge. I don't care about your opinion. Or mine. Bring me a powerful and compelling argument. Then you'll have my attention.

Everyone is part of the solution, all ideas have value, we're all experts, humility means remembering that we can't know anything absolutely -- know what all these little maxims have in common? Every last one of them is hogwash, and I can't tell you how many times I've been to trainings and workshops and retreats where people with multiple college degrees recite such phrases without irony.

Which leads me to the subject of political campaigns. Are you watching and listening to the presidential hopefuls from both parties?

I'm the candidate for change!

What change, exactly?

The change that Americans want, that they are looking for!

OK. I'll bite. What change am I looking for?

No more "business as usual" in Washington!

I so don't have a reference point here. What do you understand to be business as usual, and how would you do it differently?

My opponent is, on a good day, an idiot. But worse, his/her motives are corrupt!

Any chance for an illustration?

I'm really cool, and I have pure motives! See this picture of me and my spouse and our dog?

They are all using variations of the Sprite advertising campaign (Image is nothing; obey your thirst!), where they try to "sell" you the idea of embracing the image of someone who is so cool they have risen above the need to have an image.

Except the presidential candidates aren't selling soft drinks.

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NWAonline

Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor in Las Vegas, Nev. Contact him at skalas@reviewjournal.com.

[Betsy]

This is one of the reasons I support Barack Obama - he is inspiring young people to get involved in politics and in the process of electing a president. By virtue of the fact that it's politics and government, this creates a situation where these young people (high school, college aged students) must practice thinking critically - what are the differences in the candidates' issues? what can be done to help solve the problems we face at this time? who is telling the truth and who is lying? - Obama, more than any other candidate, is calling on citizens to get involved in their government and in solving these problems, and the younger generation has caught on. That gives me hope that Obama will be elected and continue to inspire people into action and involvement. That our society won't keep slipping into an idiocracy, and people won't just sit around watching America's Top Model and bitching about how the government isn't making our lives better - we'll all be out doing something about it.

(And yes, I'm aware that GWB deserves our bitching because he's made everything so much worse)

[Doug]

I can't be the only American who fears that critical thinking is no longer the central agenda of our schools. Read Allan Bloom's book "The Closing of the American Mind" (1987), in which he bemoans the decline of critical thinking in America. He says it's worse than no longer being taught how to think critically, and worse than not knowing how. He observes that critical thinking is no longer an abiding value in our culture. Just not that important. The winner of "America's Next Top Model"? That's important!

DOUG
And top offenders are FAUX NEWS, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and their ilk. They have to sell outright lies, so they CAN'T use the recognized methods of proper reasoning. Instead, they have to engage in informal fallacies and pure bullshit.

Lies can't be supported by the whole truth. At best, one must use half-truths, and usually a good dose of smaller, appealing lies. Hence the world of FAUX NEWS, where a substantial portion of their ignorant viewers think we found the WMD's in Iraq!

[Dardedar]

DAR
If Obama gets the nomination we are going to see a wave of support and political excitement in the populace that we haven't seen in the US in decades. I predict the republican performance, no matter which wingnut they choose, will be similar to Dole's in '96.

And if Hillary gets it, she will clean their clock.

D.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

It's true there's a whole lot of excitement with Obama - but people are buying him like the newest fad video game. I've read Hillary's and Obama's plans - healthcare and economy especially and (OK Doug, it IS my opinion) Hillary's are better - as in they are more complete and will serve more people. And yes, either one will be so many light years ahead of what the Rs have and/or are offering that it wouldn't be a contest - except critical thinking is no longer taught in America (OK, yes, you can get it as an elective, if you take debate).

[Betsy]

I was serious about the idea of the freethinkers putting an ad together - a YouTube video for that matter - that promotes independent thinking by exposing the way the right-wing manipulated Bill Clinton's quote. I was kind of hoping the group would take that idea and run with it...