Today my son has taken his GCSE exam in Critical Thinking. I find it amazing what they teach in schools and how far things have moved on since my day. I wonder at how much I would have benefited from lessons such as ‘Learning to learn’ and ‘Coming to collaboration.’ I expect many of my peers would raise an eyebrow and possibly question the need for training in how to think critically. Very few of us will have had instruction in how to think, not what to think Everyone thinks – that is building your own opinion based on consideration of a variety of different input variables.

Certainly, most people I meet think they’re good at thinking. And yet, experience has convinced me that ‘good thinking’ is hard, and it doesn’t come naturally to many. As my son’s texts books note, it’s a skill that has to be learned and practiced. Thinking about the origins of thinking, it seems obvious to assume that our brains developed to keep us alive by facilitating speedy decision making, perhaps to avoid a predator. There must also have been benefits from our brains being able to form emotional bonds within our tribes. And there’s the nub, just how far have we come from our monkey brains that developed over millions of years to address the challenges of our native habitats? Trusting that our brains inherently ‘know’ how to respond to the challenges of the present day feels like a recipe for disaster. And it doesn’t matter how smart or educated you are. One thing is clear, none can lie to us better than we can ourselves.

You can see from the ‘discussions’ on social media platforms that many of those who are most convinced that they are the true critical thinkers are actually doing the exact opposite. We all know who they are. They confidently air their opinions as fact and hide factually incorrect assertions behind an ‘opinion shield.’ Often the combatants on both side of any argument over-simplify complex issues and are unwilling or unable to entertain nuance and detail. Eventually, they resort to childish name-calling (e.g., “sheep” or “Remoaner”), and in the absence of substantive arguments proclaim that anyone who disagrees with them are ignorant and/or stupid and need to “think for themselves.” Ironically (and often comically), the participants have effectively inoculated themselves against deriving an unbiased and considered opinion…critical thinking. When you’re convinced that you’re using ‘evidence’ and ‘logic’ to demonstrate your truth, you are highly unlikely to entertain the possibility that you’re wrong (and need to adopt a more rational skill set).

Few talents are as empowering as the ability to think well. Critical thinking can help us make better decisions and come up with creative solutions to intransigent problems, it can also prevent us from being fooled or walking into planks (as it were). As Francis Bacon purportedly says in his Meditationes Sacrae (1597), "scientia potentia est" (knowledge is power). In fact, it first appeared in the 1668 version of Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, secretary to Bacon. The related phrase "sapientia est potentia" is often translated as "wisdom is power." But it’s impossible for any one person to know everything… an observation made in Alexander Pope’s "An Essay on Criticism" (1711): “One science only will one genius fit; so vast is art, so narrow human wit.” Effectively, true power comes from the way we think. Real knowledge is more than memorizing a bunch of facts. Knowledge is a process. We live in age of information – through tools like Google we have unlimited access to sources of data beyond anything we have previously. Consequently, we need to equip ourselves with a better way of thinking.

So what is critical thinking and is it the answer? How do you know if you’re a critical thinker? There are countless definitions of what represents critical thinking. In the end, critical thinking can be simply put as the self-directed process of analysing and evaluating information (and its source) prior to deciding what to believe or how to act. Why is this important, well we appear to be entering an age of misinformation, where a single individual can add false information to our collective knowledge, and it can be promoted and promulgated as well as recognised facts. Physically, we are what we eat but our intelligence will be based on what our minds consume and how we assess and allocate value to that information.

Are you a critical thinker?

In contrast to the poet John Keat’s aspirations of Negative Capability, “Beauty is truth and truth beauty – That is all/ ye know on earth, and all ye need to know,” your average critical thinker is aware that their thinking is flawed and prone to errors. They recognize that their perceptions may not be accurate and that their memories are imperfect. And they understand that their brains take shortcuts to help them make fast and easy decisions, potentially leading to bias and error. In their efforts to address this they ask themselves how and why they believe something to be true and actively seek blind spots and potential sources of bias in their understanding. They avoid emotional reasoning and intuition and instead activate what we might term higher-level thinking. Effectively the process is slower and more deliberative engaging our curiosity. The critical thinker is eager to learn, so they ask questions. Importantly, they are open to the answers, even if it’s not what they expected they might hear.

This can be an important lesson for PhD students <<ref Calling post-docs>> who must learn to:

• Separate identity from belief: Recognize that it’s difficult to challenge beliefs that are important to their sense of self critically. We are wired to believe in things that are ‘true’, and not believe in things that are untrue, even if it’s uncomfortable. Essentially, we all prefer to get it right than be right.
• Welcome criticism from others: Painful as it is we have to recognise that arguments are a collaborative process of truth searching, and we must be willing and able to evaluate other points of view fairly.
• Embrace scepticism: We need to keep and open mind but determine whether we have sufficient creditable data before we arrive at any conclusions. The critical thinker knows that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
• Reject black-and-white thinking (accepting ambiguity and uncertainty): The critical thinker recognises that the world is complex and nuanced, and that distilling issues into one of two ‘extremes’ can prevent your from understanding problems and finding solutions.
• Admit limitations: In the words of Clint Eastwood’s character, Harry Callahan, in the film Magnum Force “A man's got to know his limitations.” The first steps on the road to wisdom is the admission of ignorance.

A critical thinker will recognize they might be wrong and be willing to change their mind in the face of new evidence. And they value the insight and option of others, weighting the contribution based on the credibility of the source and the quality of the data. But, as ever PhD student discovers, critical thinking is a journey. It’s not easy, and there is always room for improvement.

The adoption of a critical thinking mindset is not the sole domain of those experiencing further education (thank the Lord). There are different discipline ‘types,’ for example my wife believes I have zero common sense. We can all adapt, though many of us need to re-learn habits developed over a lifetime. The world is full of misinformation and BS opinions. The best way to avoid being misled is to take control of your thinking and your judgements. The principals and skill-set behind practical critical thinking are the same whether you are studying for your GCSE or PhD, simply put it involves data collection and observation, evaluation and analysis, explanation and interpretation, reflection and inference.

If you are considering applying a critical thinking mindset to your next challenge you want to:

• Consider the topic or issue in an objective or critical manner.
• Establish and weight the different arguments.
• Identify weaknesses/negative points.
• Propose a hypothesis/position that describes the data
• Contemplate the implications related to limitations.
• Provide structured reasoning that supports your proposition.

In conclusion, critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skilfully conceptualizing, applying, analysing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. Philosophers, scientists and poets have practiced critical thinking for millennia but now more than ever we need critical thinking to navigate are way through the seas of misinformation, propaganda and strait-out lies that we are exposed to.