Philosophy
There is an epidemic of growing proportions afflicting ever-increasing numbers of unsuspecting victims: poor, alarmist, fluffy and discombobulated thinking. We are drowning in a sea of logical fallacies, strangling each other with accusations of guilt by association, beating each other with ad hominem accusations, deluding ourselves into thinking that we can make our points through non-sequitur tangents, and living under the false assumption that post hoc ergo propter hoc is a universal and infallible causal principle.
Not only is our reasoning faulty, we also seem to suffer from a bad case of selective belief, falling prey to innumerable instances of cognitive and statistical biases. You'd think I'm making this stuff up, but the more extraordinary and sensationalistic claims people make, the less evidence we seem to demand from them... this is worse than the Twilight Zone.
In the following impassioned presentation, Michael Specter (author of Denialism), makes the important case that poor thinking and a willful reluctance to accept scientific consensus translates itself into devastating practical consequences, usually affecting the most vulnerable instead of the idiots who promote these ridiculous forms of propaganda.
And of course, a lack of critical thinking skills is not subject to any particular political ideology, as the following cartoon quickly demonstrates:
- The Market Is Up On News That I Wrote This Post
Everyday we hear an interesting causal claim "The market is up(down) on news that..." How do the financial reporters make this statement? Seem like there are three possibilities: (1) They interview traders and ask them what influenced their thinking on...
- Logical Fallacies Classification - Formal And Informal Fallacies
Logical fallacies are classified in many different ways since there is still no agreement between thinkers for that matter. What are logical fallacies? The best definition of a fallacy in logic is an argument with poor reasoning (critical thinking rules...
- Thou Shalt Not Commit Logical Fallacies!
With unprecedented access to the vast accumulation of knowledge of the world at our fingertips, it is disappointing to see that even though we are living in the midst of the information age, this is not an age of wisdom. We seem to be surrounded by pseudo-scientific...
- Michael Shermer - The Baloney Detection Kit
In this blog we have featured previously a basic intro to logic and argumentation, a primer on the importance of critical thinking, a fun intro to informal logical fallacies, and many more relevant entries. And yet the main point cannot be emphasized...
- Bill O'reilly's Logical Blunders
It's difficult to overstate the importance of the skills associated with critical thinking. Obviously, you want to have the ability and the know-how to recognize and evaluate the quality of arguments and the evidence provided to support them fairly,...
Philosophy
Michael Specter - The Danger of Science Denial
There is an epidemic of growing proportions afflicting ever-increasing numbers of unsuspecting victims: poor, alarmist, fluffy and discombobulated thinking. We are drowning in a sea of logical fallacies, strangling each other with accusations of guilt by association, beating each other with ad hominem accusations, deluding ourselves into thinking that we can make our points through non-sequitur tangents, and living under the false assumption that post hoc ergo propter hoc is a universal and infallible causal principle.Not only is our reasoning faulty, we also seem to suffer from a bad case of selective belief, falling prey to innumerable instances of cognitive and statistical biases. You'd think I'm making this stuff up, but the more extraordinary and sensationalistic claims people make, the less evidence we seem to demand from them... this is worse than the Twilight Zone.
In the following impassioned presentation, Michael Specter (author of Denialism), makes the important case that poor thinking and a willful reluctance to accept scientific consensus translates itself into devastating practical consequences, usually affecting the most vulnerable instead of the idiots who promote these ridiculous forms of propaganda.
And of course, a lack of critical thinking skills is not subject to any particular political ideology, as the following cartoon quickly demonstrates:
Check out some fascinating details about the placebo effect.
Learn some of the science behind genetically modified food.
Or watch what would happen if doctors only practiced alternative medicine :)
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- The Market Is Up On News That I Wrote This Post
Everyday we hear an interesting causal claim "The market is up(down) on news that..." How do the financial reporters make this statement? Seem like there are three possibilities: (1) They interview traders and ask them what influenced their thinking on...
- Logical Fallacies Classification - Formal And Informal Fallacies
Logical fallacies are classified in many different ways since there is still no agreement between thinkers for that matter. What are logical fallacies? The best definition of a fallacy in logic is an argument with poor reasoning (critical thinking rules...
- Thou Shalt Not Commit Logical Fallacies!
With unprecedented access to the vast accumulation of knowledge of the world at our fingertips, it is disappointing to see that even though we are living in the midst of the information age, this is not an age of wisdom. We seem to be surrounded by pseudo-scientific...
- Michael Shermer - The Baloney Detection Kit
In this blog we have featured previously a basic intro to logic and argumentation, a primer on the importance of critical thinking, a fun intro to informal logical fallacies, and many more relevant entries. And yet the main point cannot be emphasized...
- Bill O'reilly's Logical Blunders
It's difficult to overstate the importance of the skills associated with critical thinking. Obviously, you want to have the ability and the know-how to recognize and evaluate the quality of arguments and the evidence provided to support them fairly,...