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Deciphering the Evolution of Critical Thinking with an Emphasis on Three Intellectuals

c Critical thinking may be define as,³a habit of cautious evaluation, an analytic mindset

aimed at discovering the component parts of ideas and philosophies,´ it is often eager to weigh

the merits of arguments and reasons in order to become a good judge of them. However analysis

allows for the tools of introspective insight that allow for the careful meditation and weighing of

claims that permits a transition into the realm of carful habitual thought. ³The work of an

intellectual is not to mold the political will of others«´ (Michel Foucault)Critical thinking is not

a cynical, negative force designed to improve your fault finding; it should be a constructive force

and attitude, for examining all ideas and arguments, including your own dearly held ones, and for

separating the ideas from their vehicles, to divide true from false, accurate from distorted,

complete from incomplete. ³they can resist appeals to their dearest prejudices .´ (William

Sumner)

Critical thinking begins in taking a skeptical stance toward the "received wisdom".

Language is but a mere vessel of critical thinking; language constructs the world based on "the

play of signifiers", each word for instance garnering its share of meaning based upon its position

in relation to other words a tool that critical thinkers often use to discretely convey an idea via

the skeptical tradition. ³The Fascism that causes us to love power, to desire the very thing that

dominates us.´ Often presented in the form of fascism, many important world figures have taken

advantage of this tool to garner the masses into a common cause. Always effective and reliable,

the legendary speeches of characters such a Hitler and Mussolini knew the effects of careful

presentation of ideas to the public, but this is neither the careful application nor the intention that

critical thinking demands. Government is a good pivot upon which to contemplate the collective

decisions that people in power presume to encourage in order to perhaps garner attention to
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impulse a false agenda. Critical thinking calls for meditated actions that have the best outcome or

resolution in mind. As opposed to ensuing a, ³deliberate program of discrimination, repression,

and collective cruelty,´ which powers may only be used wrongly.

An attribute of critical thinking deals with the circumspection or awareness, a wideness

of view, the ability to look around and encompass the universe of thought rather than remain

fixed within the narrow confines of one's own perspective.Awareness also requires knowledge.

This includes knowledge about what is going on in the information-driven society we inhabit,

knowledge about the various forms of verbal and visual manipulations, and knowledge about the

possibilities of, say, presentation. That is, one fact can be presented quite truthfully in several

different ways, each way creating a different impression or meaning, but a man/woman that is

educated in the art of careful thought will certainly not easily fall into the caveats of this

signifiers. ³Men« Can wait for evidence and weigh evidence.´ (William Sumner)

The ability to form independent judgments based on good evidence is of summate

importance to the ideas of ³critical thinking´. Well trained individuals in the art of critical

thinking have to slog through an extensive swamp of distortion, manipulation, ploys, half truths

and fallacies before arriving to the mountain of enlightenment. ³Education in the critical faculty

« makes good citizens.´ Evidence must be collected, weeded, and put together into something

meaningful. This is the process of synthesis. It might be said that to synthesize is to find

meaning. As opposed to the philosophical wanderings of years past, the present yields an era of

information overload; the industrial revolution has given way to the information revolution.

In a word, then, critical thinking means not taking the world at face value. It means

learning to analyze and examine ideas, learning how the manipulators work, learning to be

cautious and sympathetic and open to a range of possibilities. Critical thinking is also
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substantially disturbing and uncomfortable, because it means that you must be willing to

examine your own ideas and beliefs to see what rational base, if any, they have. ³It is our only

guarantee against delusion « and misapprehension of ourselves.´ (William Sumner) If you have

strong views on some popular raging topic like capital punishment or nuclear energy or even

theology, you'll have to take the emotional risk of examining the grounds for those beliefs and of

considering views opposed to yours. In this process, the truth will emerge much stronger than

ever, for it will gain a serious, thoughtful, intellectual base that will withstand attack or ridicule,

and the false will be cleaned out of your intellectual baggage.

A part of developing an independent judgment is the ability to avoid generalization. From

birth on, we are constantly attempting to make sense of our world by generalizing from our

experience. Unfortunately, our experience is usually limited and we often overgeneralize. What

we need to do, then, is to unmake some of the generalizations we've nailed down before really

investigating things and allow all of our generalizations to be open to modification or even

overturning. Further, we need to be cautious about forming new generalizations. We want to

form generalizations quickly for psychological reasons because doubt and uncertainty are

uncomfortable causing an effect of cognitive dissonance. However, we must learn to be

comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity if we are to be good and fair thinkers.

Critical analysis of self and society of course involves challenging one's current

view of oneself and one's current view of one's society; In order to do this, one must take up a

stance that falls outside of one's habituated perspective. These critical thinking abilities must

often be accompanied by the important ability of articulation, the ability to tell others exactly

what in an argument is good or bad. ³No one can speak up all the time « but I believe there is a

special duty to address the constituted and authorize power of society.´ Sometimes it's easier to
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perceive an unfair statement than it is to say what exactly is unfair about it. An important part of

articulation is the ability to argue on different sides of an issue as it will pose an overview of the

issue at hand.

Whenever we begin to reason about a problem, our ultimate goal is to reach a solution

which is both correct in itself u
derivative from the arguments or reasons we have concluded

that is, the solution must be both true and valid. Often we can detect unacceptable reasoning

either because we recognize the arguments as false, or because, while the arguments may be true,

we realize they are being improperly applied to the situation.

Education of the self would be useless if that who is educated cannot further learn by

careful analysis and introspective.Critical thinking at times seems like a watered down concept,

sometimes expanded, and others restricted to their corresponding cultures, disciplines or

population groups from which they are derived. William Graham Sumner refers to critical

thinking as the critical habit of thought; in society it will pervade its entire mores for it is the way

to confront the quotidian troubles of life. ³« men and women should be trained in it.´ (Sumner )

Therefore, the role of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically;

complete education gives one not only power of concentration but worthy objective upon which

to concentrate. For him the process of refection whether to belief or not can be decomposed into

a set of dispositions; the act of careful thinking and an area of strategic and tactical ability to use

critical thinking. His views may pose similar ideas as those of the more contemporary authors,

but they serve to provide an important contrast as to the recent focus of critical thinking.

More recently critical thinking has revolutionized as a result of changing social

tendencies, there applications are more closely mirrored by Said and Focault. Frequently they

query the choices of a deaf government and evidence the dissatisfaction with the poor choices
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that may be the outcome of unequivocal social powers. The fundaments of critical thinking will

always remain the same allowing for the individual to take careful though and expose the

findings of such, but the continually advancing ideals of modern times will not cease to

encounter new application to the critical thinking pillars of modern time.