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I don’t disagree with the premise that this is a worthy goal to strive for, but I do find it odd to tie it to the need to combat “outlandish conspiracy thinking

by spking 2y ago

I don’t disagree with the premise that this is a worthy goal to strive for, but I do find it odd to tie it to the need to combat “outlandish conspiracy thinking” and linking to a three year old NPR article about Trump.

argiopetech 2y ago
"The personal is political", apparently.
peterhadlaw 2y ago
I already knew it was going to be something like this just from the title. Kids should be taught to think for themselves, not just logically. We are growing a generation of people who offload their critical thinking to authority or actors/actresses or pop culture.
- bilbo0s 2y ago
  To be fair, every generations is "a generation of people who offload their critical thinking to authority or actors/actresses or pop culture." This didn't start with the generation currently under 18 years of age. I mean not to put too fine a point on it, but the outlandish conspiracy theories everyone is concerned about came from Boomers, Millennials, X'ers and older GenZ'ers. Frankly, the evidence points to all of us having questionable critical thinking skills. My suspicion is that not only those under 18, but those over 18 as well could use a bit of a refresher on symbolic logic. Also a refresher on assessing the verifiability and relative value of facts.
- graemep 2y ago
  I agree. Learning symbolic logic might help (in that it might make if easier to recognise fallacies), but it is a small part of what is needed. If you just teach it, it will just be another bit of theoretical knowledge from school people never apply. At the risk of sounding a bit conspiracy theorist myself I would say "authority" is quite comfortable with people not thinking themselves. People aim to be in authority because they think they know what is best for everyone - no thinking required of the hoi polloi. Edit: I think it would be rather like maths. A lot of people (not around here, but say, business people on LinkedIn) say "I never use the maths I was taught in school so its pointless teaching it" because they do not know how to apply it.
parpfish 2y ago
agreed. logical thinking is good, but i don't think logic is necessarily the problem for a lot of conspiratorial thinking. i'd argue that the more common problem is a deficiency in assessing reasonableness or plausibility of facts and claims. if you feed garbage data into your logic-machine, you'll get garbage results.

by spking 2y ago

argiopetech 2y ago

"The personal is political", apparently.

peterhadlaw 2y ago

I already knew it was going to be something like this just from the title. Kids should be taught to think for themselves, not just logically. We are growing a generation of people who offload their critical thinking to authority or actors/actresses or pop culture.

bilbo0s 2y ago
To be fair, every generations is "a generation of people who offload their critical thinking to authority or actors/actresses or pop culture." This didn't start with the generation currently under 18 years of age. I mean not to put too fine a point on it, but the outlandish conspiracy theories everyone is concerned about came from Boomers, Millennials, X'ers and older GenZ'ers. Frankly, the evidence points to all of us having questionable critical thinking skills. My suspicion is that not only those under 18, but those over 18 as well could use a bit of a refresher on symbolic logic. Also a refresher on assessing the verifiability and relative value of facts.
graemep 2y ago
I agree. Learning symbolic logic might help (in that it might make if easier to recognise fallacies), but it is a small part of what is needed. If you just teach it, it will just be another bit of theoretical knowledge from school people never apply. At the risk of sounding a bit conspiracy theorist myself I would say "authority" is quite comfortable with people not thinking themselves. People aim to be in authority because they think they know what is best for everyone - no thinking required of the hoi polloi. Edit: I think it would be rather like maths. A lot of people (not around here, but say, business people on LinkedIn) say "I never use the maths I was taught in school so its pointless teaching it" because they do not know how to apply it.

parpfish 2y ago

agreed. logical thinking is good, but i don't think logic is necessarily the problem for a lot of conspiratorial thinking. i'd argue that the more common problem is a deficiency in assessing reasonableness or plausibility of facts and claims. if you feed garbage data into your logic-machine, you'll get garbage results.