Critical Thinking and Campbell’s Soup

Critical Thinking has become somewhat of a trend these days. Institutions feel they should incorporate it in their curriculum. Many people have jumped into the bandwagon to teach it. Since this is a fairly recent incumbent, very few people have systematically studied it. The easiest way to get a sense of critical thinking to get one of the numerous books available on the topic and follow the exercises therein. One may also do one of the free MOOC courses available to get some kind of certification. I have done both and gone beyond. Embarking on a regimen of research, reading and actual teaching for about 20 years,  I have identified two major trends and their connections which I first articulated in a previous post, Interpreting Critical Thinking Pedagogically . I can now safely say that a lot of these popular short term critical thinking courses and textbooks see critical thinking in a very narrow sense --- only in terms of reasoning skills. Educational institutions and universities where critical thinking is a part of the regular curriculum use the much broader definition of critical thinking.  In this post, I will elaborate a little more on those thoughts, especially on looking at critical thinking only as a skill of good reasoning.

A lot of the concepts connecting critical thinking and reasoning have come from philosophy, emerging from a combination of theories of logic and rationalism. The ideas of Aristotle, the father of the Science of Logic, has its genesis in ancient Greece. This was a society governed by the assembly and law courts, where debates and argument took center stage. It is this same tradition that is now the center stage of many critical thinking books and courses. There is also a strong influence on mathematical precision, evolving from thinkers like Descartes, who saw truth and reason as universal, logical and mathematical. Emerging from such traditions, a strong influence of binary thinking can be seen in conceptualizing critical thinking in this manner --- there is only one right way of thinking, one logic and if you do not follow that pattern, you are not thinking correctly. Critical is often taken literally --- understanding the principles of reasoning that will help one to find flaws in other people’s arguments. This can be seen from the kind of exercises that are there in these books and short term courses for students to practice and be assessed on.

The key purpose of Critical thinking, as per this viewpoint, is the application of reason to evaluate claims and make sound arguments. Teaching is through exercises, often using multiple choice questions, where the right answer needs to be ticked. The assumption is that practicing such exercises over and over will hone in those skills. I have included two typical examples of exercises to illustrate my point.

Example 1:

Some world leaders and scientists believe that there is no such thing as global warming. They defend this by pointing out that Antarctic temperatures in the 1990s were the lowest ever and that the Antarctic ice sheet is thickening enough in the middle to create a 0.12 mm drop in sea levels each year. However, this is the worst kind of selectivity. The overall temperature trend is up and the edge of the ice sheet is melting by enough to cause a 0.16 mm rise in sea level each year. The net effect is clearly a rise in sea levels --- one of the most accurate indications of a warming planet.

Question:

Which of the following is the best statement of the main conclusion of the above argument?

A The belief about global warming of some world leaders and scientists is puzzling.

B Some world leaders and scientists should accept that sea levels are rising.

C Some world leaders and scientists are poorly informed about global warming.

D The rise in sea levels is evidence that the planet is getting warmer.

E The belief of some world leaders and scientists is based upon very selective evidence.

Example 2:

Research suggests that contrary to popular belief, the firms that are making most money tend to have the least happy workers. Therefore, firms that deliberately make their workers unhappy can expect a rise in profits,

Question:

Which of the following, if true, identifies the flaw in the argument above?

a.   It assumes workers are unhappy because of their work.

b.   It assume that unhappiness causes a rise in profits

c.    It assumes that workers do not get a share of the high profits

d.   It assumes that successful managers have to be hard on their staff.

Though there are several problems in running an entire course using this kind of exercises, I will only mention four here that seems most relevant to me for this post:

Firstly, if someone is able to use the principles of reasoning and make a flawless and logically strong argument, how valid the claim is does not matter. It is all about how well you have been able to make a convincing argument on it.

Secondly, I have seen entire critical thinking programmes based on the chapters of a single book. The teacher goes through the chapters and get students to answer questions given in the book. The course is basically understanding the concepts in the book and applying them in exercises. As per a lot of well-respected education frameworks, including Blooms Taxonomy, this does not even fall into the higher order thinking skills of analysis, evaluation and creation of new ideas, which together bring about critical thinking.

 Thirdly, though all the choices do fit, there is supposed to be one right answer. In a lot of ways, this makes thinking very tunnelled. The real world and actual human behaviour on which these skills will be applied on is a multi-facetted one, with myriad perspectives interacting, interconnecting and meshing with each other.  Hence, a one correct way of thinking view is problematic.

Fourthly, there is no common topic or theme holding these exercises together. The assumption is that the context does not matter. As long as students are able to understand the key concepts, in these two cases, the connection between arguments and reasons, they will be able to apply it everywhere.

Over the last few years there has been a lot of research on the importance of context for teaching and learning. Context is needed for comprehension, to be able to analyse at depth, to be able to evaluate ideas and to generate new ideas. Without content and domain material to latch skills on, learning stays superficial. This is why critical thinking needs to go much beyond mere reasoning of diverse un-connected practice material.

A speaker at a conference many years ago compared her lecture to a can of Campbell’s soup --- a very tightly condensed version of her research and the book that came out of it. I find that analogy very useful in explaining the distinction between teaching critical thinking as a one standalone reasoning oriented course and one that is embedded within the contexts of a subject. The soup that is inside a Campbell condensed soup can is compressed into a solid mass. The mass slides out of the can into a pan, a can of water is mixed into it, the mixture is heated, and soup is ready. If that is the only way a person has made soup, she/he knows how to reconstitute a can of soup, but not how to make a soup. If the context changes, that is, he/she is given an empty pot, some vegetables, flour, milk, and herbs, chances are she will not know how to proceed. The danger is that if this is the only kind of soup the person has had, she may not even realize what the real thing is.

Reasoning based critical thinking courses are popular because they can be condensed into short term courses. They are also easy to assess and grade. Unfortunately, when a skill is taught out of context, the skill is short lived. When taught as a part of a theme or specific content, the context kicks in, bringing in better comprehension, better retention and a wider perspective.

For most educators, critical thinking is much more broad based and contextual, starting with the basic understanding that knowledge is not absolute. As I have articulated in the previous post, Stages of Knowing - Journey from Non Critical to a Critical Thinker, reasoning is only one part of critical thinking. Teaching critical thinking is a much more complex process.