Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking
David Manley
It’s time the standard critical thinking curriculum was rethought. Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking does exactly this by combining the most recent findings about reasoning from philosophy, cognitive science, social psychology and behavioral economics in a way that’s practical yet rigorous. The text emphasizes developing a mindset that avoids systematic errors, while also presenting a unified picture of evidence that covers statistical, causal, and best-explanation inferences. Students will come away with a sense of how to assess the strength of evidence for claims, adjust their beliefs accordingly, and recognize the errors they're most prone to making. Reason Better is rich with instructor resources to support delivering a course that will have lasting effects on students’ lives.
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Table of Contents for Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking
- Preliminaries
- Chapter 1: Reasoning
- Chapter 2: Mindset
- Chapter 3: Clarity
- Chapter 4: Entailment
- Chapter 5: Evidence
- Chapter 6: Generalizations
- Chapter 7: Causes
- Chapter 8: Updating
- Chapter 9: Decisions
- Chapter 10: Co-thinking
- Instructor's Resources
- Advanced Chapter Materials
Key features
- A new and innovative approach to critical thinking that has greater applicability to students’ lives
- Integrated auto-assessed questions gauge comprehension throughout chapters along with separate supplementary chapter quizzes
- Robust instructor manual includes in-class exercises with insightful tips for conveying chapter material and five problem sets combining material across chapters help connect concepts for students
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A new kind of critical thinking textbook
Hi! I'm David Manley and I teach philosophy at the University of Michigan, and got frustrated with the texts available for Critical Thinking courses. So I wrote my own! The text, Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking , is about acquiring a mindset of inquiry, recognizing our cognitive biases, and adjusting our beliefs to match the strength of the evidence. You can check it out here . (Link won't work on a mobile phone. Use the “Enter as Guest” button on the right: no need for an account to check it out.)
I tried to include only the most useful skills from the toolkits of philosophy, cognitive psychology, and behavioral economics. The result is a text that:
emphasizes acquiring a mindset that avoids systematic error, rather than persuading others.
focuses on the logic of probability and decisions more than on the logic of deduction.
offers a unified picture of how evidence works in statistical, causal, and best-explanation inferences—rather than treating them as unrelated.
The unified account of evidence I offer is a broadly Bayesian one, but there aren’t any daunting theorems. (Without knowing it, students are taught to use a gentle form of the Bayes factor to measure the strength of evidence and to update.) It’s also shown how this framework illuminates aspects of the scientific method, such as the proper design of experiments.
I’m happy to report that there’s no need to accept the false choice between a narrow Intro to Logic course and a remedial Critical Thinking course. The course at Michigan that uses this text– at the moment taught by the amazing Anna Edmonds–is rigorous but immensely practical. Students come away with a sense of how to weigh the strength of evidence for claims, and adjust their beliefs accordingly.
I’ve been hesitant to turn to a traditional publisher, because I like the TopHat platform so much:
There are embedded questions in each section that are auto-graded and ensure the students are doing the readings.
It offers a really nice UI for students with search and note-taking capabilities, and they can read the text and answer questions on any device.
It’s pretty cheap: TopHat charges students $45 for the textbook (lifetime access) plus homework/grading platform for the semester.
Most importantly, it's very flexible: any prof who assigns the text can modify it it. Want the students to skip a section? Just cut it out. Don’t like the wording of a question? Just change it. It’s hard to overestimate how useful this is in a text.
The text is ready for use right now, but I’ll be continuing to improve it, so I’d be very happy to get any feedback. There is an anonymous feedback form in the text itself that anyone can use. For the next month or so I’ll be working on an additional chapter called “Sources”, about social epistemology in a world of information overload: navigating science reporting, expertise, consensus, conformity, polarization, and conditions for skilled intuition.
Here's the Table of Contents:
1 | Reasoning
What it takes
Specific vs. general skills
The right mindset
Our complex minds
Two systems
Direct control
Transparency
Clarifications
Systems in conflict
Guiding the mind
Distracted minds
Stubborn minds
Motivated minds
A closing caveat
2 | Mindset
Defense or discovery?
Accurate beliefs
Search for possibilities
Search for evidence
The bias blindspot
Considering the opposite
Openness to revision
3 | Clarity
Clear inferences
The two elements
Suppositional strength
Implicit premises
Deductive vs. inductive
The tradeoff
The ground floor
Clear interpretation
Standard form
Interpretive charity
Reconstruction
Clear language
Vagueness neglect
4 | Entailment
Deductive validity
Step by step
Flipping the argument
Logical form
Argument recipes
Some valid sentential forms
Some valid predicate forms
The limits of logical form
Overlooking validity
Biased evaluation
Some invalid forms
5 | Evidence
What is evidence?
The evidence test
The strength test
Evidence & probability
Selection effects
Survival & attrition
Selective recall
Selective noticing
Media biases
News and fear
Echo chambers
Research media
6 | Generalizations
Samples as evidence
Sample size
The law of large numbers
Better samples
Sampling methods
Survey pitfalls
The big picture
Measures of centrality
The shape of the data
Misleading presentations
Thinking proportionally
Loose generalizations
Representativeness heuristic
Causal thinking
An instinct for causal stories
One thing after another
Complex causes
Causes and correlations
The nature of correlation
Illusory correlations
Generalizing correlations
Misleading correlations
Reverse causation
Common cause
Side effects
Regression to the mean
Mere chance
Evidence & experiments
8 | Updating
How to update
The updating rule
The die is cast
More visuals
The detective
Probability Pitfalls
One-sided strength testing
Base rate neglect
Selective updating
Heads I win; tails we're even
9 | Theories
Compound claims
Conjunctions
Disjunctions
Criteria of theory choice
A case study
The best explanation
Sometimes the best explanation is probably false
IBE and statistical generalization
The scientific method
The order of observation
Ad hoc hijinks
10 | Decisions
The logic of decisions
Possible outcomes
Expected monetary value
Mo money, less marginal utility
The value of everything else
Expected utility
Decision Pitfalls
Outcome framing
New vs. old risks
The endowment effect
The possibility and certainty effects
Honoring sunk costs
Time-inconsistent utilities
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Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking
https://app.tophat.com/e/455176/assigned/ You can access the link without registration choosing Enter as Guest option.
This course or book was created by David Manley. In essence it is a critical thinking online textbook, but with integrated exercises. Other educators, who use the same platform, can change the text according to their purposes. But even if you don’t work to register you can just read it as a regular book.
The book covers a number of topics: how the human mind works, different mindsets and point of view on reasoning, how to achieve clarity with good arguments, how to understand different forms of argument, what to do with evidence and how to apply a probabilistic approach to hypotheses, how to use generalization and what kind of errors may appear during this process, how to understand causation and relate it to evidence, how new information should change our beliefs, how to formulate theories and hypotheses correctly, how to make decisions.
The book also has a list of learning objectives at the beginning of each chapter. It helps to understand what can you learn and decide how to proceed with a chapter.
In a description of his course 1 the author said he wanted to teach only the most useful skill from different fields to create efficient critical thinkers. He also aim to teach useful dispositions, although he called them a mindset. He mostly focuses on inductive logic, which is related to probabilities, than on deductive arguments. He probably did a good job on creating a unified picture of how evidence work in different contexts.
The author proposes the texts mostly as book for teachers who teach critical thinking courses. But I believe it also can be used for self-education. I can recommend this book if you have tried several other books on critical thinking and you are looking for something different. You can also try this book if you want to learn critical thinking from scratch. The book doesn’t require much prior knowledge, and most of the required knowledge can be found online.
1. ^ : http://dailynous.com/2019/05/01/new-kind-critical-thinking-text-guest-post-david-manley/
Published on 2019-07-31
Tags: critical thinking , course review , books review
Short permalink: https://umneem.org/b51/
COMMENTS
Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking does exactly this by combining the most recent findings about reasoning from philosophy, cognitive science, social psychology and behavioral economics in a way that's practical yet rigorous. The text emphasizes developing a mindset that avoids systematic errors, while also ...
Reason Better an Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking (David Manley) (Z-Library) - Free ebook download as PDF File (.pdf), Text File (.txt) or read book online for free. Scribd is the world's largest social reading and publishing site. ...
Abstract. This book is the result of rethinking the standard playbook for critical thinking courses, to include only the most useful skills from the toolkits of philosophy, cognitive psychology, and behavioral economics. The text focuses on: - a mindset that avoids systematic error, more than the ability to persuade others - the logic of ...
David Manley. 3.67. 12 ratings3 reviews. Reason Better is the result of rethinking the standard playbook for critical thinking courses. It's about acquiring a mindset of inquiry, recognizing our cognitive biases, and adjusting our beliefs to match the strength of the evidence. What would it look like if we taught only the most useful skills ...
TEXTBOOK Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking ... (to four critical studies of The Reference Book) Mind and Language, 2014, 29(4): 499-510s; ... Remarks on Boris Kment's Modality and Explanatory Reasoning-Princeton University, Feb. 2015
The text, Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking , is about acquiring a mindset of inquiry, recognizing our cognitive biases, and adjusting our beliefs to match the strength of the evidence. You can check it out here.
Find 9781774946152 Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking (TH Bundle) by Top Hat Monocle Corp at over 30 bookstores. Buy, rent or sell. Buy; Rent; ... An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking (TH Bundle) Author(s) Top Hat Monocle Corp. Format Book . ISBN 978-1-77494-615-2. Reviews. Amazon; GoodReads; Find in ...
Course goals: The hallmark of philosophical inquiry is a commitment to clarity and critical appraisal of the beliefs and values that guide our actions, that shape who we are, how we understand ourselves, our interactions with others, and the world we live in. The goals of this course include both content and skills: Critical thinking and ...
Philosophy document from Simon Fraser University, Fraser International College, 30 pages, Exported for Gourav Sharma on Sat, 15 Jan 2022 05:30:31 GMT Reason Better An interdisciplinary guide to critical thinking Chapter 1. Reasoning Introduction Thinking is easy when we're just letting our minds wander. But reasoning, especially reasoning well
ritical societies emerge. Critical societies will develop only to the extent that:• C. itical thinking is viewed as essential to living a reasonable and fa. rminded life.• Critical thinking is routinely taught. nd consistently fostered.• The problematics of thinking are an abiding concern.• Closed-mi.
define critical thinking as the activity of careful assessment and self-assessment in the process. of forming judgments. This means that when we think critically, we become the vigilant guard ...
My new text, Reason Better , is the result of rethinking the standard playbook for critical thinking courses. It's about acquiring a mindset of inquiry, recognizing our cognitive biases, and adjusting our beliefs to match the strength of the evidence. You can check it out here. (Use the "Enter as Guest" button on the right, and once you ...
It's time the standard critical thinking curriculum was rethought. Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking does exactly this by combining the most recent findings about reasoning from philosophy, cognitive science, social psychology and behavioral economics in a way that's practical yet rigorous.
quality of our thought. Shoddy thinking is costly, both in money. and in quality of life. Excellence in thought, however, must be sy. ltivated.A Definition:Critical thinking is the art of analyzing and evaluating thinking with. tical consequences; and• communicates efectively with others in figuring out soluti.
Get your Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking here today at the official University of Nebraska-Lincoln Bookstore. Look around for more while you're here. You'll find the best assortment, anywhere.
kerIntellectual IntegrityAct towards others the way you want. people to act towards you. Respect others in the same wa. you want to be respected. Don't expect others to act better than you a. e willing to act yourself. Consider the feelings of others in the same way you want your own.
A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO CRITICAL THINKING Deciding What to Do and Believe DAVID A. HUNTER Ryerson University Department of Philosophy Toronto, Ontario, Canada ... 7.1.4 Identifying a Discipline's Modes of Reasoning, 225 7.2 Critical Thinking Questions, 227 7.3 Thinking Critically in Your Own Decision Making, 228 7.3.1 Clarify Your Views, 229
In essence it is a critical thinking online textbook, but with integrated exercises. Other educators, who use the same platform, can change the text according to their purposes. But even if you don't work to register you can just read it as a regular book. The book covers a number of topics: how the human mind works, different mindsets and ...
Reason Better: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Critical Thinking by David Manley. 2. Mindset. Contains 10 items Worth 10 points Adjust Points. Private. Students have no access Assign Present Copy URL Rate This Content Edit Delete. Exported for David Manley on Sat, 14 Mar 2020 19:03:53 GMT. Reason Better ##### An interdisciplinary guide to ...
Dear Reader: This miniature guide introduces the art of asking essential questions. It is best used in conjunction with The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking and The Miniature Guide to How to Study and Learn. The quality of our lives is determined by the quality of our thinking.The quali-ty of our thinking, in turn, is determined by the ...
The book includes several other kinds of boxes as well. Some iden-tify important mistakes that a good critical thinker ought to avoid. Some provide summaries of the discussion in the body of the text. Some offer examples of critical thinking across the curriculum. Some offer practical tips and rules of thumb.
July 13, 2022 ·. The new edition of Reason Better is finally available! It has lots of updates including a brand new chapter, structure that makes using probability notation optional, and lots of new instructor materials. Check out four sample chapters at the first link below.
individuals working in exemplary interdisciplinary research centers and teaching programs in academic and professional settings. Perspectives: Disciplinary and Other Before going any further in considering work that integrates multiple approaches to thinking and problem-solving, we would like to place the notion of "disciplinary