compare and contrast moral philosophy critical thinking and logic

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47 Moral Thinking

Liane Young, Department of Psychology, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA

• Published: 03 June 2013
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This chapter presents several current models of moral thinking, with a focus on the cognitive processes that support people’s moral judgments and justifications. These models are not mutually exclusive; rather, based on recent evidence from psychology and neuroscience, they posit different cognitive processes as the primary source of moral thinking. This chapter therefore does not quantify the evidence for one model versus another but instead reviews evidence for each model separately. These models, discussed in turn, emphasize the role of conscious principled reasoning, emotional processing, theory of mind, and a domain-specific “moral faculty” that integrates information from other cognitive systems to compute specifically moral judgments.

The topic of morality has been of interest to philosophers and indeed ordinary people long before cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists took up their tools to investigate the moral mind and brain. Moral thinking as a topic for empirical science is both rewarding and challenging precisely because people—scientists or not—think about moral thinking. What sorts of behaviors are morally right or wrong? How do we make these judgments? Are there right or wrong ways to go about this? Many people find these questions easy to answer simply by introspecting on their own experience, rather than relying on experiments, either scientific experiments, or, in the case of philosophy, thought experiments. In contrast to vision, language, or motor control, morality appears accessible to everyone—not only do we engage in moral thinking, but we also have a few thoughts on how we do so. For some people, moral thinking feels a lot like thinking: It involves thoughtfully considering pros and cons and rationally reflecting on moral principles. For others, moral thinking reduces to moral feeling: Some things feel right, other things feel wrong, and our emotions help us track important moral distinctions. Some people recognize culture and education as the primary sources of moral thinking; others appeal to an innate sense of right and wrong, an unconscious moral code. Scientists are people too, and so, not surprisingly, the last decade has seen a frenzy of empirical activity as we begin to put many of these intuitions to the test.

In this chapter, I will present several current models of moral thinking, with a particular focus on how we think about and make moral judgments and justify them, rather than how we actually behave because of or in spite of these judgments. I will discuss evidence from cognitive psychology and neuroscience for each of these models, named here for their primary focus: (1) Reason, (2) Emotion, (3) Theory of Mind (i.e., the processing of mental states such as beliefs and intentions), and (4) Moral Faculty. Importantly, these models are not mutually incompatible. For instance, not all Emotion models will deny roles for Reason or Theory of Mind; Emotion models simply emphasize Emotion as the dominant process in moral judgment. Or, in the case of Theory of Mind, both domain-specific (e.g., specific to Theory of Mind) and domain-general processes (e.g., Reason) may contribute to the influence of mental state factors on moral judgment; however, here, we will focus on evidence for the domain-specific contributions. In the following four sections, I will therefore present evidence for the roles of reason, emotion, theory of mind, and a moral faculty in moral thinking.

Reason: Moral Thinking Is “Thinking”

On a reason model, moral thinking is dominated by “thinking”—of the conscious, controlled sort. In other words, most of the time, for most of moral thinking, people consult explicit moral principles or theories, engage in conscious reasoning, and in general behave as rational agents. People therefore make moral decisions that they would endorse upon reflection, given the important role of reflection in the first place. Developmental psychologists such as Piaget and Kohlberg supported such reason-based models of moral judgment and, as a consequence, identified participants’ ability to articulate justifications for their moral judgments as the primary indication of moral maturity (Kohlberg, 1981 ; Piaget, 1932/1965) . The ability to engage in conscious, principled moral reasoning was supposed to track with stages of moral development, since moral judgment was supposed to reflect directly the reasoning that led to it, and not any funny business operating under our conscious radar.

Contemporary moral psychology arose largely in resistance to rationalist or reason-based models of moral judgment (Cushman, Young, & Hauser, 2006 ; Greene, Sommerville, Nystrom, Darley, & Cohen, 2001 ; Haidt, Koller, & Dias, 1993 ). As a result, much of the evidence that follows for moral thinking as “thinking” is indirect and, in fact, falls out of results primarily seen as supporting a different conclusion, that is, moral thinking is moral feeling. That most of the evidence for moral “thinking” is indirect is also notable. At first, it might appear easy to generate evidence for moral “thinking”—after all, if moral thinking is conscious and controlled, then participants should be able to detect and report engaging in moral thinking. However, the question at hand is not whether people ever consult explicit moral principles or theories, but rather whether conscious moral reasoning is the causal source of moral judgment. This question turns out to be more difficult to address—people may report having made particular moral judgments for particular moral reasons; however, based on this report alone, the experimenter cannot know whether participants generated those reasons post hoc, after the fact, to rationalize or justify their judgments, or whether those reasons did causally determine those judgments. Most of contemporary moral psychology has emphasized the surprising absence of “thinking” in moral thinking, as we will see in the next section. This section, however, serves to show that thinking may play a greater role in moral judgment than has been recently thought—and in surprising contexts—contexts used to show that feeling, not thinking, dominates moral psychology.

The reason model makes two basic predictions. The first is that moral judgments, moral justifications, and, critically, their correspondence are subject to the influence of demographic variables such as education and culture, which partly determine access to, as well as reliance on, reason. In the first of an important line of studies, Jonathan Haidt and his colleagues investigated moral judgment and justification in participants of low and high socioeconomic status (SES) from Brazil and Philadelphia (Haidt et al., 1993 ). Participants were asked to judge not only harmful actions but also harmless actions that nevertheless violated norms of moral purity, such as consensual incest, eating the family dog upon its demise, and other disgusting but victimless transgressions. Contrary to the reason model, the upshot of this and related work is that many participants are unwilling to endorse taboo violations that elicit strong emotional responses even when they are unable to articulate reasons for their judgments—for instance, why incest is morally wrong even in the absence of any physical or psychological harm (Haidt, 2001 ).

This particular study, however, allows for a closer look, as its title suggests, at affect, culture, and morality (Haidt et al., 1993 ). Indeed, high SES participants from Philadelphia (described in the study as college students at elite universities), as compared to low SES participants from Brazil, were more likely to endorse harmless actions they found disgusting. By contrast, low SES participants from Brazil continued to judge these taboo violations as morally forbidden even when they were unable to justify their judgments, thereby revealing poor correspondence between their judgments and justifications. These demographic differences in judgments and justifications were also observed to be more pronounced in adults than children. Over time, then, differences in education and culture may lead to differences in the reliance on conscious principled reasoning for moral judgment and perhaps the resistance to moral judgments that appear not to be based on reason. This study therefore suggests that reasoning abilities, as modulated by culture and education, impact moral judgment even in the presence of strong emotions such as disgust.

A related body of research reveals a dissociation between implicit and explicit attitudes toward race and sexual orientation (Banaji, 2001 ; Inbar, Pizarro, Knobe, & Bloom, 2009 ). Very liberal college students from Berkeley, for example, appear capable of overriding their negative emotionally mediated implicit attitudes toward gay and interracial sex in order to explicitly endorse gay and interracial sex across a number of behavioral measures (Inbar, Pizarro, Knobe, et al., 2009 ). Of course, implicit attitudes may constitute moral judgment in some sense, too. However, to the extent that people’s explicit moral attitudes, determined in part by culture and education, drive moral judgment and behavior, these findings are consistent with the rational correction of implicit emotionally mediated attitudes.

The second prediction is related to the first: People make moral judgments based on factors that they endorse as morally relevant (e.g., the distinction between harming via action versus omission), and, correspondingly, people are willing to reject moral judgments made on the basis of factors they regard as morally irrelevant (e.g., the distinction between harming via personal contact versus no contact). Research from Fiery Cushman and his colleagues has provided evidence of conscious reasoning from moral principles to moral judgments (Cushman et al., 2006 ). One such principle, it is morally worse to harm by action than omission , was articulated by participants when required to justify their judgments of particular scenarios, in particular, their response that killing a person in one scenario was worse than letting a person die in another scenario. Because participants were able to articulate this general principle, it is at least possible that they consciously reasoned from this principle to their moral judgments; however, the alternative is that they reconstructed this principle post hoc when required to justify their prior judgments. Importantly, against this alternative, participants who were able to articulate this principle in their justifications showed significantly greater use of this principle in their judgments. Meanwhile, when participants in the same study discovered that their moral judgments were governed by a morally dubious principle (e.g., it is morally worse to harm via physical contact than no contact), they disavowed both the principle and their judgments that were based on the principle. Together, these findings indicate an impact of conscious principled reasoning on moral judgments.

Behavioral evidence from Tania Lombrozo also suggests a relationship between general moral commitments and moral judgments of particular scenarios (Lombrozo, 2009 ). Participants who explicitly endorsed consequentialist moral theories, that is, theories focused on the moral significance of consequences (e.g., the greatest good for the greatest number) were more likely to ignore nonconsequentialist distinctions between scenarios (e.g., physical contact versus no contact) when the scenarios were presented side by side. In fact, as will be discussed in more depth in the next section, an important body of behavioral and neural evidence suggests a direct correspondence between conscious principled reasoning and consequentialist moral judgments (Greene et al., 2001 ; Koenigs et al., 2007 ; Valdesolo & DeSteno, 2006 ). Extensive work by Josh Greene and his colleagues suggests a correlation between consequentialist moral judgments and activity in brain regions for abstract reasoning, such as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), as well as slower consequentialist moral judgments under cognitive load (Greene, Morelli, Lowenberg, Nystrom, & Cohen, 2008 ; Greene, Nystrom, Engell, Darley, & Cohen, 2004 ).

In all, these results reveal a substantial role for reason in moral judgment—even in the very cases thought to exemplify the emotion model. Reasoning abilities, determined in part by culture and education, may allow us in some instances to override our initial moral attitudes. As rational moral agents, we may be able to make judgments based on principles and theories that we explicitly endorse and invoke when justifying our judgments. As we will see in the next section, though, not all moral judgments arise from conscious, principled reasoning. Much of moral thinking may be emotionally mediated and immune to conscious correction.

Emotion: Moral Thinking Is Moral Feeling

The emergence of the Emotion Model accompanied the birth of contemporary moral psychology (Haidt et al., 1993 ). On this model, most of moral thinking is moral feeling—judgments are made not via conscious, principled reasoning primarily but via emotional responses. These emotions include those, like disgust, that drive Haidt’s participants to condemn disgusting but harmless actions (e.g., eating the family dog), as we will discuss next, as well as prosocial emotions, like empathy, disrupted in certain patient populations (e.g., psychopathy, frontotemporal dementia, ventromedial prefrontal damage), as we will discuss later in this section.

Emotion models do not necessarily deny a role for other cognitive processes, as discussed in the prior section (“Reason) and subsequent section (“Theory of Mind”). Haidt, for example, recognizes a limited role for conscious reasoning—in social contexts and motivated moral reasoning. Nevertheless, on Haidt’s model, emotions such as disgust dominate, as evident in the title of his seminal paper: “The Emotional Dog and Its Rational Tail” (Haidt, 2001 ). Conscious reasoning plays a more prominent role in Greene’s dual-process model, as discussed later in this section (Greene et al., 2004 ). Greene’s model highlights the competitive interaction between consciously reasoned responses (e.g., consequentialist responses) and emotional responses, including empathy. This section discusses the behavioral, neuroimaging, and neuropsychological evidence for the contribution of emotional processes to moral judgments.

Disgust, in particular, appears to be a key candidate emotion for certain moral judgments. On the one hand, certain actions may be perceived as immoral but not disgusting (e.g., tax fraud) and other actions as purely disgusting but not immoral (e.g., drinking urine). On the other hand, abundant research indicates a complex and often causal relationship between disgust and morality. Recent research suggests, for example, that individual differences in disgust responses may drive moral judgments: Political conservatives are more “disgust sensitive” (Inbar, Pizarro, & Bloom, 2009 ), a trait that can play a causal role in moral attitudes toward homosexuality (Inbar, Pizarro, Knobe, et al., 2009 ). In a more direct test of the causal link between disgust and moral judgment, participants were hypnotized to experience disgust at an arbitrary word (e.g., “often”) and consequently delivered harsh moral judgments even when this word described benign behaviors (e.g., the student often chose popular topics for discussion) (Wheatley & Haidt, 2005 ). A related study investigated the impact of disgust induction on moral judgment (i.e., via a disgusting smell, a disgusting testing room, a memory of a physically disgusting experience, and a disgusting video) (Schnall, Haidt, Clore, & Jordan, 2008 ). After the disgust induction, subjects made harsher moral judgments, particularly if they were sensitive to their own bodily state. Finally, in a surprising study of moral behavior, participants were found to be more likely to engage in physical cleansing after behaving immorally and, conversely, to engage in immoral behaviors after physical cleansing (Zhong & Liljenquist, 2006 ). These behavioral findings converge on the notion that our emotional responses, and especially disgust, can dramatically shape our moral thinking.

Studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have also revealed an important association between activity in brain regions implicated in disgust, including the insula, and moral judgments of purity violations (e.g., incest) (Schaich Borg, Lieberman, & Kiehl, 2008 ) and even unfair and harmful actions (Hsu, Anen, & Quartz, 2008 ; Moll et al., 2005 ). More generally, since its inception, contemporary moral psychology has seen a continuous stream of neuroimaging and neuropsychological research focused on the role of emotion in moral judgment (Young & Koenigs, 2007 ).

Much of this research has focused on the role of brain regions involved in empathy and emotional responsiveness, in particular, the ventral and medial portions of prefrontal cortex, referred to as ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPC). The VMPC includes the medial portions of orbitofrontal cortex (Brodmann areas 11 and 12) and the medial prefrontal cortex from the ventral surface to around the level of the genu of the corpus callosum (Brodmann area 25 and portions of Brodmann areas 10 and 32). The VMPC projects to limbic, hypothalamic, and brainstem regions that execute visceral and autonomic components of emotional responses (Ongur & Price, 2000 ); neurons within the VMPC encode the emotional value of sensory stimuli (Rolls, 2000 ). Damage to VMPC results in striking impairments in emotional function, including generally blunted affect, diminished empathy, emotional lability, and poorly regulated anger and frustration (Anderson, Barrash, Bechara, & Tranel, 2006 ; Barrash, Tranel, & Anderson, 2000 ). Activation in the VMPC is therefore taken as evidence of emotional processing, as in many of the fMRI studies described next.

Early fMRI studies of moral thinking were designed to isolate whatever cognitive processes or neural substrates might be specific to morality. With domain specificity in mind, these studies relied on paradigms contrasting neural responses to moral stimuli versus nonmoral stimuli. In an early study, subjects viewed emotionally salient scenes with moral content (e.g., physical assaults, war scenes) versus nonmoral content (e.g., body lesions, dangerous animals; Moll, de Oliveira-Souza, Bramati, & Grafman, 2002 ). Regions of VMPC, in this case the right medial orbitofrontal cortex and medial frontal gyrus (Brodmann areas 10 and 11), were selectively recruited when participants passively viewed the moral scenes. Broadly similar activation patterns in the VMPC (lower medial Brodmann area 10) were observed when moral and nonmoral stimuli were matched for social content (e.g., number of people depicted in the scenes) and when subjects down-regulated their own emotional responses to the moral stimuli (Harenski & Hamaan, 2006 ). Another series of studies targeted the relationship between emotion and explicit moral judgment, replacing moral scenes with “moral statements,” simple descriptions of morally salient behavior. VMPC activation (left medial orbitofrontal cortex) was selectively enhanced during the processing of emotionally salient moral statements (e.g., “He shot the victim to death”) versus socially and emotionally salient nonmoral statements (e.g., “He licked the dirty toilet”) (Moll, de Oliveira-Souza, Eslinger, et al., 2002 ). Even in the absence of explicit emotional content, moral statements describing morally inappropriate or appropriate actions (e.g., “A steals a car”/“A admires a car”) elicited enhanced VMPC activation (medial Brodmann area 10) compared to nonmoral statements that were either semantically appropriate or inappropriate (e.g., “A takes a walk”/“A waits a walk”) (Heekeren, Wartenburger, Schmidt, Schwintowski, & Villringer, 2003 ). Finally, in a similar vein, VMPC activation was observed for silent “right” or “wrong” judgments of simple statements with moral content (e.g., “We break the law when necessary”) versus nonmoral content (e.g., “Stones are made of water”) (Moll, Eslinger, & de Oliveira-Souza, 2001 ). Across these fMRI studies, emotional brain regions, in the VMPC, were recruited for moral thinking, in particular, the processing of moral scenes and statements versus nonmoral scenes and statements controlled for social and emotional content. These early studies set the stage for addressing additional questions about emotion and moral judgment in more detail. Do emotions support the processing of complex moral stimuli such as moral dilemmas? Do emotions systematically drive specific moral judgments?

Greene and his colleagues were the first to investigate whether emotion-related areas, such as the VMPC, support moral judgment in the context of moral dilemmas and, importantly, whether neural activity tracks with different moral content, within the moral domain. An early topic of investigation was the difference between moral scenarios that were “personal” or more emotionally salient and moral scenarios that were “impersonal” or less emotionally salient (Greene et al., 2001 ). For example, a trolley is headed for five people, and participants can save them by sacrificing the life of one person instead. In the “impersonal” scenario, participants can choose to turn the trolley away from the five people onto a side track where one person where will be hit instead. In the “personal” scenario, participants can choose to push a large stranger off a footbridge onto the tracks below, where his body will stop the trolley from hitting the five, though he, of course, will be hit. Personal moral scenarios selectively recruited VMPC (medial Brodmann area 10).

Greene and colleagues took this finding further when they investigated whether the observed activation patterns track not only emotionally salient scenarios but also emotionally mediated moral judgments. In particular, does emotional engagement track nonconsequentialist moral judgments—judgments based on factors other than consequences (e.g., intention, physical contact)? In Greene’s experiments, nonconsequentialist judgments consisted of rejecting harmful actions that maximized good consequences (e.g., killing one to save five), while consequentialist judgments consisted of endorsing such harmful actions (Greene et al., 2004 ). Participants therefore made judgments for a series of scenarios. For example: Enemy soldiers have taken over your village. They have orders to kill all remaining civilians. You and some of your townspeople have sought refuge in the cellar of a large house. Outside, you hear the voices of soldiers who have come to search the house for valuables. Your baby begins to cry loudly. You cover his mouth to block the sound. If you remove your hand from his mouth, his crying will summon the attention of the soldiers who will kill you, your child, and the others hiding out in the cellar. To save yourself and the others, you must smother your child to death. Is it appropriate for you to smother your child in order to save yourself and the other townspeople? For this scenario, the nonconsequentialist judgment (e.g., “Don’t smother the baby”) is to reject the harmful action, even though it would maximize the greater good. On Greene’s model, this judgment is rooted in an automatic emotional aversion to the harmful act. In other words, participants’ prepotent response is an emotional response to the harm, leading participants to reject it. By contrast, consequentialist reasoning requires participants to stifle their emotional response (e.g., “The baby will die no matter what, so smother the baby to save everyone else”), leading to the consciously reasoned and emotionally incongruent judgment. Consistent with Greene’s dual-process model, brain regions associated with cognitive conflict and abstract reasoning, such as anterior cingulate and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, were selectively recruited for consequentialist judgments. Subjects appeared able to override their emotional aversion to the harm and engage in consequentialist reasoning.

The growing body of neuroimaging work suggests emotional engagement during moral judgment and, in particular, nonconsequentialist moral judgments. Neuroimaging methods, however, are currently limited in that they reveal only correlations between neural activity and cognitive processes rather than causally necessary connections. One way to determine whether emotional processing plays a causally necessary role in moral judgment is to test individuals with selective deficits in emotional processing. As we will see, neuropsychological studies suggest a causal connection between prosocial emotions and social cognition. Emotional dysfunction often does lead to deficits in moral judgment, reasoning, and behavior.

An early study investigated moral reasoning in two adult individuals with early-onset VMPC lesions (Anderson, Bechara, Damasio, Tranel, & Damasio, 1999 ). According to a traditional characterization of moral development (Kohlberg, 1981 ), both individuals exhibited a “preconventional” stage of moral reasoning. More specifically, both early-onset VMPC lesion patients provided immature moral justifications, engaging in moral reasoning from an egocentric perspective of punishment-avoidance (e.g., reasoning that stealing medicine for a loved one is morally wrong because one might get caught). This finding was especially striking given prior research revealing normal moral reasoning in patients with adult-onset VMPC damage (Saver & Damasio, 1991 ). The moral reasoning deficit documented in the early-onset cases suggests that areas of prefrontal cortex support the original acquisition of normal moral reasoning abilities (Anderson et al., 1999 ). A caveat, however, is that these studies target participants’ justifications rather than judgments, licensing only limited conclusions about the role of the VMPC in moral thinking.

Investigations of adult and developmental psychopaths have associated emotional impairment with defects in moral behavior and judgment. Psychopathy is typically associated with pronounced emotional impairment, for instance, considerably reduced empathy and guilt, and pronounced behavioral disturbance, for instance, criminal and frequently violent behavior (Hare, 1991 ). Reports of deficits in prosocial emotions (e.g., empathy) and behavior motivated a pair of studies on moral judgment in psychopathy (Blair, 1995 , 1997 ). James Blair found that both adult and developmental psychopaths were unable to distinguish between unambiguous moral transgressions (e.g., hitting someone) and unambiguous conventional transgressions (e.g., talking out of turn) along the dimensions of permissibility, seriousness, and authority contingence—a distinction that even young children are able to make (Turiel, 1983 ). Recent work suggests that individuals with psychopathic tendencies may show normal moral judgments in limited contexts but simply lack motivation to behave prosocially in accordance with their judgments (Cima, Tonnaer, & Hauser, 2010 ).

The first direct investigation of moral judgment (as opposed to behavior or justification) in brain-damaged populations was a study of patients with frontotemporal dementia (FTD; Mendez, Chen, Shapira, & Miller, 2005 ). FTD involves deterioration of prefrontal and anterior temporal brain areas. FTD patients therefore exhibit blunted emotion and diminished regard for others early in the course of the disease. Similar to psychopathy, FTD is marked by behavioral changes, including transgressive behavior, that is, stealing, physical assault, and inappropriate sexual advances (Mendez, Chen, et al., 2005 ). In light of the deficits in prosocial emotions and behavior associated with FTD, Mendez and colleagues (Mendez, Anderson, & Shapira, 2005 ) investigated FTD patients’ moral judgments of personal and impersonal moral scenarios (Greene et al., 2001 ). Again, most healthy participants advocate turning a trolley away from five people and onto one person, in the impersonal scenario, but not pushing a stranger off a footbridge so that his body will stop a trolley from hitting five people, in the personal scenario (Cushman et al., 2006 ; Hauser, Cushman, Young, Jin, & Mikhail, 2007 ; Mikhail, 2002 ) However, most FTD patients endorsed the harmful action for both the impersonal and personal scenarios. Social psychologists have observed similar patterns of judgment after reducing negative affect by exposing subjects to Chris Farley’s comedic Saturday Night Live skits (Valdesolo & DeSteno, 2006 ). These results suggest that due to the deterioration of emotional processing mediated by the VMPC, the FTD patients did not fully experience the emotional salience of the personal harm (e.g., pushing the stranger). However, since neurodegeneration in FTD affects multiple prefrontal and temporal areas, precise conclusions about the impact of emotional processing subserved by the VMPC versus other cognitive functions cannot yet be drawn.

Investigating moral judgment in individuals with focal VMPC lesions represents the most direct approach to the relationship between emotional processing in the VMPC and moral judgment. Like FTD patients, VMPC lesion patients exhibit diminished empathy and blunted affect, but, importantly, unlike FTD patients, VMPC lesion patients retain broader intellectual function. VMPC patients can therefore be studied to characterize the specific role of emotion in moral judgment. One study tested a group of six patients with focal, adult-onset, bilateral lesions of VMPC to determine whether emotional processing subserved by VMPC is, in fact, causally necessary for normal moral judgment (Koenigs et al., 2007 ). In this study, patients evaluated the same impersonal and personal moral scenarios described earlier. As in previous fMRI studies (Greene et al., 2001 , 2004 ), many of the personal scenarios pit an emotionally aversive harm against the “greater good” (e.g., killing one to save many). Like the FTD patients, VMPC patients responded normally to the impersonal moral scenarios, but for the personal scenarios the VMPC patients were significantly more likely to endorse committing an emotionally aversive harm if a greater number of people would benefit—the consequentialist judgment. A second lesion study confirmed this finding (Ciaramelli, Muccioli, Ladavas, & di Pellegrino, 2007 ). Together, these studies suggest that emotional processing mediated by VMPC is crucial for moral judgment and in particular consequentialist moral judgment (Greene et al., 2004 ).

All of these studies, however, rely on moral scenarios describing intentional harms: Agents act with the belief and intent, stated or implied, that they will cause the harmful outcome that they, in fact, cause. It is thus unresolved whether the brain regions implicated in emotional processing, such as the VMPC, are involved in processing harmful outcomes or harmful intentions or both. Recent functional neuroimaging and neuropsychological evidence suggests that the VMPC supports the processing of harmful intentions (Young & Saxe, 2009b ). In healthy adult participants, moral judgments of failed attempts to harm (harmful intention, neutral outcome) were significantly correlated with the average neural response in the VMPC. Individuals with a high VMPC response, and a stronger emotional response to the harmful intention, assigned more blame for failed attempts to harm, while individuals with a low VMPC response, and a weaker emotional response to the harmful intention, assigned less blame.

A follow-up study investigated moral judgments made by patients with adult-onset VMPC lesions, as in the study described earlier (Young, Bechara, et al., 2010 ). Consistent with the fMRI evidence, VMPC patients judged attempted harms as significantly more morally permissible, compared to control participants—and even compared to their own judgments of accidental harms. In fact, this pattern reflects a striking reversal of the normal pattern of moral judgments; in judging failed attempts to harm as more permissible than accidental harms, VMPC patients revealed an extreme “no harm, no foul” mentality. VMPC patients showed a selective deficit in moral judgment of attempted harms, including attempted murder, suggesting that although VMPC patients may be able to reason about the content of a belief or an intention, they are unable to trigger normal emotional responses to mental state content for moral judgment—in line with prior work showing deficits in their emotional processing of abstract versus concrete information (Bechara & Damasio, 2005 ). The finding that the VMPC is associated with processing intentions with high emotional content, that is, harmful intent, for moral judgment, is also consistent with the role of the VMPC in “affective” theory of mind or emotional empathy (Jenkins & Mitchell, 2009 ; Mitchell, Macrae, & Banaji, 2006 ; Shamay-Tsoory & Aharon-Peretz, 2007 ; Vollm et al., 2006 ). Prior evidence has suggested a specific role for the VMPC in processing affective aspects of another person’s mental states (Jenkins & Mitchell, 2009 ; Mitchell et al., 2006 ; Shamay-Tsoory & Aharon-Peretz, 2007 ; Vollm et al., 2006 ). Therefore, damage to these processes for emotional empathy may lead to deficits in both moral judgment and prosocial behavior.

Research using behavioral methods, fMRI, and neuropsychology has illuminated the specific role of emotion in moral judgment. Manipulating emotions, by either enhancing or suppressing them, can systematically bias people’s moral judgments; brain regions associated with emotional processing are recruited for moral judgment, and more for some kinds of moral judgments over others; patients with deficits in emotional processing show systematically abnormal moral cognition in judgment, justification, and behavior.

Theory of Mind: Moral Thinking Is Thinking About Thinking

A third cognitive model posits that, in addition to conscious reasoning and emotional processing, theory of mind is a key cognitive process for moral judgment, that is, how we reason about the mental states of moral agents, including their innocent and guilty intentions (Hart, 1968 ; Kamm, 2001 ; Mikhail, 2007 ). My colleagues and I have focused on the dominant role of mental states versus outcomes for moral judgment (Young, Cushman, Hauser, & Saxe, 2007 ). In our studies, participants typically read stories in which agents produced either a negative outcome (harm to another person) or a neutral outcome (no harm), based on the belief that they would cause the negative outcome (“negative” belief or intention) or the neutral outcome (“neutral” belief or intention). Participants then judge whether the action was morally permissible or forbidden, or how much moral blame the agent deserves.

For example, in one scenario, Grace and her coworker are taking a tour of a chemical factory. Grace stops to pour herself and her coworker some coffee. Nearby is a container of sugar. The container, however, has been mislabeled “toxic,” so Grace thinks that the powder inside is toxic. She spoons some into her coworker’s coffee and takes none for herself. Her coworker drinks the coffee, and nothing bad happens. In an alternative scenario, a container of poison sits near the coffee. The container, however, has been mislabeled “sugar,” so Grace thinks the powder inside is sugar. She spoons some into her coworker’s coffee. Her coworker drinks her coffee and ends up dead. Across all of our studies using scenarios like these, participants weighed the agent’s belief and intent more heavily than the action’s outcomes in their moral judgments (Young et al., 2007 ; Young, Nichols, & Saxe, 2010 ). A simple metric of this effect is that our participants almost universally judge an attempted harm (negative belief, neutral outcome) as more morally blameworthy and more morally forbidden than an accidental harm (neutral belief, negative outcome).

Cushman ( 2008 ) has pushed this line of work even further, directly comparing the roles of outcome, causation, beliefs, and desires for different kinds of moral judgments (e.g., person, permissibility, blame, and punishment) (Cushman, 2008 ; Cushman, Dreber, Wang, & Costa, 2009 ). The agent’s belief about whether his or her action would cause harm was the most important factor across the board, followed by the agent’s desire to cause harm. Notably, though, judgments about how much to punish the agent relied relatively more on outcomes, as compared to judgments about the moral character of the agent or the moral permissibility of the action, which relied more on beliefs.

What’s surprising is that mental state factors dominate even where external outcomes appear to drive moral judgments. For instance, agents who cause harmful outcomes by accident are still judged to be somewhat morally blameworthy in spite of their mental states. Consider again the scenario where Grace accidentally poisons her coworker because she mistakes poison for sugar. Though we mostly let Grace off the hook for her false belief and innocent intention, we still assign some moral blame. Recent research suggests that this negative moral judgment is based not simply on the harmful outcome of Grace’s action but largely on participants’ assessment of Grace’s mental state (Young, Nichols, & Saxe, 2010 ). In particular, participants judge Grace’s false belief as unjustified or unreasonable and therefore Grace as morally blameworthy. So, even when we assign blame for accidents, we may do so on the basis of mental state factors (e.g., negligence) and not simply on the basis of the harmful outcome.

For most healthy adults, mental states, including beliefs, intentions, and desires, carry more moral weight than external outcomes. In some cases, mental states overwhelm other morally relevant external factors, including external constraints, like whether the person could have acted otherwise (Woolfolk, Doris, & Darley, 2006 ). Woolfolk, Doris, and Darley ( 2006 ) presented subjects with variations of one basic story: Bill discovers that his wife Susan and his best friend Frank have been involved in a love affair. All three are flying home from a group vacation on the same airplane. In one variation of the story, their plane is hijacked by a gang of ruthless kidnappers, who surround the passengers with machine guns and order Bill to shoot Frank in the head; otherwise, they will shoot Bill, Frank, and the other passengers. Bill recognizes the opportunity to kill his wife’s lover and get away with it. He wants to kill Frank and does so. In another variation: Bill forgives Frank and Susan and is horrified when the situation arises but complies with the kidnappers’ demand to kill Frank. On average, observers rate Bill as more responsible for Frank’s death, and the killing as more wrong, when Bill wanted to kill Frank, even though this desire played no role in causing the death, in either case.

While assigning moral blame for harmful desires and intentions appears easy and automatic (except in case of VMPC damage), forgiving accidental harms appears to present more of a challenge. Among healthy adults, we have found evidence of substantial individual variability in moral blame assigned to protagonists for accidental harms (Young & Saxe, 2009b ). In development, full forgiveness or exculpation for accidents does not emerge until approximately 7 years of age, surprisingly late in childhood. Meanwhile, 5-year-old children are capable of reasoning about false beliefs: In the paradigmatic “false-belief task,” children predict that observers will look for a hidden object where they last saw the object, not in its true current location (Flavell, 1999 ; Wellman, Cross, & Watson, 2001 ). These same children, however, judge that if a false belief led an observer to unknowingly and accidentally cause harm to another person (e.g., mistake poison for sugar), the agent is just as bad as if he or she had caused the harm on purpose (Piaget, 1932 /1965). The ability to integrate beliefs and intentions into moral judgments appears then to be a distinct developmental achievement (Young & Saxe, 2008 ). Consistent with this idea, high-functioning adults diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, who also pass standard false-belief tasks, assign abnormally high levels of moral blame for accidental harms as well (Moran et al., 2011 ).

My colleagues and I have recently investigated the neural mechanisms that support moral judgments based on mental states such as beliefs and intentions. Our results suggest that specific brain regions support multiple distinct cognitive components of mental state reasoning for moral judgment: the initial encoding of the agent’s belief, the use and integration of the belief (with outcome information) for moral judgment, as discussed earlier, spontaneous mental state inference when mental state information is not explicitly provided in the moral scenario, and even post hoc reasoning about beliefs and intentions to rationalize or justify moral judgments (Kliemann, Young, Scholz, & Saxe, 2008 ; Young et al., 2007 ; Young & Saxe, 2008 , 2009a ).

Building on prior research on neural substrates for theory of mind in nonmoral contexts (Perner, Aichhorn, Kronbichler, Staffen, & Ladurner, 2006 ; Saxe & Kanwisher, 2003 ), our research suggests that the most selective brain region appears to be the right temporo-parietal junction (RTPJ). In one study, individual differences in moral judgments were correlated with individual differences in the RTPJ response (Young & Saxe, 2009b ). Participants with a high RTPJ response, and a more robust mental state representation (e.g., false belief, innocent intention), assigned less blame to agents causing accidental harm. Participants with a low RTPJ response, and a weaker mental state representation, assigned more blame, like young children and our participants with Asperger’s Syndrome. One source of developmental change in moral judgments may therefore be the maturation of specific brain regions for representing mental states such as beliefs—consistent with recent research suggesting the RTPJ may be late maturing (Saxe, Whitfield-Gabrieli, Scholz, & Pelphrey, 2009 ).

The correlation observed here between the use of mental states for moral judgment and the neural response in a brain region dedicated to mental state reasoning suggests that individual differences in moral judgment are not due exclusively to individual differences in domain-general capacities for abstract reasoning or cognitive control, as discussed in the preceding sections. What determines blame or forgiveness is not just the ability to override a prepotent response to a salient harmful outcome (Greene et al., 2004 ). The conflict between mental state and outcome factors may account for part of the challenge of forgiveness. The neural data suggest that the strength of the mental state representation matters for how the conflict is resolved—and whether forgiveness or blame is offered.

Disrupting RTPJ activity also disrupts the use of mental state information for moral judgment. In a recent study, we produced a temporary “virtual lesion” in the RTPJ, using a neurophysiological technique known as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) (Young, Camprodon, Hauser, Pascual-Leone, & Saxe, 2010 ). TMS allows the induction of a current in the brain, using a magnetic field to pass the scalp and skull. After using fMRI to identify the RTPJ in each of our participants, and a nearby control region not implicated in mental state reasoning, we used offline and online TMS to modulate neural activity in two experiments. In both experiments, TMS to the RTPJ versus the control region made a significant and selective difference, reducing the impact of intentions and, as a direct result, increasing the impact of outcomes on moral judgments. For example, disrupting RTPJ activity led to more lenient judgments of failed attempts to harm, based on the neutral outcome, and not the harmful intent. Indeed, moral judgment depends critically on specific neural substrates for processing mental states like beliefs and intentions.

Together, these studies provide behavioral and neural evidence for theory of mind as a key cognitive process for moral judgment. Evaluating moral agents and their actions requires an assessment of the agents’ mental states. Specific neural substrates support such mental state assessments. Compromised mental state reasoning in the case of neurodevelopmental disorders (e.g., autism) or via TMS therefore leads to abnormal moral thinking.

Moral Faculty: Moral Thinking Is Uniquely Moral

In contrast to the models presented so far, moral faculty models focus on what, if anything, might be specific to the domain of morality—rather than the contribution of cognitive processes already known to operate in other domains (e.g., reasoning, emotion, theory of mind). Moral faculty models posit a uniquely moral faculty that takes multiple cognitive inputs and computes a uniquely moral judgment (Hauser, 2006 ; Mikhail, 2002 , 2007 ). Interestingly, at the outset of contemporary moral psychology, the key questions for many focused directly on what was specific to the moral domain. Are moral judgments governed by specific moral rules and computations, or specific moral emotions? Are moral judgments supported by a specific neural substrate or network? An illustration of this domain-specific approach can be found in early fMRI studies of morality, described earlier in the section on “Emotion.” Many of these studies were designed around comparing moral stimuli to nonmoral stimuli, while controlling for differences along other dimensions (e.g., emotional salience, social content). Before too long, though, moral psychology saw a subtle shift from these questions of domain specificity toward questions concerning other better studied cognitive processes—how they might interact and contribute to moral judgment.

In some sense, all models of moral judgment depend on some sort of “faculty” that functions to integrate the outputs of others cognitive processes (e.g., theory of mind) in order to compute a distinctly moral judgment. Then, any debate about the future of moral psychology might simply concern where to direct our empirical efforts—the moral faculty or the processes that feed into the faculty. This might turn on the complexity of the computations performed by the moral faculty: How much or how little work is done before the moral faculty runs its moral computations? Current models posit relatively simple moral rules, for example, “ME HURT YOU” (Greene et al., 2004 ) and “it is wrong to intentionally cause harm” (Cushman, Young, & Hauser, 2011 ; Mikhail, 2007 ). The simplicity of these moral computations recommends the worthy challenge of characterizing the messier processes that provide the inputs to the moral faculty.

It may be also worth noting, however, that while the moral rules themselves may be relatively simple, “hurt” and “harm” may require some deconstruction into further component parts (S. Carey, personal communication). What constitutes “hurt” and “harm”? Causing distress to another person (Leslie, Knobe, & Cohen, 2006 )? Violating moral norms that extend beyond physical harms, to norms concerning fairness, community, authority, and purity (Haidt, 2007 )? Hindering others—something that even 6-month-old infants recognize as “bad” (Hamlin, Wynn, & Bloom, 2007 ; Kuhlmeier, Wynn, & Bloom, 2003 )? How “hurt” and “harm” are filled out may turn out to be learned or innate (or some combination), learned explicitly or associatively (Blair, 1995 ), culturally bound or universal. In the meantime, any innate content of “hurt” and “harm” may be one candidate for what is uniquely moral.

Another candidate, though, is the moral faculty itself, in other words, not merely the content of “hurt” and “harm” within the moral computation, but that which performs the computation. Indeed, some mechanism must take nonmoral inputs and deliver a uniquely “moral” judgment. And, yet, it is also possible that whatever integrative mechanism that takes, for example, mental states and outcomes as inputs to compute moral permissibility is no different from that which takes height and radius to compute volume (Anderson & Cuneo, 1978 ). What would be needed then is positive evidence for a specifically “moral” faculty. This evidence might take the form of a specific neural process dedicated to integrating information for moral judgment (Hsu et al., 2008 ), or the systematic transformation of the nonmoral inputs, post moral computation. For example, are there unique behavioral or neural signatures of theory of mind for moral judgment, compared to theory of mind deployed in nonmoral contexts, for predicting and explaining behavior (Knobe, 2005 ; F. Cushman, personal communication)? If so, then searching for a moral faculty may indeed be worth the effort.

In the past decade, cognitive psychology and neuroscience has started to reveal moral thinking in the mind and brain. Moral judgment includes a complex set of cognitive processes, including reason, emotion, and theory of mind, each with distinct behavioral and neural signatures. Conscious reasoning from explicit principles or theories may lead directly to some moral judgments and allow us to correct others. Emotional processes, including disgust and empathy, may drive us to judge some actions as harmful, unfair, or impure, and also motivate us to behave prosocially. Theory of mind enables us to evaluate moral agents based not only on their actions and effects on the external world but on the internal contents of agents’ minds—their beliefs and intentions. Finally, a moral faculty may serve to integrate the information from these cognitive processes and generate a uniquely moral judgment of right or wrong. The science of morality therefore requires at once investigating the multitude of cognitive and neural processes known to function in other domains, as well as exploring the possibility of processes dedicated specifically to morality.

Future Directions

How do different cognitive processes for moral judgment interact?

What is the relationship between moral judgment and moral behavior?

What are the differences and similarities between moral judgment of self versus other?

What are the differences and similarities between moral judgment of ingroup versus outgroup members?

Do distinct moral domains (e.g., harm versus purity) follow distinct cognitive rules?

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19 Logic and Critical Thinking

Introduction [1].

This chapter is a primer on basic logical concepts that often appear in various critical thinking textbooks—concepts such as entailment, contraries, contradictories, necessary and sufficient conditions, etc. The chapter will not provide a historical genealogy of these concepts—in some sense critical thinking, argumentation theory, and formal logic all trace their roots back to at least Aristotle over two thousand years ago. As a result, for many of these concepts, determining whether the concept was a logic concept co-opted by critical thinking, or a critical thinking concept co-opted and changed by logic and then co-opted back again, is extremely difficult. Regardless, a brief orientation of the relationship of critical thinking and logic is in order.

Critical thinking, at least as it is most often justified, is a practical, skill-building exercise with the goal of improving our reasoning. This motivation, of understanding and improving our reasoning, has also been the motivation behind the development of logic over the past several thousand years. While we could study and understand each piece of reasoning individually, it is much more efficient to look for reasoning patterns that recur over and over again, to distinguish those patterns that are good from those that are bad, and so to find principles underpinning our reasoning that help us distinguish good reasoning from bad reasoning across the board. This push to generalize and theorize with the patterns of reasoning generated numerous formal logical systems, including the syllogistic and modal logics of Aristotle.

However, logic, especially formal logic, has not been constrained solely by the goal of understanding and improving our reasoning. Like abstract mathematics, the formal structures underpinning logical systems, are rich and complex enough to generate study all their own, with no concern for the original motivation that may have pushed us to study patterns of human reasoning. Regardless, many of logic’s concepts are still useful in organizing any study of reasoning.

In what follows I begin with a fairly substantial discussion of the core concept needed to understand the traditional logical concepts such as entailment or contradictory or necessary condition—the concept of a possibility. Once we have this notion in play, the definitions of the standard logical concepts, which I provide in Section 2, are quite straightforward. In the final section, I discuss the potential for misapplication of various concepts or distinctions.

1. Possibilities

1.1 possibility and reasoning.

The core concept of logic is the concept of a possibility (a case, a scenario, an option, a way things could be). While logicians and philosophers continue to work on illuminating the nature of possibilities, we can, even without a precise definition, still intuitively grasp the notion. You could stop reading right now or you could keep going. England didn’t win, but England could have won, if they had scored their penalty kick. That die, when rolled, will land on one of six possible sides. There are many things that might happen if the bill is passed into law. According to 18th century philosopher Gottfried Leibniz, God surveyed all the possible ways the universe might be and, being omnibenevolent, chose to create the best one (this one!?).

We appeal to possibilities all the time in our reasoning. Indeed, if there were but one way things could be and we knew completely what that way was like, then we would not need to reason at all—we would just know how things were going to unfold. But given that (i) we do not know completely how things are or how the future is going to unfold and (ii) we assume there are multiple possibilities for how the future might unfold, we need to reason about the ways things could be in order to learn how things are and how to best manage whatever the future brings. For example, the detective investigating a suspicious death gets a new piece of evidence—the deceased was killed by a rare poison. As a result, some scenarios are closed off as viable explanations of the death—e.g., the deceased was deliberately killed by someone who did not have access to the poison. Other scenarios, ones that may not have been in the detective’s awareness before the new piece of evidence was acquired, become relevant—e.g., that someone who knew or at least had access to the poison was responsible for the death. As a result, a new line of inquiry opens for the detective: find out who had access to the poison. Similarly, a doctor runs a series of tests to try to eliminate certain possible explanations for a given patient’s symptoms. Given certain results the possible explanations get narrowed down to one (and hopefully a treatment is available); given other results multiple possibilities remain and the doctor has to decide which tests may be required for progress to be made; unexpected results, while eliminating some possibilities may open up new possibilities that the doctor had not originally been considering. Finally, you are trying to decide when and in which order to run a list of errands. You take into account the likely lines at each location at different times of day, and the likely traffic at different times of day. After evaluating the possibilities, you choose the best option for you.

1.2 Types of possibil i ties

1.2 .1 physical & epistemic possibilities.

Given the ubiquity of possibilities in our reasoning, theorists often classify the possibilities. For example, physicists are interested in distinguishing the physical possibilities (the possibilities consistent with the laws of physics) from the physical impossibilities (the possibilities inconsistent with the laws of physics). Other general types of possibilities include epistemic possibilities—scenarios consistent with what we know; moral possibilities—those consistent with a given moral code; legal possibilities—situations consistent with what is permitted by a given legal code. We can even combine these types—epistemic physical possibilities are those that are consistent with the laws of physics as we currently know them. If what we know about the world changes at a fundamental level, what once was epistemically physically possible (measuring time independently of motion or gravity) may become epistemically physically impossible. Like for the detective and the doctor above, new, unexpected evidence may require an adjustment by the scientist in what possibilities are under consideration as viable explanations.

1.2 .2 Equally probable possibilities

Two other sorts of possibilities deserve mention. Probabilistic reasoning depends on possibilities of a very special sort—equally probable possibilities. To determine the probability that a fair coin will come up heads we assume that there are two equally likely possibilities, “heads’’ and “tails” (we usually ignore the extremely unlikely, though still physically possible situation in which the coin lands and stays on its edge). Failing to consider the relevant equally likely possibilities can make our probabilistic reasoning go awry. You will either win the lottery or you will not. There are two possibilities here, but treating them as equally likely is certainly an obvious mistake. Assuming the lottery is fair, the relevant equally likely possibilities are that each individual ticket (or set of numbers) will be the winner. If your ticket is one of many, then the probability you will win the lottery is much lower than the probability of your losing. Less obvious, but equally problematic is the following sort of case:

Three drawers contain the following mixture of coins—one contains two gold coins, one contains two silver coins, and one contains one gold coin and one silver coin. Without looking you pick a drawer, open it, and pick out a coin. When you open your eyes, you see the coin is gold. What is the probability that the other coin in that drawer is gold?

Many will reason as follows. The coin came from either the gold/gold drawer or the gold/silver drawer. Each drawer is equally likely and if it came from the gold/gold drawer the other coin is gold. But if it came from the gold/silver drawer the other coin is silver. Hence, the probability the other coin is gold is ½ or 50%. Unfortunately, the two possible drawers are not the relevant equally likely possibilities (no more than your winning or losing were the relevant equally likely possibilities in the lottery case). The relevant possibilities are opening a drawer and picking out a coin without looking. There are six different equally likely ways that could happen, one for each coin. Once you gain the new evidence that the coin you picked is gold when you open your eyes, you can eliminate three of the six possibilities, i.e. the ones in which you pick a silver coin. Of the three possibilities left two are such that the other coin is gold, i.e., the two possibilities in which you pick one of the two coins from the gold/gold drawer. Only in the gold/silver case is the other coin silver. Hence, the probability of the other coin being gold is 2/3. The moral here is that accurate probabilistic reasoning requires identifying and using the relevant equally likely possibilities from amongst all the sorts of possibilities that may present themselves—not always an easy task.

1.2 .3 Practical possibilities

Another significant type of possibility, especially in our everyday reasoning, is practical possibility—possibilities that are consistent with our means, desires, and will (or perhaps our epistemic practical possibilities—the possibilities that, given what we know or believe, are consistent with our means, desires, and will). When deciding how to get to an important meeting across town you are likely to not even consider the possibility that you flap your arms and fly, or the possibility that you use your personal matter/energy transport device, or even the possibility that you sprint all the way there. The first is physically impossible; the second, while perhaps physically possible, is beyond our current technological means; and the third, while certainly physically possible, is quite likely beyond your will and most certainly contrary to your strong desire to not arrive at the important meeting sweating profusely and gasping for breath. Instead you consider what your actual transportation options are (your own car, Uber, taxi, walk, subway, or some combination), how much time you have, how much money you are willing to spend, and then you try to find the optimal possibility (usually constrained by the desire to not spend too much time actually calculating the optimal possibility). Mundane decisions about which possibility to actualize like this happen all the time: what to eat this week, which movie to go see, what to do after dinner, when to get your hair cut, etc. Though mundane, they are still of interest to critical thinking or argumentation theorists since businesses and advertisers spend billions of dollars and devote millions of work-hours to trying to influence your desires and will in order to persuade you to choose their product.

Of more social significance are your individual choices that impact larger groups—in particular (if you live in a democracy) your voting choices, your decisions about how much effort you put into monitoring the outcome of your voting choices, and what the individuals or policies you voted for end up doing. In an optimal world, your political representatives would enact policies that benefit the most people in the most cost efficient, affordable, and just way. Of course, there may be little agreement about what is the most affordable, or just, or beneficial option, especially if what elected representatives take to be the best option is what will get them re-elected rather than what is actually good for their constituents. Regardless of the complexities and intricacies of public policy debate and decision-making, at the core is an attempt to find and agree upon a practical possibility, from amongst the myriad available, to actualize for our mutual benefit.

Given so many types of overlapping sets of possibilities, many of which differ for different individuals or groups of individuals—your set of practical possibilities does not likely match that of your neighbor even if the two sets overlap significantly; compare your set with someone of quite different socio-economic means and the sets overlap even less—and it is no surprise that numerous problems can arise when reasoning with and about possibilities. Individuals can consider too many possibilities, or more commonly, fail to consider all the relevant possibilities. For example, human beings are quite prone to confirmation bias—taking confirming instances as justifying an already-accepted theory or explanation rather than actively seeking out or testing for disconfirming instances. Detectives, or doctors, or researchers can become so fixated on the explanation they already believe to be correct that they are blind to the alternate explanations that are still consistent with the evidence available. In the case of probabilistic reasoning, we already saw cases of considering the wrong set of possibilities. Reasoners can also illegitimately shift the set of possibilities under consideration or shift the value assigned to various possibilities mid-reasoning. An egregious example can occur in public policy debates over the negative consequences of potential policies. When negative consequence X is a potential consequence of the opposition’s preferred policy it is judged to be likely enough to count as a reason against the policy, but when negative consequence X is a potential consequence of one’s own preferred policy, it is judged not to be likely enough to count as a reason against the policy. Identifying the correct set of possibilities and correct relative values of those possibilities is essential to reasoning correctly in numerous situations and yet identifying and ranking possibilities is often an extremely difficult task.

1.2 .4 Logical possibilities

One way to try to sidestep some of these problems is to determine what reasoning holds no matter what the possibilities in question are—to determine the patterns of reasoning that work in all the possibilities. After all, if a piece of reasoning works no matter what possibility you are considering, then you do not need to worry whether you are considering the right set of possibilities or not. Hence, one goal of formal logic is to be able to identify the structure that defines all the ways things could be, i.e., the logical possibilities.

The rough and ready notion of a “logical possibility” is a possibility that has no contradiction in it. Whilst it is not logically possible for an individual to both exist at a particular time and place and not exist at that time and place, which is contradictory, it is logically possible that the person exist in Montana in one instant, and then exist on one of the moons of Jupiter, say Io, in the next. There is no contradiction in the possibility that you exist in Montana in one instant and on Io in the next. But this possibility, while logically possible, is not physically possible. Given the distance from Montana to Io, we would need to violate the physical restriction on moving matter or energy (currently travelling below the speed of light) faster than the speed of light to get from Montana to Io from one instant to the next, so such travel is physically impossible.

Earlier I said that philosophers are still investigating and debating the nature of possibilities. But, whatever they are, there is one actualized one and lots of unactualized ones. In Leibniz’s argument that this world is the best of all possibilities, God examines all the possibilities and then actualizes the best one. Even if you doubt Leibniz’s argument, of all the myriad ways this universe could be, it is in fact one way, namely, the possibility that is actualized. The detective has numerous possibilities in mind about who is responsible for the deceased’s death; the detective hopes that by finding more evidence the possibilities can be reduced to one, the actual one. When you are deciding what to do tomorrow, you consider numerous possibilities and then engage in actions that make one (hopefully the one you wanted) actual.

But since there are lots of unactualized possibilities and only one actual possibility, how do we distinguish the unactualized possibilities from each other? Quite simply by what is true and false at each possibility. I flip a coin twice. There are four possible outcomes. Heads for the first flip and heads for the second; heads for the first and tails for the second; tails for the first, and heads for the second; and tails for both. Suppose the coin comes up tails on the first and heads on the second—that is the possibility that got actualized. How do we distinguish the three non-actualized possibilities? Well, in the first and second it is true that the coin first came up heads, but in fourth it is false that the coin first came up heads. But possibilities one and two differ in what is true and false of the second coin flip.

1.3 Declarative sentences and propositions

Given that we distinguish possibilities by what is true and false if they are actualized, one proposal for understanding possibilities is just as sets of declarative sentences. For example, the first coin flip possibility would be the set {“the first flip of the coin came up heads”, “the second flip of the coin came up heads”}. While initially appealing, the problem with this proposal is that sentences are not as well behaved as is needed to demarcate possibilities. Why?

Sometimes different sentences describe the same possibility or state of affairs. For example, “George is a bachelor” and “George is an unmarried male of marriageable age” describe the same state of affairs, but are different sentences since they are composed of different words. But since they are different sentences, sets that differ only in regards to which of these two sentences they contain are still different sets, and so different possibilities. Yet, we agreed the sentences were just two different ways of talking about the same possibility.

Alternatively, sometimes the same sentence can be used in different ways to describe different possibilities. For example, the sentence “The movie was a bomb” used in the United States likely describes a state of affairs in which the movie was bad, but the same sentence used in the United Kingdom likely describes a state of affairs in which the movie was good. But if one sentence can be used in different ways to describe different possibilities, then, once again, we cannot identify possibilities merely with sets of sentences.

To avoid the vagaries of sentences, logicians usually resort to propositions—what it is that declarative sentences express. “George is a bachelor” and “George is an unmarried male of marriageable age” express the same proposition about George’s marital status. “England won the World Cup in 1966” expresses a true proposition about the English national soccer team; “2+2 = 5” expresses a false proposition about the sum of 2 and 2. We use declarative sentences to express propositions directly, but other language use often involves them. For instance, when we ask, “did Hungary win the World Cup in 1938?” we wonder whether the proposition that Hungary won the 1938 World Cup is true or false. If we get the correct answer (they did not win—they lost to Italy 4-2 in the finals), then we stop wondering whether it is true or false and start believing it is false (and if the belief if strong enough and acquired in the correct way, we might even know that the proposition is false).

Instead of treating possibilities as sets of sentences, many logicians treat possibilities (or at least model possibilities) as sets of propositions. There are technical details that might require modifying even this proposal, but since the resolution of these details is unlikely to be relevant to the critical thinking project, we can take possibilities to be sets of propositions. The propositions that are members of a particular possibility are said to be true or obtain at that possibility. Propositions that are not members of a particular possibility are false at that possibility or do not obtain at that possibility. Armed with the concepts of (i) a possibility and (ii) propositions being true at or obtaining at possibilities, we can define many of the logical concepts that pervade logic and critical thinking textbooks. So even though some of the logical concepts that are forthcoming are, in some textbooks, defined in terms of sentences, the more common way is to define them in terms of propositions.

2. Logical concepts

2.1 types of propositions.

I begin by discussing some common types of propositions that arise in our reasoning. The most basic is a simple proposition, propositions expressed by such declarative sentences as “George is a bachelor” or “the sky is blue” or “Romeo loves Juliet.” Simple propositions attribute something to some object(s) or thing(s). In the first case, of George, that he is a bachelor, and in the third case, of Romeo, that he loves another object, namely Juliet. N egations of simple propositions, propositions expressed by such declarative sentences as “George is not a bachelor” or “Hungary did not win the 1938 World Cup” say that the simple proposition does not obtain. Of course, we do not speak declaratively solely by affirming either simple propositions or the denial of simple propositions; we combine or modify our simple propositions such as in:

• “George is a bachelor, and so is Todd”;
• “Mary loves Antonio, but he does not love her back”;
• “George went to Sophie’s house or he went to the movies”;
• “If the butler did not do it, then the cook did”;
• “If I take the subway, I will be on time for my meeting”;
• “Every student in this class is eligible”;
• “Someone deliberately killed the deceased”;
• “In order to be on time for your meeting, you must take the subway”;
• “England did not win the game, but they might have if they had scored their penalty kick in the last minute.”

The first two sentences express conjunctions . For a conjunction to be true, both sub-parts of the conjunction have to be true. So for “George is a bachelor and so is Todd” to be true, both “George is a bachelor” and “Todd is a bachelor” must be true. [For ease of exposition I will often omit the phrase “the proposition expressed by” before mentioning sentences as I just did above.]

The sentence “George went to Sophie’s house or he went to the movies” expresses a disjunction. There are two sorts of disjunctions—inclusive and exclusive. For an inclusive disjunction to be true, at least one of the sub-parts must be true. For an exclusive di s junction to be true, exactly one of the sub-parts must be true. If our sentence about George expresses an exclusive disjunction, then for it to be true George needs to be in exactly one of two places—at Sophie’s house or at the movies. This is likely to be the usage of someone trying to tell us where George is at a particular moment. If, on the other hand, the sentence expresses an inclusive disjunction, then it will be true if George went to one of those locations and is still true if George went to both. This is likely to be the usage of someone just trying to lay out where George might have gone over a period of time. While some languages have different words for expressing inclusive and exclusive disjunctions. English relies on context or background knowledge, sometimes with limited success, to try to distinguish which type of disjunction is being expressed. Legal documents, in order to avoid the ambiguity of ‘or’ in English, often spell out exclusive disjunctions as “A or B and not both A and B” while representing inclusive disjunctions as “A and/or B”.

Sentences such as: “ If the butler did not do it, then the cook did” and “ If I take the subway, [ then ] I will be on time for my meeting,” express onditional propositions. Conditionals are frequently used in natural languages such as English, yet there is little agreement on how they are to be analyzed logically. (Some theorists even go so far as to deny that conditional sentences express propositions at all.) Usually the disagreement concerns determining exactly what it takes for conditionals to be true, but there is widespread agreement that declarative conditionals are false if the ‘if’­–part, the antecedent , is true, and the ‘then’–part, the consequent , is false. If it is true that I take the subway, and false that I will be on time for my meeting, then the conditional “If I take the subway, I will be on time for my meeting,” is false. As a consequence, logic has defined a minimal version of the conditional, called the material conditional . Material conditionals are false if the antecedent is true and the consequent is false, but true otherwise—in other words, material conditionals are the most permissive when considering what it takes for a conditional to be true. There has been much debate about whether indicative conditionals such as “If the butler did not do it, then the cook did” just express material conditionals or rather express something stronger. Despite the disagreement, the most common articulation of conditionals in introductory logic texts is in terms of material conditionals, and it is most often this sort of conditional that is coopted into critical thinking texts. One merely needs to keep in mind that the work on understanding conditionals is far from finished.

“ Every student in this class is eligible” expresses a universal proposition—a proposition that attributes something to every member of a specified group. For a universal proposition to be true there can be no instance of a member of the group not having the specified attribute. If “Every student in this class is eligible” is true, then there is no student in the class who is not eligible. Oftentimes the group is not fully identified in the sentence used to express the proposition. For example, saying “All the beer is in the fridge” or “All horses have heads” are unlikely to be taken as expressing that every single beer in the universe is in a particular fridge or that there is no single instance of a headless horse anywhere. Depending on the context of use, likely plausible interpretations of those sentences would be: “All the beer we brought home from the store (and which has not already been drunk) is in the fridge” and “Typical, normal live horses have heads.” But once the group is fully specified, for a universal proposition to be true, every member of the group must have the attributed property or properties.

Instead of saying that everything in a given group has a stated attribute, we often merely want to convey that at least one thing or some things in the group have a particular property as in “Someone deliberately killed the deceased.” Such propositions are existential propositions. They are true when at least one object in a specified group has a specified attribute. For example, “Some student is eligible” is true just so long as at least one student is indeed eligible.

So far, most of our examples of propositions can be true or false given a single possibility. Suppose we restrict ourselves to just the actual possibility—then it is either true that George is a bachelor at the actual possibility or it is not; if, at the actual possibility, there is no student in the class who is not eligible, then the universal “Every student in class is eligible” is true at the actual possibility and otherwise false. But some of our declarative sentences are not just about one possibility; rather, they depend on multiple possibilities. Sentences such as the last two on our list, which express modal propositions are examples. (They are called “modal” because expressions such as “must”, “can”, “might”, “would”, etc., were said to indicate the “mode” of the component proposition.)

Different modal expressions have different truth conditions. Consider, for example, the sentence—“In order to be on time for your meeting you must take the subway.” For it to be true, all the possible ways (probably some set of practical possibilities constrained by the background in which the sentence is uttered) in which you make the meeting on time include your taking the subway. In the case of England losing, but winning if they’d scored their penalty, the first part is a negation that is true just so long as England won is false. So the first part tells us what the actual possibility is like. But the second part tells us what the relevantly similar possibilities except for England scoring their penalty, are like—namely, that England won in at least one of those possibilities. Compare that with the stronger claim that England would have won if they had scored their penalty—that claim will be true just so long as England wins in all the relevantly similar possibilities. (Part of the debate about conditionals is whether even conditionals without explicit modal terms, such as ‘might’ or ‘would’ or ‘must’, etc. are really expressing propositions concerning multiple possibilities, and not just the actual one—again, a debate I will not be able to resolve here.)

This list is not at all meant to be exhaustive of the type of propositions we express via our declarative sentences. Rather, it is meant to give a flavor for the sorts of propositions dealt with in first and second logic courses, the sorts of propositions that logicians attempt to model and define clearly and precisely in their basic systems. Why are logicians interested in these sorts of propositions? Because they show up in many of the reasoning patterns that we use over and over. For example, if I tell you George is either at Sophie’s or at the movies, and you tell me he is not at movies, we both hopefully reason that we should check for George at Sophie’s house. Another example: If the IRS says that all taxpayers satisfying their three specified conditions can claim a particular deduction, and you determine that you satisfy those three conditions, you should reason that you can take that particular deduction. It is by recognizing these types of propositions, and the patterns that result in combining them, that formal logic, which focuses on the patterns, gets its impetus. But regardless of whether one is focusing on the goodness of patterns or more generally on the patterns and content of reasoning, both critical thinking theorists and logicians need to take special care in determining what proposition a given sentence in a particular context expresses, for without understanding the correct proposition we will not be considering and evaluating the correct possibilities.

Even though understanding and classifying what propositions various declarative sentences express is an ongoing project, there is another classification scheme that logicians often appeal to—necessary truths (also called tautologies), necessary falsehoods (also called contradictions), and contingent propositions. The definitions are as follows:

Necessary Truth : A proposition that is true in all possibilities.

Necessary Falsehood : A proposition that is false in all possibilities.

Contingent Proposition : A proposition that is true in some, but not all, possibilities.

Sentences such as: “Either Socrates corrupts the youth of Athens or he does not”, or “If it is raining, then it is raining” express necessary truths. For every possibility there is, either Socrates corrupts the youth of Athens in that possibility or he does not. Some have wondered if there any non-trivial tautologies, since the standard examples, such as the ones I just gave, seem to be pretty trivial, uninformative sentences. Many theoreticians hold that the truths of mathematics are all necessary truths and many of those truths are certainly non-trivial—they often take a lot of work for us to know that they are true. Others point out that even if many necessary truths seem trivial or uninformative, they are still very useful. Plato, for example, uses the Socrates sentence in part of his dialogue concerning whether Socrates should have been found guilty of a particular offense. Plato starts with the obvious truth that either Socrates corrupts the youth or he does not, but proceeds to argue that in either case, Socrates should not be found guilty.

Sentences such as “At a particular moment in time, Socrates is over six-feet tall and Socrates is not over six-feet tall” express necessary falsehoods. For any possibility, and any moment of time in that possibility, Socrates cannot be both over six-feet tall and not over six-feet tall. Necessary falsehoods, or contradictions as they are more commonly called, are useful as sign-posts of something having gone drastically wrong in our reasoning. If we can show that someone’s position contains or leads to a contradiction, then we show that they aren’t even talking about a genuine possibility at all, but rather an impossibility. Good reasoners generally want to avoid being committed to impossibilities, so they try to avoid being committed to contradictions in their reasoning.

Most of the propositions we deal with in our everyday reasoning are contingent ones. “The coin landed heads on the first flip” is true in some possibilities, but false in others. “George will arrive on time” is true in some, but false in others. Even complex propositions, such as “If I take the subway, I will make it to the meeting on time” are likely to be true in some possibilities (smooth running reliable subway system) and false in others (an unreliable or scanty subway system). The challenge for good reasoners, of course, is to try to figure out, on the basis of what we already know, and the acquisition of new evidence, which propositions are in fact true at the actual possibility and which are not true. The detective, the doctor, the scientist, the everyday reasoner, are all reasoning using various possibilities in order to try to determine which propositions are true or false at the actual possibility.

2.2 Relations amongst propositions

Given that reasoning is the moving from given propositions to other propositions, and logicians are trying to understand correct reasoning, many of the important concepts of logic concern not just types of propositions, but the relations amongst propositions, I finish this section with definitions, examples, and discussion of eight such relations.

Necessary condition

One proposition, A , is a necessary condition for another propos i tion , B, if there is no possibility in which B obtains and A does not.

If A is a necessary condition for B, then you cannot have B without A. For example, if it is true that meeting the eligibility requirements is a necessary condition for legitimately holding office, then there is no possibility in which one legitimately holds office and does not meet the eligibility requirements. But if it is false that meeting the eligibility requirements is a necessary condition for legitimately holding office, then there is at least one possibility in which one legitimately holds office and does not meet the eligibility requirements.

Sufficient condition

One proposition, A , is a sufficient condition for another propos i tion B, if there is no possibility in which A obtains and B does not.

If A is a sufficient condition for B, then A guarantees B. For example, if it is true that getting a perfect score on every assessment is sufficient for passing the course, then there is no possibility in which one gets a perfect score on every assessment and one does not pass the course. If it is false, then there is at least one possibility in which one gets a perfect score on every assessment and still does not pass the course.

In many elementary logic or critical thinking textbooks, necessary and sufficient conditions are treated as material conditionals. For example, “George attending class is sufficient for George passing the course” is treated as “If George attends class, then George passes the course.” But necessary and sufficient conditions cannot be material conditionals, since denying a sufficient or necessary condition is not the same as denying a material conditional. For example, saying “George attending class is not sufficient for George passing” is not the same as denying the material conditional “If George attends class, then George passes the course” is true. Denying the material conditional is just saying that it is actually the case that George attends class, but does not pass the course, i.e., that the antecedent is true and the consequent is false. But denying that George’s attending is sufficient for George’s passing is not saying that George attends and does not pass, but rather says that there is a possibility, not necessarily the actual one, in which George attends, but does not pass. In other words, necessary and sufficient conditions are describing what is true of a range of possibilities.

Equivalence

Two propositions are equivalent just so long as there is no poss i bility in which one is true and the other is false .

In other words, for each possibility, the two propositions are either both true or both false. For example, “All Euclidean triangles have three sides” and “All Euclidean triangles have three interior angles” are both true in all possibilities and false in none, so they are logically equivalent to each other. Similarly, “Either Peter failed to make the team or Abigail failed to make the team” is logically equivalent to “Abigail and Peter did not both make the team.” If the first proposition is true, then, on an inclusive disjunction reading, at least one of the two did not make the team, so it is true that they did not both make the team. If on the other hand the first proposition is false, then it is false Pater failed to make the team (and so made it) and it is false Abigail failed to make the team (and so also made it), in which case both made the team and the second proposition is also false. Since the propositions are true in the same possibilities and false in the same possibilities they are logically equivalent.

Equivalence of proposition is not to be confused with the equivalence of sentences. Two sentences are equivalent, such as “George is a bachelor” and “George is a unmarried male of marriageable age” just in case they express the same proposition. Two distinct propositions, on the other hand, are equivalent just in case they are true or false in exactly the same possibilities. Of course, without a clear notion of the identity conditions of propositions, it is often hard to determine whether we have two sentences expressing one proposition, or two sentences expressing two distinct propositions that are equivalent to each other. [Like possibilities, theorists are still debating how to understand propositions. For example, here I have defined possibilities as sets of propositions, but some theorists reverse the order of dependence and define propositions as sets of possibilities, i.e., the possibilities at which they are true. Either way, having defined one concept in the terms of the other, the theorist still owes us an account of the undefined concept—a task theorists continue to pursue.]

Consistency

Two propositions are consistent with each other just in case there is at least one possibility in which both are true.

For example, “Sphere A is completely red” is consistent with “Cube B is completely blue” just so long as there is a possibility in which both are true. But “Sphere A is completely red” is inconsistent with “Sphere A is partly blue” since there is no possibility in which both are true.

Two propositions are contrary to each other if there is no possibi l ity in which both are true.

Contrariness is a kind of inconsistency. As we just saw, “Sphere A is completely red” is inconsistent with “Sphere A is partly blue” because there is no possibility in which both are true, i.e., because they are contrary to each other. But even though both propositions cannot be true together, they both could be false together, such as in possibilities in which “Sphere A is completely green” is true. But there is an even stronger kind of inconsistency, than mere contrariness.

Contradictor y

Two propositions are contradictory to each other if there is no possibility in which both are true or both are false .

“Sphere A is completely red” is contradictory to “Sphere A is not completely red” since if one is true, the other is false and if one is false, the other is true. Similarly, if it is true that “Snow guarantees skiing” then it is false that “There is a possibility in which there is snow and no skiing” and vice versa.

One important reason to keep these two kinds of inconsistency separate is that reasoners sometimes treat inconsistency as if it were just the same as being contradictory—they reason that if two states of affairs are inconsistent, then if one is false, the other one must be true. But such reasoners miss or ignore the possibility that two inconsistent propositions might still both be false, and as we saw in the previous section, ignoring or missing relevant possibilities is prone to generate reasoning errors. Hence, knowing whether two propositions are consistent, or contrary, or contradictory gives us important information about which possibilities are still relevant to whatever inquiry or reasoning we are pursuing using those propositions.

Since logicians are motivated by the goal of distinguishing good reasoning from bad reasoning and at least one part of good reasoning is that what we reason from adequately supports what we reason to, logicians are very interested in relations of adequate support. One very special kind of adequate support is entailment.

Entailmen t

P roposition A entails proposition B just so long as there is no po s sibility in which A is true and B is false.

For example, “Sam’s car weighs over 1000kg” entails “Sam’s car weighs at least 500kg”—any possibility in which Sam’s car is over 1000kg it is clearly at least 500kg. “Sam’s car is a red hatchback” entails “Sam’s car is red” and “Sam possesses a car” and “Sam’s car is a hatchback”. Instead of talking about what a single proposition entails, logicians are often interested in what a group or set of propositions entails. [A set of propositions entails another proposition just so long as there is no possibility in which all members of the set are true and the other proposition is false.] For example, “George went to Sophie’s house or to the movies” and “George did not go to the movies” entail “George went to Sophie’s house.” On the other hand, “If Sally attends class, then she passes the course” and “Sally passes the course” does not entail “Sally attends class,” since there are possibilities in which Sally can study well enough on her own and there is no attendance requirement, such that while it is true that “If Sally attends, then she passes the course” and true that “she passes the course”, it is false that “she attends class”.

Logic, especially formal logic, is primarily interested in entailment and other consequence relations. But at the elementary levels of logic at least the concept of entailment is applied to a concept that is also of interest to critical thinking and argumentation theorists—the concept of an argument. In logic, arguments are often modeled as a set of a set of propositions (the premises) and another proposition (the conclusion). [But see Chapters 8 and 9 of this volume for a more detailed discussion of the concept of an argument.] Logicians define validity , a property of arguments, in terms of whether or not the entailment relation holds between the premises and the other proposition, the conclusion. If the premises entail the conclusion, then the argument is valid, i.e., there is no possibility in which the premises are true and the conclusion false, and otherwise the argument is invalid. [Validity here is not to be confused with the notion of ‘valid’ that is used in everyday speech to signify that something is “good” or “worthy of further consideration”, as in: “She made a valid point, when she said ….”. Nor is it to be confused with the notion of ‘valid’ that is used in survey research to signify the goodness or utility of a measuring instrument or the results of such an instrument—for that concept see Chapter 19 of this volume.]

In the previous section, I said that one of the motivations for studying logic was to try to find properties of good reasoning that would hold in all the possibilities. Entailment (and so validity) is one such property. If the arguments you make are valid, i.e. if your reasons entail your conclusion, then your reasoning, at least in terms of support, is good reasoning. Of course, other aspects of that reasoning might be problematic, but at least you know that your reasons, if true, guarantee your conclusion, no matter what set of possibilities is the relevant set.

But consider: Most of the coins on the table are heads-up and that quarter is a coin on the table, so it is heads up. “Most of the coins on the table are heads-up” and “That quarter is a coin on the table” do not entail that “That quarter is heads up” and yet in many situations we would likely say that the first two propositions give very strong reasons to believe the third. In other words while entailment is a sure sign of inferential goodness in reasoning, the lack of entailment does not necessarily mean there is a lack of inferential goodness. Sometimes we say our reasoning is good enough, even if our reasons do not entail what we infer from them. If, in the possibilities in which our reasons are true, enough of them also have what we infer to be true, then we can say that the inferential link is good because the reasons sufficiently support our conclusion. The general definition of sufficient support is as follows:

Sufficient Support

Propostion A (or a set of propositions) sufficiently supports a proposition B just so long as, in enough of the possibilities in which A (or the set of propositions) is true, B is also true.

What counts as “enough” often varies from context to context. For example, in civil litigation, the conclusion of wrongdoing has to be supported by a preponderance of the evidence, i.e., the possibilities in which the defendant did what they are accused of, should be the case in more than 50% of the possibilities in which the provided evidence is true. But in criminal cases, the conclusion of wrongdoing should be supported beyond a reasonable doubt (which, at least if we take the vast majority of judges’ views on what that means, is above 80%). Statistical significance for supporting various hypotheses in the sciences is often set at 95% or higher. Determining what should count as “enough” in various contexts is often extremely challenging. At the very least, some of what counts as “enough” depends on the importance of the outcome. For example, since criminal sanctions are so much higher than civil sanctions, we demand more assurance that the evidence supports the conclusion of wrongdoing in the criminal case than in the civil case.

Logicians, I said, are primarily interested in consequence relations such as entailment. Different types of logic study these relations in different domains. For example, temporal or tense logics are interested in determining the consequence relations amongst uses of temporal phrases, such as, “in the future”, “in the past” and “now”. Modal logics study the consequence relations amongst propositions containing modal terms such as “must”, “can”, etc. But in addition to distinguishing types of logics by the types of propositions being modeled, logics are also categorized in terms of the type of consequence relation being studied. At the most general level, there are two types of logic—deductive and inductive. Deductive logic is concerned with entailment. Inductive logic is concerned with consequence relations weaker than entailment. Unsurprisingly, since there are many consequence relations weaker than entailment, inductive logic is a much less unified field of study than deductive logic. As we shall see in the next section, there are other uses of the terms ‘deductive’ and ‘inductive’, but these are generally misuses—the key difference between inductive and deductive logic is the type of consequence relation being studied.

I conclude this section with a final point about these eight definitions. They have all been given in terms of possibilities in general, i.e., logical possibilities. But for each definition, we could restrict the possibilities we are talking about and get restricted versions of these definitions. For example, physically necessary truths are those that hold in all the possibilities in which the physical laws hold. Morally necessary truths are those that are true in all the possibilities with the same moral code, etc. A set of propositions would physically entail another proposition if there is no physical possibility in which the propositions in the set are true and the other proposition is false. Two propositions are morally contradictory if there is no moral possibility in which both are true or both are false.

Even though explicit talk of these restricted kinds of logical concepts is rare, the theoretical apparatus is available and useful for trying to get clear on what various reasoners or arguers are in fact claiming. For example, in common discourse, when someone says that A entails B, I suspect they rarely mean that there is no possibility whatsoever in which A obtains and B does not; rather, for some contextually determined (though usually unspecified) group of possibilities there is no possibility in which A obtains and B does not. Similarly, for necessary and sufficient conditions; when someone says that snow is necessary for skiing, they probably do not mean that there is no possibility whatsoever in which there is skiing but no snow (there are in fact numerous possibilities—water skiing, roller skiing, sand skiing, skiing on artificial pellets, etc.), but rather that our typical conception of skiing requires snow. In the sciences, they are rarely concerned with logically necessary and sufficient conditions, but rather with causally necessary and sufficient conditions—conditions that require or guarantee something else in all the possibilities consistent with the causal laws. The moral for critical thinking is that even when one encounters terms such as ‘entails’ or ‘contradictory’ or ‘necessary condition’ they may not be being used in their strictly logical sense, but rather being used over a subset of relevant possibilities.

3. Logic and the activity of reasoning

3.1 logic and reasoning.

I conclude with some final comments about the application, and misapplication, of logical concepts in the study of reasoning. Logical systems are models. In particular, they are models of consequence relations between propositions. Some of the models are quite limited. For example, standard sentential or propositional logic systems ignore the internal structure of simple propositions and focus solely on connectives such as ‘and’, ‘or’ or ‘if,…then’. Others add elements to model ‘must’ and ‘can’ while still ignoring everything else, and so on. The hope is to ultimately get a model, or group of models, that illuminates the standards of good reasoning, at least with regards to inferential support. Like most models, logical models can be very helpful when properly applied within the domain they model. Trying to use the model outside the proper domain, however, can have drastic consequences. For example, claiming that the standard sentential logic system is a good model for explaining instances of good reasoning utilizing modal claims is clearly a mistake. (This is true not just for logical models. For example, using the “model” of the north star as a fixed point is extremely useful for general terrestrial navigation, but using the same model for routing certain sorts of messages, which requires quite precise location determination, gets poor results.) Similarly, since logic focuses on support relations and good reasoning usually involves not just adequate support, but good reasons as well, it is a mistake to think logic is the whole story of good reasoning. Indeed, logic has little to nothing to say about what makes reasons good reasons, but rather focuses on what can legitimately be inferred from whatever good reasons we find.

3.2 Arguments and explanations

Clearly the target domain we are trying to understand and improve—the activities of reasoning, arguing, justifying, persuading, etc., are much more complicated than any of the various logical systems that logicians produce to model certain aspects of those activities. And yet many theorists still try to find distinctions in the models that are really only distinctions in the activities and not really the concern of logic at all. For example, logicians and argumentation theorists have spent a lot of time trying to distinguish arguments from explanations. But suppose I lay out several reasons (including some reasons about what I think will happen in the next six months) why you should believe a particular company will fail in the next six months. Six months go by and the company fails and someone else asks “Why?” and I trot out my reasons again. Nothing has changed about the propositions involved, so, from the perspective of logic, there is one object, one set of propositions, here. Yet, how that object has been used has changed. Initially the reasons are used to argue that the company will fail. After the fact, the reasons are used to explain the company’s failure. We argue for propositions we are not sure of (or to convince others of propositions they are not sure of), but we explain propositions we are sure of, some of which may have been proved to us by argument, in order to understand why they are true. [Note that unlike my example, there are plenty of cases where the reasons one might give to argue for a proposition, which turns out to be true, need not be the reasons given when explaining why the proposition is true. For example, if something unexpected happens in the six months that contributes to the company’s failure that is likely to be a part of the act of explaining even though it was not part of the act of arguing.] The fact that there is a difference between acts of arguing and acts of explaining does not mean that, in the domain of logic, we should find separate kinds of things—arguments on the one hand and explanations on the other.

3.3 Inferring and implying

Going in the other direction, no one doubts that, considered in terms of propositions and support relations the inference from A to B and the implication of B by A are the same thing. But it is a mistake to think that the act of inferring is the same as the act of implying. You assert a group of facts (with the intention that I draw conclusions from those facts). I, being a good reasoner, draw those conclusions. You imply those conclusions and I infer those conclusions. Put another way, if I ask someone what they are inferring, I am asking about reasoning going on in their head, but if I ask someone what they are implying, I am asking about reasoning they hope to be going on in other people’s heads. Put yet another way, reasons do not infer conclusions, but rather imply them. People, when considering those reasons on their own, infer those conclusions, but do not imply them.

3.4 Deductive and inductive

Sometimes concepts are misapplied in both the model and the target domain. For example, some logic textbooks and critical thinking textbooks try to distinguish deductive arguments from inductive arguments, but from the perspective of logic there is nothing about the sets of propositions that compose arguments that make one kind of set deductive and another set inductive. For every group of reasons and a given conclusion we can ask whether the reasons entail the conclusion or not (the domain of deductive logic) or whether those very same reasons offer some support weaker than entailment or not (the domain of inductive logic.) Nor is it clear that we reason deductively or inductively—when we reason, we infer one or more propositions from others. Of that reasoning we did, we might wonder whether it is good or bad. The answer to that question will, in part, depend on what counts as good enough support in the situation in which I am using the reasoning. If the context requires entailment and the reasons do entail the conclusion, then the reasoning is adequate with regards to its support relation. If the reasons do not entail the conclusion, then it will fail to be adequate in such a situation. Similarly for a required support relation weaker than entailment—if reasons support the conclusion at or above the required level, then the support relation is adequate, whereas if it is below the required level the support relation is not adequate. The reasoning is one act of reasoning—whether the actual support relation of that reasoning is adequate or not depends on the situation. But none of this suddenly makes it the case that there are two distinct kinds of reasoning going on (even if there is a felt difference between realizing some reasons entail a conclusion versus realizing some premises only strongly support a conclusion.)

3.5 Linked vs. convergent arguments

One final example. The push for general principles often takes something that may track a real distinction or property in a certain specific set of cases and try to generalize it to all cases. For example, there is a strong intuition that reasons such as: “If you pass the test, then you will pass the course” and “You pass the test” work together to support the conclusion “you will pass the course” whereas reasons such as “You read all the supplemental material” and “You took good notes” and “You went to the tutor consistently” independently support the conclusion that “You are prepared for the test.” This intuition is strong enough, that numerous textbooks, especially those that use argument diagramming as a tool, try to distinguish arguments with linked premise structures from arguments with convergent premise structures. The problem here is two-fold. On the one hand, attempts to actually provide a rule for determining when a set (or subset) of reasons are linked or not have, to date, all failed, at least if we trust the intuitions that generated the drive to generalize the phenomena in the first place. On the other hand, the underlying judgments of whether premises are working together or are independent seem to vary from person to person and context to context enough to suspect that the distinction may not be tracking a real phenomenon that deserves to be represented or captured in our logical models.

4. Last word

Despite these injunctions to take care with the proper application of various concepts that have made their way into various textbooks, the core logical concepts of Section 2, such as sufficient support or co n sistency or necessary condition are useful in any study of reasoning. Even if good reasoners need to be careful and work diligently to determine which propositions are being expressed, and which possibilities are relevant, and what the needed standard of sufficient support is in a given situation, once these tasks are accomplished, we can evaluate our reasoning for inconsistencies and determine whether our reasons entail or at least adequately support our conclusions.

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Studies in Critical Thinking Copyright © by G.C. Goddu is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Kant and the Science of Logic: A Historical and Philosophical Reconstruction

Huaping Lu-Adler, Kant and the Science of Logic: A Historical and Philosophical Reconstruction , Oxford University Press, 2018, 244pp., $74.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780190907136.

Reviewed by Jill Vance Buroker, California State University, San Bernardino

In this book, Huaping Lu-Adler provides a detailed analysis of Kant's view that logic is a science, that is, a formal system of a priori rules of thought. This characterization is not surprising, but the complexity underlying it is. To spell this out, she identifies four key questions to be answered. First, is logic a) a science, b) an instrument or organon for acquiring knowledge, c) a canon or standard for assessing reasoning, or d) some combination of these? Second, if logic is a science, what is its subject matter distinguishing it from other sciences? Third, if logic is necessary to all philosophy, on what principles is it based and how are they justified? And fourth, if logic is both a science and an instrument, what is the relation between these roles?

Lu-Adler places Kant in historical context (chapters 1-3), details his pre-Critical development to the idea of a transcendental logic (chapter 4), and ends by answering the four questions above with respect to Kant's Critical views (chapter 5). In her analysis she marks several distinctions, notably between pure vs. applied logic, general vs. particular logics, pure general vs. transcendental logic, and artificial vs. natural logic. Despite the (occasionally) exhausting details, Lu-Adler's account is clearly written and organized. Throughout, her discussion is enlightening and a solid corrective to the standard view that, from the 16 th -19 th centuries, philosophers had nothing interesting to say about logic.

Chapter one lays the foundation by discussing Kant's logical texts and the approaches to logic in the period he was writing. Most readers are aware that the views designated as Kant's 'Logic' are scattered through a number of texts. These include Kant's own lecture notes based on Meier's Auszug aus der Vernunftlehre ; numerous Reflexionen passages, including his marginal notes to Meier's text; the Logic compiled by Jäsche; other transcripts of his lectures ( Vorlesungen ); and his own published remarks, including those in the Critique of Pure Reason. Given this variety, and the fact that Kant's lectures were subject to curricular constraints, Lu-Adler's first problem is to determine Kant's actual views. Among the reasons to doubt the accuracy of Jäsche's text is his position that Kant was not concerned with the grounding principles of logic. As Lu-Adler will show, this was precisely the basis of Kant's Critical distinction between pure general and transcendental logic and his position on the necessity of logic to all philosophy.

Lu-Adler then places Kant in the context of a methodological debate between eclectics and dogmatic sectarians. The former, represented by Christian Thomasias (1655-1728), valued intellectual autonomy and independence from tradition and prejudice. From the standpoint of dogmatic sectarians, the eclectic method was arbitrary and unsystematic. Christian Wolff's systematic method was often treated as dogmatic, given his idea that each science has an end that determines its a priori principles. Although Kant criticized Wolff's attempt to justify the principles of logic, he accepted Wolff's view that a science is a systematic whole having an a priori unity. In the Critique , Kant characterizes reason as progressing from dogmatic to skeptical to critical methods (A761/B789), mirroring the stages of growth from childhood to teenager to adult. Accordingly, Lu-Adler describes Kant's methodology as a "critical eclecticism," based on the idea that the fundamental principles of logic are grounded in the nature and limits of human capacities.

Chapter two surveys the history of views of logic from Aristotle up to the 16 th century. One issue concerns the relation between logic and branches of philosophy such as metaphysics, ethics, and physics. Another is the subject matter and purpose of logic: if it is a theoretical science, how does it relate to rhetoric (or grammar) and dialectic? And of course the main question: what are the first principles on which logic is based, and how are they justified? To answer the skeptical dilemma concerning first principles -- either they cannot be demonstrated, or the attempt at demonstration results in an infinite regress -- Aristotle claims the principles of logic are learned by induction from experience. For him logic is a general theoretical science serving as a unique organon to acquiring knowledge. Aquinas adopts this view, identifying the subject matter of logic as the three acts of reason (actus rationis): conceiving, judging and inferring. Lu-Adler's survey ranges widely over the medieval period, touching on the views of Avicenna and al-Farabi, Peter Abelard, John of Salisbury, Walter Burley, William of Ockham, and others on the questions listed above. Based on their disagreements, she concludes that "logic never enjoyed a definitive, secure, or lasting position in philosophy." (66)

Chapter three examines Kant's immediate predecessors, who fall into two groups. Bacon and Locke share an empiricist "natural history" approach to logic and reject syllogistic logic as unfruitful. Unlike Locke, Bacon sees logic as an organon to acquire knowledge. Because syllogistic logic is based on haphazard principles and vulgar notions, such as substance, quality, and being, he argues for a new logic ( Novum Organum ) that will clear the mind of the prejudices and "idols" that corrupt reason. Locke agrees that logic is based on an analysis of natural reason, but he interprets that as a physiology of the mind developed inductively by reflection. His method treats the thinker as an independent agent who must regulate her own activities, in choosing how to direct the mind. Thus syllogistic and formal systems, although useful in some cases, are artificial tools that cannot help expand knowledge. Instead, making correct inferences depends on discerning the agreement of ideas and ordering them correctly. Both Bacon and Locke trace the errors of reasoning and mistaken philosophical systems to prejudices and undue influences. Although Kant rejects their empirical approach to reasoning, he accepts their view of errors of reasoning.

By contrast, Leibniz and Wolff base their positions on rationalist theories of innate reason, guaranteed by God's goodness. Because the texts we consider as containing Leibniz's logic were not published until the 20 th century, Kant's knowledge of Leibniz was based on the New Essays . There Leibniz argues that syllogistic forms are simply well-ordered versions of laws of natural reason, which are preformed dispositions in the soul. Although Aristotle invented the syllogism as a formal device, a scientific method of demonstration, such as that exhibited in Euclidean geometry, can be extended to other sciences, including metaphysics and ethics. Wolff agrees that logic must have an a priori unity with demonstrable first principles, but he locates it differently in relation to philosophy. As Lu-Adler summarizes his position, it includes four theses, all of which Kant will reject: 1) artificial logic is a distinct representation of natural logic; 2) the principles of scientific logic are derived from ontology and psychology; 3) the part of logic that applies rules to extend knowledge in the sciences forms a "practical logic;" and 4) philosophical and mathematical methods are based on the syllogistic logic of certitude. (96-7) Lu-Adler wraps up this chapter by concluding that with respect to the grounding principles of logic, Bacon and Locke opt for natural reason, although Locke denies that syllogistic logic is universal. By contrast, Leibniz and Wolff attribute the principles of natural logic to the goodness of God. Regarding whether logic provides an organon, Locke rejects a universal logical tool, whereas Bacon seeks a new instrument, and Leibniz and Wolff envision a universal logic for all sciences. Finally, with respect to philosophy, Bacon, Leibniz and Wolff all give logic a pre-eminent role, while Locke considers formal logic unnecessary, although helpful in assisting human intellectual endeavors.

Chapter four treats Kant's thinking from the mid-1760s up to his conception of transcendental logic. As a student at Königsberg, Kant attended lectures by Martin Knutzen, who largely adopted Wolff's views, but distinguished general logic, consisting of norms of reasoning, from special logic, a study of errors in reasoning. Kant later recasts this distinction as pure vs. applied logic. Kant also adopts Wolff's notion of logic as a systematic science with apodictic certainty, but denies that its basic principles are derived from psychology or ontology. And early on Kant also rejects Wolff's view that logic serves as an organon for acquiring knowledge, although it does function as a canon for assessing reasoning.

In the 1760s Kant was searching for a proper foundation for metaphysics. His conclusion that logic and metaphysics are distinct sciences with different subject matters leads to his distinction between logical and real uses of the understanding. In the Inaugural Dissertation of 1770, Kant separated the sensibility from the intellect; by 1772 he recognized that the main problem was to determine the source of intellectual elements of cognition. In his 1773 letter to Herz, Kant describes transcendental philosophy as both the system of a priori concepts of reason, and a critique explaining how these concepts apply to objects of experience. This leads to Kant's characterization of metaphysics as subjective insofar as it determines the boundaries of human cognition, as opposed to pure general logic, which is objective insofar as it identifies rules of reason independently of their relation to objects.

Chapter five answers the four questions outlined earlier: what is the subject matter of logic? What is its relation to metaphysics? Why can it not serve as an organon to further knowledge? And on what principles is it based as a science? This chapter alone is worth the price of the book. In answering these questions, Lu-Adler brings out many surprising aspects of Kant's familiar claim that "logic is the science of a priori principles of human reason," in particular illuminating the relation between Kant's and Aristotle's logics. There are too many details to recount here, but these are the highlights of her answers to the four questions. First, the subject matter of general logic is the understanding. Second, the separation between general logic and metaphysics (transcendental logic) depends on distinguishing necessary conditions for thinking abstracted from reference to an object, from those for thinking about objects of experience. Here she disagrees with Clinton Tolley's view that the formality of general logic consists in specifying rules of non-intentional thinking. This part of her discussion also marks several different notions of "formal" as well as ways in which logic is both objective and subjective. Third, logic cannot serve as an organon because, as the critique of reason demonstrates, the attempt to derive knowledge from the understanding alone leads to dialectical illusion. Fourth, in explaining Kant's critical view of the principles of logic, Lu-Adler enumerates various functions of logical rules: determining the possible forms of thought, evaluating thought (e.g., the PNC), uncovering the source of cognition, generating forms of thought, and defining the objective validity of thought. Finally, she offers an enlightening analysis of Kant's view of Aristotelian logic, and specifically his claim that Aristotle's logic is "complete." She makes a convincing case that Kant is actually reconstructing Aristotelian logic, just as his table of categories reconstructs Aristotle's mistaken theory of categorial concepts.

Despite her clear writing, Lu-Adler's text is not easy reading because of the detailed nature of her discussion, and in particular her many distinctions. But the book sets a high standard for future discussions of Kant's views of logic and its relation to philosophy. Anyone interested in Kant or the history and philosophy of logic will find this worth the effort.

Success Skills

Critical thinking and logic.

Critical thinking is fundamentally a process of questioning information and data. You may question the information you read in a textbook, or you may question what a politician or a professor or a classmate says. You can also question a commonly-held belief or a new idea. With critical thinking, anything and everything is subject to question and examination.

Logic’s Relationship to Critical Thinking

The word logic comes from the Ancient Greek logike , referring to the science or art of reasoning. Using logic, a person evaluates arguments and strives to distinguish between good and bad reasoning, or between truth and falsehood. Using logic, you can evaluate ideas or claims people make, make good decisions, and form sound beliefs about the world. [1]

Questions of Logic in Critical Thinking

Let’s use a simple example of applying logic to a critical-thinking situation. In this hypothetical scenario, a man has a PhD in political science, and he works as a professor at a local college. His wife works at the college, too. They have three young children in the local school system, and their family is well known in the community.

The man is now running for political office. Are his credentials and experience sufficient for entering public office? Will he be effective in the political office? Some voters might believe that his personal life and current job, on the surface, suggest he will do well in the position, and they will vote for him.

In truth, the characteristics described don’t guarantee that the man will do a good job. The information is somewhat irrelevant. What else might you want to know? How about whether the man had already held a political office and done a good job? In this case, we want to ask, How much information is adequate in order to make a decision based on logic instead of assumptions?

The following questions, presented in Figure 1, below, are ones you may apply to formulating a logical, reasoned perspective in the above scenario or any other situation:

• What’s happening? Gather the basic information and begin to think of questions.
• Why is it important? Ask yourself why it’s significant and whether or not you agree.
• What don’t I see? Is there anything important missing?
• How do I know? Ask yourself where the information came from and how it was constructed.
• Who is saying it? What’s the position of the speaker and what is influencing them?
• What else? What if? What other ideas exist and are there other possibilities?

• "logic." Wordnik . n.d. Web. 16 Feb 2016 . ↵
• Revision, Adaptation, and Original Content. Provided by : Lumen Learning. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Thinking Critically. Authored by : UBC Learning Commons. Provided by : The University of British Columbia, Vancouver Campus. Located at : http://www.oercommons.org/courses/learning-toolkit-critical-thinking/view . License : CC BY: Attribution
• Critical Thinking Skills. Authored by : Linda Bruce. Provided by : Lumen Learning. Located at : https://courses.candelalearning.com/lumencollegesuccess/chapter/critical-thinking-skills/ . License : CC BY: Attribution

5.2 Logical Statements

Learning objectives.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Identify the necessary and sufficient conditions in conditionals and universal affirmative statements.
• Describe counterexamples for statements.
• Assess the truth of conditionals and universal statements using counterexamples.

Specific types of statements have a particular meaning in logic, and such statements are frequently used by philosophers in their arguments. Of particular importance is the conditional , which expresses the logical relations between two propositions. Conditional statements are used to accurately describe the world or construct a theory. Counterexamples are statements used to disprove a conditional. Universal statements are statements that assert something about every member of a set of things and are an alternative way to describe a conditional.

Conditionals

A conditional is most commonly expressed as an if–then statement, similar to the examples we discussed earlier when considering hypotheses. Additional examples of if–then statements are “If you eat your meat, then you can have some pudding” and “If that animal is a dog, then it is a mammal.” But there are other ways to express conditionals, such as “You can have pudding only if you eat your meat” or “ All dogs are mammals.” While these sentences are different, their logical meaning is the same as their correlative if–then sentences above.

All conditionals include two components—that which follows the “if” and that which follows the “then.” Any conditional can be rephrased in this format. Here is an example:

Statement 1: You must complete 120 credit hours to earn a bachelor’s degree. Statement 2: If you expect to graduate, then you must complete 120 credit hours.

Whatever follows “if” is called the antecedent ; whatever follows “then” is called the consequent . Ante means “before,” as in the word “antebellum,” which in the United States refers to anything that occurred or was produced before the American Civil War. The ante cedent is the first part of the conditional, occurring before the consequent. A consequent is a result, and in a conditional statement, it is the result of the antecedent (if the antecedent is true).

Necessary and Sufficient Conditions

All conditionals express two relations, or conditions : those that are necessary and those that are sufficient. A relation is a relationship/property that exists between at least two things. If something is sufficient, it is always sufficient for something else . And if something is necessary, it is always necessary for something else. In the conditional examples offered above, one part of the relation is required for the other. For example, 120 credit hours are required for graduation, so 120 credit hours is necessary if you expect to graduate. Whatever is the consequent—that is, whatever is in the second place of a conditional—is necessary for that particular antecedent. This is the relation/condition of necessity. Put formally, Y is a necessary condition for X if and only if X cannot be true without Y being true . In other words, X cannot happen or exist without Y. Here are a few more examples:

• Being unmarried is a necessary condition for being a bachelor . If you are a bachelor, then you are unmarried.
• Being a mammal is a necessary condition for being a dog. If a creature is a dog, then it is a mammal.

But notice that the necessary relation of a conditional does not automatically occur in the other direction. Just because something is a mammal does not mean that it must be a dog. Being a bachelor is not a necessary feature of being unmarried because you can be unmarried and be an unmarried woman. Thus, the relationship between X and Y in the statement “if X, then Y” is not always symmetrical (it does not automatically hold in both directions). Y is always necessary for X, but X is not necessary for Y. On the other hand, X is always sufficient for Y.

Take the example of “If you are a bachelor, then you are unmarried.” If you know that Eric is a bachelor, then you automatically know that Eric is unmarried. As you can see, the antecedent/first part is the sufficient condition, while the consequent/second part of the conditional is the necessary condition. X is a sufficient condition for Y if and only if the truth of X guarantees the truth of Y. Thus, if X is a sufficient condition for Y, then X automatically implies Y. But the reverse is not true. Oftentimes X is not the only way for something to be Y. Returning to our example, being a bachelor is not the only way to be unmarried. Being a dog is a sufficient condition for being a mammal, but it is not necessary to be a dog to be a mammal since there are many other types of mammals.

The ability to understand and use conditionals increases the clarity of philosophical thinking and the ability to craft effective arguments. For example, some concepts, such as “innocent” or “good,” must be rigorously defined when discussing ethics or political philosophy. The standard practice in philosophy is to state the meaning of words and concepts before using them in arguments. And oftentimes, the best way to create clarity is by articulating the necessary or sufficient conditions for a term. For example, philosophers may use a conditional to clarify for their audience what they mean by “innocent”: “If a person has not committed the crime for which they have been accused, then that person is innocent.”

Counterexamples

Sometimes people disagree with conditionals. Imagine a mother saying, “If you spend all day in the sun, you’ll get sunburnt.” Mom is claiming that getting sunburnt is a necessary condition for spending all day in the sun. To argue against Mom, a teenager who wants to go to the beach might offer a counterexample , or an opposing statement that proves the first statement wrong. The teenager must point out a case in which the claimed necessary condition does not occur alongside the sufficient one. Regular application of an effective sunblock with an SPF 30 or above will allow the teenager to avoid sunburn. Thus, getting sunburned is not a necessary condition for being in the sun all day.

Counterexamples are important for testing the truth of propositions. Often people want to test the truth of statements to effectively argue against someone else, but it is also important to get into the critical thinking habit of attempting to come up with counterexamples for our own statements and propositions. Philosophy teaches us to constantly question the world around us and invites us to test and revise our beliefs. And generating creative counterexamples is a good method for testing our beliefs.

Universal Statements

Another important type of statement is the universal affirmative statement . Aristotle included universal affirmative statements in his system of logic, believing they were one of only a few types of meaningful logical statements ( On Interpretation ). Universal affirmative statements take two groups of things and claim all members of the first group are also members of the second group: “All A are B.” These statements are called universal and affirmative because they assert something about all members of group A. This type of statement is used when classifying objects and/or the relationships. Universal affirmative statements are, in fact, an alternative expression of a conditional.

Universal Statements as Conditionals

Universal statements are logically equivalent to conditionals, which means that any conditional can be translated into a universal statement and vice versa. Notice that universal statements also express the logical relations of necessity and sufficiency. Because universal affirmative statements can always be rephrased as conditionals (and vice versa), the ability to translate ordinary language statements into conditionals or universal statements is helpful for understanding logical meaning. Doing so can also help you identify necessary and sufficient conditions. Not all statements can be translated into these forms, but many can.

Counterexamples to Universal Statements

Universal affirmative statements also can be disproven using counterexamples. Take the belief that “All living things deserve moral consideration.” If you wanted to prove this statement false, you would need to find just one example of a living thing that you believe does not deserve moral consideration. Just one will suffice because the categorical claim is quite strong—that all living things deserve moral consideration. And someone might argue that some parasites, like the protozoa that causes malaria, do not deserve moral consideration.

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Overtime📖Philosophy

East vs West: Compare Their Differing Views On Philosophy

In the vast realm of philosophical thought, two distinct streams have shaped the way we perceive and understand the world: Eastern Philosophy and Western Philosophy. These two philosophical traditions, originating from different corners of the globe, offer unique perspectives on…

In the vast realm of philosophical thought, two distinct streams have shaped the way we perceive and understand the world: Eastern Philosophy and Western Philosophy. These two philosophical traditions, originating from different corners of the globe, offer unique perspectives on existence, knowledge, and the nature of reality.

While both approaches strive to uncover truth and meaning, they diverge in fundamental ways, encapsulating the richness and diversity of human intellectual inquiry.

Introduction

Philosophy, as a discipline, encompasses a vast array of ideas, concepts, and perspectives on the fundamental questions of existence, knowledge, ethics, and reality. This article aims to delve into the distinctive characteristics of Eastern and Western philosophies, highlighting their cultural origins, central themes, and contributions to our understanding of the world.

Cultural Origins

Eastern philosophy.

Eastern philosophy emerges primarily from the rich cultural tapestry of ancient civilizations in Asia, including India, China, Japan, and the Middle East. These philosophical traditions are deeply intertwined with religious and spiritual practices such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism.

Western Philosophy

Western philosophy finds its roots in ancient Greece and has evolved through the contributions of prominent thinkers from Europe and North America. Greek philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle laid the groundwork for subsequent philosophical movements, and Western philosophy has since expanded to encompass diverse schools of thought, including Rationalism, Empiricism, Existentialism , and Analytic philosophy.

Epistemological Differences

Eastern philosophical traditions often prioritize intuitive and experiential knowledge. They emphasize direct personal experience, meditation, introspection, and spiritual practices as means of gaining insight and understanding the nature of reality. Concepts such as enlightenment, self-realization, and transcendence are central to many Eastern philosophical systems.

Western philosophy, particularly in its modern form, places a significant emphasis on reason, logic, and critical thinking. The Western tradition values empirical observation, deductive and inductive reasoning, and the scientific method as means of acquiring knowledge. Analytical clarity and systematic argumentation play a crucial role in Western philosophical discourse.

Metaphysical and Ontological Perspectives

Eastern metaphysics often explores the interconnectedness and unity of all things. Concepts such as Brahman (the ultimate reality) in Hinduism, the Tao (the way) in Taoism, and the concept of Emptiness in Buddhism highlight the non-dualistic nature of reality and the idea that individual entities are part of a larger whole.

Eastern philosophy tends to emphasize the impermanence of material existence and the pursuit of spiritual liberation or enlightenment.

Western metaphysical inquiries often revolve around dualistic concepts, such as the distinction between mind and body, subject and object, and appearance and reality. Philosophers like Descartes, Kant, and Hegel have explored the nature of consciousness, the existence of God, and the relationship between the individual and society.

Western philosophy has also engaged with the study of ethics, aesthetics , and political philosophy, addressing questions about moral values, beauty, and the ideal society.

Ethical Orientations

Ethics in Eastern philosophy is often rooted in the concepts of harmony, balance, and compassionate action. Buddhist teachings emphasize the alleviation of suffering and the cultivation of compassion for all sentient beings. Confucianism emphasizes virtues such as filial piety, respect for hierarchy, and social harmony. Daoist ethics encourage one to align with the natural flow of the universe and cultivate inner virtues.

Western ethical theories have explored various approaches, including consequentialism (e.g., utilitarianism), deontological ethics (e.g., Kantian ethics), and virtue ethics (e.g., Aristotelian ethics). These frameworks address questions of moral duty, the nature of right and wrong actions, and the cultivation of virtuous character traits.

Bottom Line

The distinction between Eastern and Western Philosophies is not meant to create a binary opposition, but rather to highlight their unique strengths and approaches. Both traditions have enriched our collective intellectual landscape and continue to offer valuable insights into the human condition. As the world becomes increasingly interconnected, there is a growing appreciation for the fusion of these traditions, leading to the emergence of a more global and inclusive philosophical discourse.

Eastern philosophy and Western philosophy offer distinct lenses through which to explore the complexities of existence, knowledge, and ethical conduct. Eastern philosophy, with its emphasis on spiritual enlightenment, interconnectedness, and intuitive knowledge, provides a unique perspective on the nature of reality and the human experience.

Western philosophy, characterized by rigorous analysis, logical reasoning, and empirical investigation, has shaped our scientific, ethical, and political frameworks.

Recognizing the value of both Eastern and Western philosophical traditions encourages a broader, more inclusive understanding of the world, fostering dialogue and mutual enrichment. Ultimately, embracing the diversity of philosophical perspectives enriches our collective exploration of truth and meaning.

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1.8: Deductive vs. Inductive Arguments

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The concepts of validity and soundness that we have introduced apply only to the class of what are called “deductive arguments”. A deductive argument is an argument whose conclusion is supposed to follow from its premises with absolute certainty, thus leaving no possibility that the conclusion doesn’t follow from the premises. For a deductive argument to fail to do this is for it to fail as a deductive argument. In contrast, an inductive argument is an argument whose conclusion is supposed to follow from its premises with a high level of probability, which means that although it is possible that the conclusion doesn’t follow from its premises, it is unlikely that this is the case. Here is an example of an inductive argument:

Tweets is a healthy, normally functioning bird and since most healthy, normally functioning birds fly, Tweets probably flies.

Notice that the conclusion, Tweets probably flies, contains the word “probably.” This is a clear indicator that the argument is supposed to be inductive, not deductive. Here is the argument in standard form:

• Tweets is a healthy, normally functioning bird
• Most healthy, normally functioning birds fly
• Therefore, Tweets probably flies

Given the information provided by the premises, the conclusion does seem to be well supported. That is, the premises do give us a strong reason for accepting the conclusion. This is true even though we can imagine a scenario in which the premises are true and yet the conclusion is false. For example, suppose that we added the following premise:

Tweets is 6 ft tall and can run 30 mph.

Were we to add that premise, the conclusion would no longer be supported by the premises, since any bird that is 6 ft tall and can run 30 mph, is not a kind of bird that can fly. That information leads us to believe that Tweets is an ostrich or emu, which are not kinds of birds that can fly. As this example shows, inductive arguments are defeasible arguments since by adding further information or premises to the argument, we can overturn (defeat) the verdict that the conclusion is well-supported by the premises. Inductive arguments whose premises give us a strong, even if defeasible, reason for accepting the conclusion are called, unsurprisingly, strong inductive arguments . In contrast, an inductive argument that does not provide a strong reason for accepting the conclusion are called weak inductive arguments.

Whereas strong inductive arguments are defeasible, valid deductive arguments aren’t. Suppose that instead of saying that most birds fly, premise 2 said that all birds fly.

• Tweets is a healthy, normally function bird.
• All healthy, normally functioning birds can fly.
• Therefore, Tweets can fly.

This is a valid argument and since it is a valid argument, there are no further premises that we could add that could overturn the argument’s validity. (True, premise 2 is false, but as we’ve seen that is irrelevant to determining whether an argument is valid.) Even if we were to add the premise that Tweets is 6 ft tall and can run 30 mph, it doesn’t overturn the validity of the argument. As soon as we use the universal generalization , “all healthy, normally function birds can fly,” then when we assume that premise is true and add that Tweets is a healthy, normally functioning bird, it has to follow from those premises that Tweets can fly. This is true even if we add that Tweets is 6 ft tall because then what we have to imagine (in applying our informal test of validity) is a world in which all birds, including those that are 6 ft tall and can run 30 mph, can fly. Although inductive arguments are an important class of argument that are commonly used every day in many contexts, logic texts tend not to spend as much time with them since we have no agreed upon standard of evaluating them. In contrast, there is an agreed upon standard of evaluation of deductive arguments. We have already seen what that is; it is the concept of validity. In chapter 2 we will learn some precise, formal methods of evaluating deductive arguments. There are no such agreed upon formal methods of evaluation for inductive arguments. This is an area of ongoing research in philosophy. In chapter 3 we will revisit inductive arguments and consider some ways to evaluate inductive arguments.

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Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is a widely accepted educational goal. Its definition is contested, but the competing definitions can be understood as differing conceptions of the same basic concept: careful thinking directed to a goal. Conceptions differ with respect to the scope of such thinking, the type of goal, the criteria and norms for thinking carefully, and the thinking components on which they focus. Its adoption as an educational goal has been recommended on the basis of respect for students’ autonomy and preparing students for success in life and for democratic citizenship. “Critical thinkers” have the dispositions and abilities that lead them to think critically when appropriate. The abilities can be identified directly; the dispositions indirectly, by considering what factors contribute to or impede exercise of the abilities. Standardized tests have been developed to assess the degree to which a person possesses such dispositions and abilities. Educational intervention has been shown experimentally to improve them, particularly when it includes dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring. Controversies have arisen over the generalizability of critical thinking across domains, over alleged bias in critical thinking theories and instruction, and over the relationship of critical thinking to other types of thinking.

2.1 Dewey’s Three Main Examples

2.2 dewey’s other examples, 2.3 further examples, 2.4 non-examples, 3. the definition of critical thinking, 4. its value, 5. the process of thinking critically, 6. components of the process, 7. contributory dispositions and abilities, 8.1 initiating dispositions, 8.2 internal dispositions, 9. critical thinking abilities, 10. required knowledge, 11. educational methods, 12.1 the generalizability of critical thinking, 12.2 bias in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, 12.3 relationship of critical thinking to other types of thinking, other internet resources, related entries.

Use of the term ‘critical thinking’ to describe an educational goal goes back to the American philosopher John Dewey (1910), who more commonly called it ‘reflective thinking’. He defined it as

active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it, and the further conclusions to which it tends. (Dewey 1910: 6; 1933: 9)

and identified a habit of such consideration with a scientific attitude of mind. His lengthy quotations of Francis Bacon, John Locke, and John Stuart Mill indicate that he was not the first person to propose development of a scientific attitude of mind as an educational goal.

In the 1930s, many of the schools that participated in the Eight-Year Study of the Progressive Education Association (Aikin 1942) adopted critical thinking as an educational goal, for whose achievement the study’s Evaluation Staff developed tests (Smith, Tyler, & Evaluation Staff 1942). Glaser (1941) showed experimentally that it was possible to improve the critical thinking of high school students. Bloom’s influential taxonomy of cognitive educational objectives (Bloom et al. 1956) incorporated critical thinking abilities. Ennis (1962) proposed 12 aspects of critical thinking as a basis for research on the teaching and evaluation of critical thinking ability.

Since 1980, an annual international conference in California on critical thinking and educational reform has attracted tens of thousands of educators from all levels of education and from many parts of the world. Also since 1980, the state university system in California has required all undergraduate students to take a critical thinking course. Since 1983, the Association for Informal Logic and Critical Thinking has sponsored sessions in conjunction with the divisional meetings of the American Philosophical Association (APA). In 1987, the APA’s Committee on Pre-College Philosophy commissioned a consensus statement on critical thinking for purposes of educational assessment and instruction (Facione 1990a). Researchers have developed standardized tests of critical thinking abilities and dispositions; for details, see the Supplement on Assessment . Educational jurisdictions around the world now include critical thinking in guidelines for curriculum and assessment. Political and business leaders endorse its importance.

For details on this history, see the Supplement on History .

2. Examples and Non-Examples

Before considering the definition of critical thinking, it will be helpful to have in mind some examples of critical thinking, as well as some examples of kinds of thinking that would apparently not count as critical thinking.

Dewey (1910: 68–71; 1933: 91–94) takes as paradigms of reflective thinking three class papers of students in which they describe their thinking. The examples range from the everyday to the scientific.

Transit : “The other day, when I was down town on 16th Street, a clock caught my eye. I saw that the hands pointed to 12:20. This suggested that I had an engagement at 124th Street, at one o'clock. I reasoned that as it had taken me an hour to come down on a surface car, I should probably be twenty minutes late if I returned the same way. I might save twenty minutes by a subway express. But was there a station near? If not, I might lose more than twenty minutes in looking for one. Then I thought of the elevated, and I saw there was such a line within two blocks. But where was the station? If it were several blocks above or below the street I was on, I should lose time instead of gaining it. My mind went back to the subway express as quicker than the elevated; furthermore, I remembered that it went nearer than the elevated to the part of 124th Street I wished to reach, so that time would be saved at the end of the journey. I concluded in favor of the subway, and reached my destination by one o’clock.” (Dewey 1910: 68-69; 1933: 91-92)

Ferryboat : “Projecting nearly horizontally from the upper deck of the ferryboat on which I daily cross the river is a long white pole, having a gilded ball at its tip. It suggested a flagpole when I first saw it; its color, shape, and gilded ball agreed with this idea, and these reasons seemed to justify me in this belief. But soon difficulties presented themselves. The pole was nearly horizontal, an unusual position for a flagpole; in the next place, there was no pulley, ring, or cord by which to attach a flag; finally, there were elsewhere on the boat two vertical staffs from which flags were occasionally flown. It seemed probable that the pole was not there for flag-flying.

“I then tried to imagine all possible purposes of the pole, and to consider for which of these it was best suited: (a) Possibly it was an ornament. But as all the ferryboats and even the tugboats carried poles, this hypothesis was rejected. (b) Possibly it was the terminal of a wireless telegraph. But the same considerations made this improbable. Besides, the more natural place for such a terminal would be the highest part of the boat, on top of the pilot house. (c) Its purpose might be to point out the direction in which the boat is moving.

“In support of this conclusion, I discovered that the pole was lower than the pilot house, so that the steersman could easily see it. Moreover, the tip was enough higher than the base, so that, from the pilot's position, it must appear to project far out in front of the boat. Morevoer, the pilot being near the front of the boat, he would need some such guide as to its direction. Tugboats would also need poles for such a purpose. This hypothesis was so much more probable than the others that I accepted it. I formed the conclusion that the pole was set up for the purpose of showing the pilot the direction in which the boat pointed, to enable him to steer correctly.” (Dewey 1910: 69-70; 1933: 92-93)

Bubbles : “In washing tumblers in hot soapsuds and placing them mouth downward on a plate, bubbles appeared on the outside of the mouth of the tumblers and then went inside. Why? The presence of bubbles suggests air, which I note must come from inside the tumbler. I see that the soapy water on the plate prevents escape of the air save as it may be caught in bubbles. But why should air leave the tumbler? There was no substance entering to force it out. It must have expanded. It expands by increase of heat, or by decrease of pressure, or both. Could the air have become heated after the tumbler was taken from the hot suds? Clearly not the air that was already entangled in the water. If heated air was the cause, cold air must have entered in transferring the tumblers from the suds to the plate. I test to see if this supposition is true by taking several more tumblers out. Some I shake so as to make sure of entrapping cold air in them. Some I take out holding mouth downward in order to prevent cold air from entering. Bubbles appear on the outside of every one of the former and on none of the latter. I must be right in my inference. Air from the outside must have been expanded by the heat of the tumbler, which explains the appearance of the bubbles on the outside. But why do they then go inside? Cold contracts. The tumbler cooled and also the air inside it. Tension was removed, and hence bubbles appeared inside. To be sure of this, I test by placing a cup of ice on the tumbler while the bubbles are still forming outside. They soon reverse” (Dewey 1910: 70–71; 1933: 93–94).

Dewey (1910, 1933) sprinkles his book with other examples of critical thinking. We will refer to the following.

Weather : A man on a walk notices that it has suddenly become cool, thinks that it is probably going to rain, looks up and sees a dark cloud obscuring the sun, and quickens his steps (1910: 6–10; 1933: 9–13).

Disorder : A man finds his rooms on his return to them in disorder with his belongings thrown about, thinks at first of burglary as an explanation, then thinks of mischievous children as being an alternative explanation, then looks to see whether valuables are missing, and discovers that they are (1910: 82–83; 1933: 166–168).

Typhoid : A physician diagnosing a patient whose conspicuous symptoms suggest typhoid avoids drawing a conclusion until more data are gathered by questioning the patient and by making tests (1910: 85–86; 1933: 170).

Blur : A moving blur catches our eye in the distance, we ask ourselves whether it is a cloud of whirling dust or a tree moving its branches or a man signaling to us, we think of other traits that should be found on each of those possibilities, and we look and see if those traits are found (1910: 102, 108; 1933: 121, 133).

Suction pump : In thinking about the suction pump, the scientist first notes that it will draw water only to a maximum height of 33 feet at sea level and to a lesser maximum height at higher elevations, selects for attention the differing atmospheric pressure at these elevations, sets up experiments in which the air is removed from a vessel containing water (when suction no longer works) and in which the weight of air at various levels is calculated, compares the results of reasoning about the height to which a given weight of air will allow a suction pump to raise water with the observed maximum height at different elevations, and finally assimilates the suction pump to such apparently different phenomena as the siphon and the rising of a balloon (1910: 150–153; 1933: 195–198).

Diamond : A passenger in a car driving in a diamond lane reserved for vehicles with at least one passenger notices that the diamond marks on the pavement are far apart in some places and close together in others. Why? The driver suggests that the reason may be that the diamond marks are not needed where there is a solid double line separating the diamond line from the adjoining lane, but are needed when there is a dotted single line permitting crossing into the diamond lane. Further observation confirms that the diamonds are close together when a dotted line separates the diamond lane from its neighbour, but otherwise far apart.

Rash : A woman suddenly develops a very itchy red rash on her throat and upper chest. She recently noticed a mark on the back of her right hand, but was not sure whether the mark was a rash or a scrape. She lies down in bed and thinks about what might be causing the rash and what to do about it. About two weeks before, she began taking blood pressure medication that contained a sulfa drug, and the pharmacist had warned her, in view of a previous allergic reaction to a medication containing a sulfa drug, to be on the alert for an allergic reaction; however, she had been taking the medication for two weeks with no such effect. The day before, she began using a new cream on her neck and upper chest; against the new cream as the cause was mark on the back of her hand, which had not been exposed to the cream. She began taking probiotics about a month before. She also recently started new eye drops, but she supposed that manufacturers of eye drops would be careful not to include allergy-causing components in the medication. The rash might be a heat rash, since she recently was sweating profusely from her upper body. Since she is about to go away on a short vacation, where she would not have access to her usual physician, she decides to keep taking the probiotics and using the new eye drops but to discontinue the blood pressure medication and to switch back to the old cream for her neck and upper chest. She forms a plan to consult her regular physician on her return about the blood pressure medication.

Candidate : Although Dewey included no examples of thinking directed at appraising the arguments of others, such thinking has come to be considered a kind of critical thinking. We find an example of such thinking in the performance task on the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA+), which its sponsoring organization describes as

a performance-based assessment that provides a measure of an institution’s contribution to the development of critical-thinking and written communication skills of its students. (Council for Aid to Education 2017)

A sample task posted on its website requires the test-taker to write a report for public distribution evaluating a fictional candidate’s policy proposals and their supporting arguments, using supplied background documents, with a recommendation on whether to endorse the candidate.

Immediate acceptance of an idea that suggests itself as a solution to a problem (e.g., a possible explanation of an event or phenomenon, an action that seems likely to produce a desired result) is “uncritical thinking, the minimum of reflection” (Dewey 1910: 13). On-going suspension of judgment in the light of doubt about a possible solution is not critical thinking (Dewey 1910: 108). Critique driven by a dogmatically held political or religious ideology is not critical thinking; thus Paulo Freire (1968 [1970]) is using the term (e.g., at 1970: 71, 81, 100, 146) in a more politically freighted sense that includes not only reflection but also revolutionary action against oppression. Derivation of a conclusion from given data using an algorithm is not critical thinking.

What is critical thinking? There are many definitions. Ennis (2016) lists 14 philosophically oriented scholarly definitions and three dictionary definitions. Following Rawls (1971), who distinguished his conception of justice from a utilitarian conception but regarded them as rival conceptions of the same concept, Ennis maintains that the 17 definitions are different conceptions of the same concept. Rawls articulated the shared concept of justice as

a characteristic set of principles for assigning basic rights and duties and for determining… the proper distribution of the benefits and burdens of social cooperation. (Rawls 1971: 5)

Bailin et al. (1999b) claim that, if one considers what sorts of thinking an educator would take not to be critical thinking and what sorts to be critical thinking, one can conclude that educators typically understand critical thinking to have at least three features.

• It is done for the purpose of making up one’s mind about what to believe or do.
• The person engaging in the thinking is trying to fulfill standards of adequacy and accuracy appropriate to the thinking.
• The thinking fulfills the relevant standards to some threshold level.

One could sum up the core concept that involves these three features by saying that critical thinking is careful goal-directed thinking. This core concept seems to apply to all the examples of critical thinking described in the previous section. As for the non-examples, their exclusion depends on construing careful thinking as excluding jumping immediately to conclusions, suspending judgment no matter how strong the evidence, reasoning from an unquestioned ideological or religious perspective, and routinely using an algorithm to answer a question.

If the core of critical thinking is careful goal-directed thinking, conceptions of it can vary according to its presumed scope, its presumed goal, one’s criteria and threshold for being careful, and the thinking component on which one focuses As to its scope, some conceptions (e.g., Dewey 1910, 1933) restrict it to constructive thinking on the basis of one’s own observations and experiments, others (e.g., Ennis 1962; Fisher & Scriven 1997; Johnson 1992) to appraisal of the products of such thinking. Ennis (1991) and Bailin et al. (1999b) take it to cover both construction and appraisal. As to its goal, some conceptions restrict it to forming a judgment (Dewey 1910, 1933; Lipman 1987; Facione 1990a). Others allow for actions as well as beliefs as the end point of a process of critical thinking (Ennis 1991; Bailin et al. 1999b). As to the criteria and threshold for being careful, definitions vary in the term used to indicate that critical thinking satisfies certain norms: “intellectually disciplined” (Scriven & Paul 1987), “reasonable” (Ennis 1991), “skillful” (Lipman 1987), “skilled” (Fisher & Scriven 1997), “careful” (Bailin & Battersby 2009). Some definitions specify these norms, referring variously to “consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusions to which it tends” (Dewey 1910, 1933); “the methods of logical inquiry and reasoning” (Glaser 1941); “conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication” (Scriven & Paul 1987); the requirement that “it is sensitive to context, relies on criteria, and is self-correcting” (Lipman 1987); “evidential, conceptual, methodological, criteriological, or contextual considerations” (Facione 1990a); and “plus-minus considerations of the product in terms of appropriate standards (or criteria)” (Johnson 1992). Stanovich and Stanovich (2010) propose to ground the concept of critical thinking in the concept of rationality, which they understand as combining epistemic rationality (fitting one’s beliefs to the world) and instrumental rationality (optimizing goal fulfillment); a critical thinker, in their view, is someone with “a propensity to override suboptimal responses from the autonomous mind” (2010: 227). These variant specifications of norms for critical thinking are not necessarily incompatible with one another, and in any case presuppose the core notion of thinking carefully. As to the thinking component singled out, some definitions focus on suspension of judgment during the thinking (Dewey 1910; McPeck 1981), others on inquiry while judgment is suspended (Bailin & Battersby 2009), others on the resulting judgment (Facione 1990a), and still others on the subsequent emotive response (Siegel 1988).

In educational contexts, a definition of critical thinking is a “programmatic definition” (Scheffler 1960: 19). It expresses a practical program for achieving an educational goal. For this purpose, a one-sentence formulaic definition is much less useful than articulation of a critical thinking process, with criteria and standards for the kinds of thinking that the process may involve. The real educational goal is recognition, adoption and implementation by students of those criteria and standards. That adoption and implementation in turn consists in acquiring the knowledge, abilities and dispositions of a critical thinker.

Conceptions of critical thinking generally do not include moral integrity as part of the concept. Dewey, for example, took critical thinking to be the ultimate intellectual goal of education, but distinguished it from the development of social cooperation among school children, which he took to be the central moral goal. Ennis (1996, 2011) added to his previous list of critical thinking dispositions a group of dispositions to care about the dignity and worth of every person, which he described as a “correlative” (1996) disposition without which critical thinking would be less valuable and perhaps harmful. An educational program that aimed at developing critical thinking but not the correlative disposition to care about the dignity and worth of every person, he asserted, “would be deficient and perhaps dangerous” (Ennis 1996: 172).

Dewey thought that education for reflective thinking would be of value to both the individual and society; recognition in educational practice of the kinship to the scientific attitude of children’s native curiosity, fertile imagination and love of experimental inquiry “would make for individual happiness and the reduction of social waste” (Dewey 1910: iii). Schools participating in the Eight-Year Study took development of the habit of reflective thinking and skill in solving problems as a means to leading young people to understand, appreciate and live the democratic way of life characteristic of the United States (Aikin 1942: 17–18, 81). Harvey Siegel (1988: 55–61) has offered four considerations in support of adopting critical thinking as an educational ideal. (1) Respect for persons requires that schools and teachers honour students’ demands for reasons and explanations, deal with students honestly, and recognize the need to confront students’ independent judgment; these requirements concern the manner in which teachers treat students. (2) Education has the task of preparing children to be successful adults, a task that requires development of their self-sufficiency. (3) Education should initiate children into the rational traditions in such fields as history, science and mathematics. (4) Education should prepare children to become democratic citizens, which requires reasoned procedures and critical talents and attitudes. To supplement these considerations, Siegel (1988: 62–90) responds to two objections: the ideology objection that adoption of any educational ideal requires a prior ideological commitment and the indoctrination objection that cultivation of critical thinking cannot escape being a form of indoctrination.

Despite the diversity of our 11 examples, one can recognize a common pattern. Dewey analyzed it as consisting of five phases:

• suggestions , in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution;
• an intellectualization of the difficulty or perplexity into a problem to be solved, a question for which the answer must be sought;
• the use of one suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis , to initiate and guide observation and other operations in collection of factual material;
• the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or supposition ( reasoning , in the sense on which reasoning is a part, not the whole, of inference); and
• testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (Dewey 1933: 106–107; italics in original)

The process of reflective thinking consisting of these phases would be preceded by a perplexed, troubled or confused situation and followed by a cleared-up, unified, resolved situation (Dewey 1933: 106). The term ‘phases’ replaced the term ‘steps’ (Dewey 1910: 72), thus removing the earlier suggestion of an invariant sequence. Variants of the above analysis appeared in (Dewey 1916: 177) and (Dewey 1938: 101–119).

The variant formulations indicate the difficulty of giving a single logical analysis of such a varied process. The process of critical thinking may have a spiral pattern, with the problem being redefined in the light of obstacles to solving it as originally formulated. For example, the person in Transit might have concluded that getting to the appointment at the scheduled time was impossible and have reformulated the problem as that of rescheduling the appointment for a mutually convenient time. Further, defining a problem does not always follow after or lead immediately to an idea of a suggested solution. Nor should it do so, as Dewey himself recognized in describing the physician in Typhoid as avoiding any strong preference for this or that conclusion before getting further information (Dewey 1910: 85; 1933: 170). People with a hypothesis in mind, even one to which they have a very weak commitment, have a so-called “confirmation bias” (Nickerson 1998): they are likely to pay attention to evidence that confirms the hypothesis and to ignore evidence that counts against it or for some competing hypothesis. Detectives, intelligence agencies, and investigators of airplane accidents are well advised to gather relevant evidence systematically and to postpone even tentative adoption of an explanatory hypothesis until the collected evidence rules out with the appropriate degree of certainty all but one explanation. Dewey’s analysis of the critical thinking process can be faulted as well for requiring acceptance or rejection of a possible solution to a defined problem, with no allowance for deciding in the light of the available evidence to suspend judgment. Further, given the great variety of kinds of problems for which reflection is appropriate, there is likely to be variation in its component events. Perhaps the best way to conceptualize the critical thinking process is as a checklist whose component events can occur in a variety of orders, selectively, and more than once. These component events might include (1) noticing a difficulty, (2) defining the problem, (3) dividing the problem into manageable sub-problems, (4) formulating a variety of possible solutions to the problem or sub-problem, (5) determining what evidence is relevant to deciding among possible solutions to the problem or sub-problem, (6) devising a plan of systematic observation or experiment that will uncover the relevant evidence, (7) carrying out the plan of systematic observation or experimentation, (8) noting the results of the systematic observation or experiment, (9) gathering relevant testimony and information from others, (10) judging the credibility of testimony and information gathered from others, (11) drawing conclusions from gathered evidence and accepted testimony, and (12) accepting a solution that the evidence adequately supports (cf. Hitchcock 2017: 485).

Checklist conceptions of the process of critical thinking are open to the objection that they are too mechanical and procedural to fit the multi-dimensional and emotionally charged issues for which critical thinking is urgently needed (Paul 1984). For such issues, a more dialectical process is advocated, in which competing relevant world views are identified, their implications explored, and some sort of creative synthesis attempted.

If one considers the critical thinking process illustrated by the 11 examples, one can identify distinct kinds of mental acts and mental states that form part of it. To distinguish, label and briefly characterize these components is a useful preliminary to identifying abilities, skills, dispositions, attitudes, habits and the like that contribute causally to thinking critically. Identifying such abilities and habits is in turn a useful preliminary to setting educational goals. Setting the goals is in its turn a useful preliminary to designing strategies for helping learners to achieve the goals and to designing ways of measuring the extent to which learners have done so. Such measures provide both feedback to learners on their achievement and a basis for experimental research on the effectiveness of various strategies for educating people to think critically. Let us begin, then, by distinguishing the kinds of mental acts and mental events that can occur in a critical thinking process.

• Observing : One notices something in one’s immediate environment (sudden cooling of temperature in Weather , bubbles forming outside a glass and then going inside in Bubbles , a moving blur in the distance in Blur , a rash in Rash ). Or one notes the results of an experiment or systematic observation (valuables missing in Disorder , no suction without air pressure in Suction pump )
• Feeling : One feels puzzled or uncertain about something (how to get to an appointment on time in Transit , why the diamonds vary in frequency in Diamond ). One wants to resolve this perplexity. One feels satisfaction once one has worked out an answer (to take the subway express in Transit , diamonds closer when needed as a warning in Diamond ).
• Wondering : One formulates a question to be addressed (why bubbles form outside a tumbler taken from hot water in Bubbles , how suction pumps work in Suction pump , what caused the rash in Rash ).
• Imagining : One thinks of possible answers (bus or subway or elevated in Transit , flagpole or ornament or wireless communication aid or direction indicator in Ferryboat , allergic reaction or heat rash in Rash ).
• Inferring : One works out what would be the case if a possible answer were assumed (valuables missing if there has been a burglary in Disorder , earlier start to the rash if it is an allergic reaction to a sulfa drug in Rash ). Or one draws a conclusion once sufficient relevant evidence is gathered (take the subway in Transit , burglary in Disorder , discontinue blood pressure medication and new cream in Rash ).
• Knowledge : One uses stored knowledge of the subject-matter to generate possible answers or to infer what would be expected on the assumption of a particular answer (knowledge of a city’s public transit system in Transit , of the requirements for a flagpole in Ferryboat , of Boyle’s law in Bubbles , of allergic reactions in Rash ).
• Experimenting : One designs and carries out an experiment or a systematic observation to find out whether the results deduced from a possible answer will occur (looking at the location of the flagpole in relation to the pilot’s position in Ferryboat , putting an ice cube on top of a tumbler taken from hot water in Bubbles , measuring the height to which a suction pump will draw water at different elevations in Suction pump , noticing the frequency of diamonds when movement to or from a diamond lane is allowed in Diamond ).
• Consulting : One finds a source of information, gets the information from the source, and makes a judgment on whether to accept it. None of our 11 examples include searching for sources of information. In this respect they are unrepresentative, since most people nowadays have almost instant access to information relevant to answering any question, including many of those illustrated by the examples. However, Candidate includes the activities of extracting information from sources and evaluating its credibility.
• Identifying and analyzing arguments : One notices an argument and works out its structure and content as a preliminary to evaluating its strength. This activity is central to Candidate . It is an important part of a critical thinking process in which one surveys arguments for various positions on an issue.
• Judging : One makes a judgment on the basis of accumulated evidence and reasoning, such as the judgment in Ferryboat that the purpose of the pole is to provide direction to the pilot.
• Deciding : One makes a decision on what to do or on what policy to adopt, as in the decision in Transit to take the subway.

By definition, a person who does something voluntarily is both willing and able to do that thing at that time. Both the willingness and the ability contribute causally to the person’s action, in the sense that the voluntary action would not occur if either (or both) of these were lacking. For example, suppose that one is standing with one’s arms at one’s sides and one voluntarily lifts one’s right arm to an extended horizontal position. One would not do so if one were unable to lift one’s arm, if for example one’s right side was paralyzed as the result of a stroke. Nor would one do so if one were unwilling to lift one’s arm, if for example one were participating in a street demonstration at which a white supremacist was urging the crowd to lift their right arm in a Nazi salute and one were unwilling to express support in this way for the racist Nazi ideology. The same analysis applies to a voluntary mental process of thinking critically. It requires both willingness and ability to think critically, including willingness and ability to perform each of the mental acts that compose the process and to coordinate those acts in a sequence that is directed at resolving the initiating perplexity.

Consider willingness first. We can identify causal contributors to willingness to think critically by considering factors that would cause a person who was able to think critically about an issue nevertheless not to do so (Hamby 2014). For each factor, the opposite condition thus contributes causally to willingness to think critically on a particular occasion. For example, people who habitually jump to conclusions without considering alternatives will not think critically about issues that arise, even if they have the required abilities. The contrary condition of willingness to suspend judgment is thus a causal contributor to thinking critically.

Now consider ability. In contrast to the ability to move one’s arm, which can be completely absent because a stroke has left the arm paralyzed, the ability to think critically is a developed ability, whose absence is not a complete absence of ability to think but absence of ability to think well. We can identify the ability to think well directly, in terms of the norms and standards for good thinking. In general, to be able do well the thinking activities that can be components of a critical thinking process, one needs to know the concepts and principles that characterize their good performance, to recognize in particular cases that the concepts and principles apply, and to apply them. The knowledge, recognition and application may be procedural rather than declarative. It may be domain-specific rather than widely applicable, and in either case may need subject-matter knowledge, sometimes of a deep kind.

Reflections of the sort illustrated by the previous two paragraphs have led scholars to identify the knowledge, abilities and dispositions of a “critical thinker”, i.e., someone who thinks critically whenever it is appropriate to do so. We turn now to these three types of causal contributors to thinking critically. We start with dispositions, since arguably these are the most powerful contributors to being a critical thinker, can be fostered at an early stage of a child’s development, and are susceptible to general improvement (Glaser 1941: 175)

8. Critical Thinking Dispositions

Educational researchers use the term ‘dispositions’ broadly for the habits of mind and attitudes that contribute causally to being a critical thinker. Some writers (e.g., Paul & Elder 2006; Hamby 2014; Bailin & Battersby 2016) propose to use the term ‘virtues’ for this dimension of a critical thinker. The virtues in question, although they are virtues of character, concern the person’s ways of thinking rather than the person’s ways of behaving towards others. They are not moral virtues but intellectual virtues, of the sort articulated by Zagzebski (1996) and discussed by Turri, Alfano, and Greco (2017).

On a realistic conception, thinking dispositions or intellectual virtues are real properties of thinkers. They are general tendencies, propensities, or inclinations to think in particular ways in particular circumstances, and can be genuinely explanatory (Siegel 1999). Sceptics argue that there is no evidence for a specific mental basis for the habits of mind that contribute to thinking critically, and that it is pedagogically misleading to posit such a basis (Bailin et al. 1999a). Whatever their status, critical thinking dispositions need motivation for their initial formation in a child—motivation that may be external or internal. As children develop, the force of habit will gradually become important in sustaining the disposition (Nieto & Valenzuela 2012). Mere force of habit, however, is unlikely to sustain critical thinking dispositions. Critical thinkers must value and enjoy using their knowledge and abilities to think things through for themselves. They must be committed to, and lovers of, inquiry.

A person may have a critical thinking disposition with respect to only some kinds of issues. For example, one could be open-minded about scientific issues but not about religious issues. Similarly, one could be confident in one’s ability to reason about the theological implications of the existence of evil in the world but not in one’s ability to reason about the best design for a guided ballistic missile.

Critical thinking dispositions can usefully be divided into initiating dispositions (those that contribute causally to starting to think critically about an issue) and internal dispositions (those that contribute causally to doing a good job of thinking critically once one has started) (Facione 1990a: 25). The two categories are not mutually exclusive. For example, open-mindedness, in the sense of willingness to consider alternative points of view to one’s own, is both an initiating and an internal disposition.

Using the strategy of considering factors that would block people with the ability to think critically from doing so, we can identify as initiating dispositions for thinking critically attentiveness, a habit of inquiry, self-confidence, courage, open-mindedness, willingness to suspend judgment, trust in reason, wanting evidence for one’s beliefs, and seeking the truth. We consider briefly what each of these dispositions amounts to, in each case citing sources that acknowledge them.

• Attentiveness : One will not think critically if one fails to recognize an issue that needs to be thought through. For example, the pedestrian in Weather would not have looked up if he had not noticed that the air was suddenly cooler. To be a critical thinker, then, one needs to be habitually attentive to one’s surroundings, noticing not only what one senses but also sources of perplexity in messages received and in one’s own beliefs and attitudes (Facione 1990a: 25; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001).
• Habit of inquiry : Inquiry is effortful, and one needs an internal push to engage in it. For example, the student in Bubbles could easily have stopped at idle wondering about the cause of the bubbles rather than reasoning to a hypothesis, then designing and executing an experiment to test it. Thus willingness to think critically needs mental energy and initiative. What can supply that energy? Love of inquiry, or perhaps just a habit of inquiry. Hamby (2015) has argued that willingness to inquire is the central critical thinking virtue, one that encompasses all the others. It is recognized as a critical thinking disposition by Dewey (1910: 29; 1933: 35), Glaser (1941: 5), Ennis (1987: 12; 1991: 8), Facione (1990a: 25), Bailin et al. (1999b: 294), Halpern (1998: 452), and Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo (2001).
• Self-confidence : Lack of confidence in one’s abilities can block critical thinking. For example, if the woman in Rash lacked confidence in her ability to figure things out for herself, she might just have assumed that the rash on her chest was the allergic reaction to her medication against which the pharmacist had warned her. Thus willingness to think critically requires confidence in one’s ability to inquire (Facione 1990a: 25; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001).
• Courage : Fear of thinking for oneself can stop one from doing it. Thus willingness to think critically requires intellectual courage (Paul & Elder 2006: 16).
• Open-mindedness : A dogmatic attitude will impede thinking critically. For example, a person who adheres rigidly to a “pro-choice” position on the issue of the legal status of induced abortion is likely to be unwilling to consider seriously the issue of when in its development an unborn child acquires a moral right to life. Thus willingness to think critically requires open-mindedness, in the sense of a willingness to examine questions to which one already accepts an answer but which further evidence or reasoning might cause one to answer differently (Dewey 1933; Facione 1990a; Ennis 1991; Bailin et al. 1999b; Halpern 1998, Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001). Paul (1981) emphasizes open-mindedness about alternative world-views, and recommends a dialectical approach to integrating such views as central to what he calls “strong sense” critical thinking.
• Willingness to suspend judgment : Premature closure on an initial solution will block critical thinking. Thus willingness to think critically requires a willingness to suspend judgment while alternatives are explored (Facione 1990a; Ennis 1991; Halpern 1998).
• Trust in reason : Since distrust in the processes of reasoned inquiry will dissuade one from engaging in it, trust in them is an initiating critical thinking disposition (Facione 1990a, 25; Bailin et al. 1999b: 294; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001; Paul & Elder 2006). In reaction to an allegedly exclusive emphasis on reason in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, Thayer-Bacon (2000) argues that intuition, imagination, and emotion have important roles to play in an adequate conception of critical thinking that she calls “constructive thinking”. From her point of view, critical thinking requires trust not only in reason but also in intuition, imagination, and emotion.
• Seeking the truth : If one does not care about the truth but is content to stick with one’s initial bias on an issue, then one will not think critically about it. Seeking the truth is thus an initiating critical thinking disposition (Bailin et al. 1999b: 294; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001). A disposition to seek the truth is implicit in more specific critical thinking dispositions, such as trying to be well-informed, considering seriously points of view other than one’s own, looking for alternatives, suspending judgment when the evidence is insufficient, and adopting a position when the evidence supporting it is sufficient.

Some of the initiating dispositions, such as open-mindedness and willingness to suspend judgment, are also internal critical thinking dispositions, in the sense of mental habits or attitudes that contribute causally to doing a good job of critical thinking once one starts the process. But there are many other internal critical thinking dispositions. Some of them are parasitic on one’s conception of good thinking. For example, it is constitutive of good thinking about an issue to formulate the issue clearly and to maintain focus on it. For this purpose, one needs not only the corresponding ability but also the corresponding disposition. Ennis (1991: 8) describes it as the disposition “to determine and maintain focus on the conclusion or question”, Facione (1990a: 25) as “clarity in stating the question or concern”. Other internal dispositions are motivators to continue or adjust the critical thinking process, such as willingness to persist in a complex task and willingness to abandon nonproductive strategies in an attempt to self-correct (Halpern 1998: 452). For a list of identified internal critical thinking dispositions, see the Supplement on Internal Critical Thinking Dispositions .

Some theorists postulate skills, i.e., acquired abilities, as operative in critical thinking. It is not obvious, however, that a good mental act is the exercise of a generic acquired skill. Inferring an expected time of arrival, as in Transit , has some generic components but also uses non-generic subject-matter knowledge. Bailin et al. (1999a) argue against viewing critical thinking skills as generic and discrete, on the ground that skilled performance at a critical thinking task cannot be separated from knowledge of concepts and from domain-specific principles of good thinking. Talk of skills, they concede, is unproblematic if it means merely that a person with critical thinking skills is capable of intelligent performance.

Despite such scepticism, theorists of critical thinking have listed as general contributors to critical thinking what they variously call abilities (Glaser 1941; Ennis 1962, 1991), skills (Facione 1990a; Halpern 1998) or competencies (Fisher & Scriven 1997). Amalgamating these lists would produce a confusing and chaotic cornucopia of more than 50 possible educational objectives, with only partial overlap among them. It makes sense instead to try to understand the reasons for the multiplicity and diversity, and to make a selection according to one’s own reasons for singling out abilities to be developed in a critical thinking curriculum. Two reasons for diversity among lists of critical thinking abilities are the underlying conception of critical thinking and the envisaged educational level. Appraisal-only conceptions, for example, involve a different suite of abilities than constructive-only conceptions. Some lists, such as those in (Glaser 1941), are put forward as educational objectives for secondary school students, whereas others are proposed as objectives for college students (e.g., Facione 1990a).

The abilities described in the remaining paragraphs of this section emerge from reflection on the general abilities needed to do well the thinking activities identified in section 6 as components of the critical thinking process described in section 5 . The derivation of each collection of abilities is accompanied by citation of sources that list such abilities and of standardized tests that claim to test them.

Observational abilities : Careful and accurate observation sometimes requires specialist expertise and practice, as in the case of observing birds and observing accident scenes. However, there are general abilities of noticing what one’s senses are picking up from one’s environment and of being able to articulate clearly and accurately to oneself and others what one has observed. It helps in exercising them to be able to recognize and take into account factors that make one’s observation less trustworthy, such as prior framing of the situation, inadequate time, deficient senses, poor observation conditions, and the like. It helps as well to be skilled at taking steps to make one’s observation more trustworthy, such as moving closer to get a better look, measuring something three times and taking the average, and checking what one thinks one is observing with someone else who is in a good position to observe it. It also helps to be skilled at recognizing respects in which one’s report of one’s observation involves inference rather than direct observation, so that one can then consider whether the inference is justified. These abilities come into play as well when one thinks about whether and with what degree of confidence to accept an observation report, for example in the study of history or in a criminal investigation or in assessing news reports. Observational abilities show up in some lists of critical thinking abilities (Ennis 1962: 90; Facione 1990a: 16; Ennis 1991: 9). There are items testing a person’s ability to judge the credibility of observation reports in the Cornell Critical Thinking Tests, Levels X and Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005). Norris and King (1983, 1985, 1990a, 1990b) is a test of ability to appraise observation reports.

Emotional abilities : The emotions that drive a critical thinking process are perplexity or puzzlement, a wish to resolve it, and satisfaction at achieving the desired resolution. Children experience these emotions at an early age, without being trained to do so. Education that takes critical thinking as a goal needs only to channel these emotions and to make sure not to stifle them. Collaborative critical thinking benefits from ability to recognize one’s own and others’ emotional commitments and reactions.

Questioning abilities : A critical thinking process needs transformation of an inchoate sense of perplexity into a clear question. Formulating a question well requires not building in questionable assumptions, not prejudging the issue, and using language that in context is unambiguous and precise enough (Ennis 1962: 97; 1991: 9).

Imaginative abilities : Thinking directed at finding the correct causal explanation of a general phenomenon or particular event requires an ability to imagine possible explanations. Thinking about what policy or plan of action to adopt requires generation of options and consideration of possible consequences of each option. Domain knowledge is required for such creative activity, but a general ability to imagine alternatives is helpful and can be nurtured so as to become easier, quicker, more extensive, and deeper (Dewey 1910: 34–39; 1933: 40–47). Facione (1990a) and Halpern (1998) include the ability to imagine alternatives as a critical thinking ability.

Inferential abilities : The ability to draw conclusions from given information, and to recognize with what degree of certainty one’s own or others’ conclusions follow, is universally recognized as a general critical thinking ability. All 11 examples in section 2 of this article include inferences, some from hypotheses or options (as in Transit , Ferryboat and Disorder ), others from something observed (as in Weather and Rash ). None of these inferences is formally valid. Rather, they are licensed by general, sometimes qualified substantive rules of inference (Toulmin 1958) that rest on domain knowledge—that a bus trip takes about the same time in each direction, that the terminal of a wireless telegraph would be located on the highest possible place, that sudden cooling is often followed by rain, that an allergic reaction to a sulfa drug generally shows up soon after one starts taking it. It is a matter of controversy to what extent the specialized ability to deduce conclusions from premisses using formal rules of inference is needed for critical thinking. Dewey (1933) locates logical forms in setting out the products of reflection rather than in the process of reflection. Ennis (1981a), on the other hand, maintains that a liberally-educated person should have the following abilities: to translate natural-language statements into statements using the standard logical operators, to use appropriately the language of necessary and sufficient conditions, to deal with argument forms and arguments containing symbols, to determine whether in virtue of an argument’s form its conclusion follows necessarily from its premisses, to reason with logically complex propositions, and to apply the rules and procedures of deductive logic. Inferential abilities are recognized as critical thinking abilities by Glaser (1941: 6), Facione (1990a: 9), Ennis (1991: 9), Fisher & Scriven (1997: 99, 111), and Halpern (1998: 452). Items testing inferential abilities constitute two of the five subtests of the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (Watson & Glaser 1980a, 1980b, 1994), two of the four sections in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level X (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005), three of the seven sections in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005), 11 of the 34 items on Forms A and B of the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (Facione 1990b, 1992), and a high but variable proportion of the 25 selected-response questions in the Collegiate Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017).

Experimenting abilities : Knowing how to design and execute an experiment is important not just in scientific research but also in everyday life, as in Rash . Dewey devoted a whole chapter of his How We Think (1910: 145–156; 1933: 190–202) to the superiority of experimentation over observation in advancing knowledge. Experimenting abilities come into play at one remove in appraising reports of scientific studies. Skill in designing and executing experiments includes the acknowledged abilities to appraise evidence (Glaser 1941: 6), to carry out experiments and to apply appropriate statistical inference techniques (Facione 1990a: 9), to judge inductions to an explanatory hypothesis (Ennis 1991: 9), and to recognize the need for an adequately large sample size (Halpern 1998). The Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005) includes four items (out of 52) on experimental design. The Collegiate Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017) makes room for appraisal of study design in both its performance task and its selected-response questions.

Consulting abilities : Skill at consulting sources of information comes into play when one seeks information to help resolve a problem, as in Candidate . Ability to find and appraise information includes ability to gather and marshal pertinent information (Glaser 1941: 6), to judge whether a statement made by an alleged authority is acceptable (Ennis 1962: 84), to plan a search for desired information (Facione 1990a: 9), and to judge the credibility of a source (Ennis 1991: 9). Ability to judge the credibility of statements is tested by 24 items (out of 76) in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level X (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005) and by four items (out of 52) in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005). The College Learning Assessment’s performance task requires evaluation of whether information in documents is credible or unreliable (Council for Aid to Education 2017).

Argument analysis abilities : The ability to identify and analyze arguments contributes to the process of surveying arguments on an issue in order to form one’s own reasoned judgment, as in Candidate . The ability to detect and analyze arguments is recognized as a critical thinking skill by Facione (1990a: 7–8), Ennis (1991: 9) and Halpern (1998). Five items (out of 34) on the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (Facione 1990b, 1992) test skill at argument analysis. The College Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017) incorporates argument analysis in its selected-response tests of critical reading and evaluation and of critiquing an argument.

Judging skills and deciding skills : Skill at judging and deciding is skill at recognizing what judgment or decision the available evidence and argument supports, and with what degree of confidence. It is thus a component of the inferential skills already discussed.

Lists and tests of critical thinking abilities often include two more abilities: identifying assumptions and constructing and evaluating definitions.

In addition to dispositions and abilities, critical thinking needs knowledge: of critical thinking concepts, of critical thinking principles, and of the subject-matter of the thinking.

We can derive a short list of concepts whose understanding contributes to critical thinking from the critical thinking abilities described in the preceding section. Observational abilities require an understanding of the difference between observation and inference. Questioning abilities require an understanding of the concepts of ambiguity and vagueness. Inferential abilities require an understanding of the difference between conclusive and defeasible inference (traditionally, between deduction and induction), as well as of the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions. Experimenting abilities require an understanding of the concepts of hypothesis, null hypothesis, assumption and prediction, as well as of the concept of statistical significance and of its difference from importance. They also require an understanding of the difference between an experiment and an observational study, and in particular of the difference between a randomized controlled trial, a prospective correlational study and a retrospective (case-control) study. Argument analysis abilities require an understanding of the concepts of argument, premiss, assumption, conclusion and counter-consideration. Additional critical thinking concepts are proposed by Bailin et al. (1999b: 293), Fisher & Scriven (1997: 105–106), and Black (2012).

According to Glaser (1941: 25), ability to think critically requires knowledge of the methods of logical inquiry and reasoning. If we review the list of abilities in the preceding section, however, we can see that some of them can be acquired and exercised merely through practice, possibly guided in an educational setting, followed by feedback. Searching intelligently for a causal explanation of some phenomenon or event requires that one consider a full range of possible causal contributors, but it seems more important that one implements this principle in one’s practice than that one is able to articulate it. What is important is “operational knowledge” of the standards and principles of good thinking (Bailin et al. 1999b: 291–293). But the development of such critical thinking abilities as designing an experiment or constructing an operational definition can benefit from learning their underlying theory. Further, explicit knowledge of quirks of human thinking seems useful as a cautionary guide. Human memory is not just fallible about details, as people learn from their own experiences of misremembering, but is so malleable that a detailed, clear and vivid recollection of an event can be a total fabrication (Loftus 2017). People seek or interpret evidence in ways that are partial to their existing beliefs and expectations, often unconscious of their “confirmation bias” (Nickerson 1998). Not only are people subject to this and other cognitive biases (Kahneman 2011), of which they are typically unaware, but it may be counter-productive for one to make oneself aware of them and try consciously to counteract them or to counteract social biases such as racial or sexual stereotypes (Kenyon & Beaulac 2014). It is helpful to be aware of these facts and of the superior effectiveness of blocking the operation of biases—for example, by making an immediate record of one’s observations, refraining from forming a preliminary explanatory hypothesis, blind refereeing, double-blind randomized trials, and blind grading of students’ work.

Critical thinking about an issue requires substantive knowledge of the domain to which the issue belongs. Critical thinking abilities are not a magic elixir that can be applied to any issue whatever by somebody who has no knowledge of the facts relevant to exploring that issue. For example, the student in Bubbles needed to know that gases do not penetrate solid objects like a glass, that air expands when heated, that the volume of an enclosed gas varies directly with its temperature and inversely with its pressure, and that hot objects will spontaneously cool down to the ambient temperature of their surroundings unless kept hot by insulation or a source of heat. Critical thinkers thus need a rich fund of subject-matter knowledge relevant to the variety of situations they encounter. This fact is recognized in the inclusion among critical thinking dispositions of a concern to become and remain generally well informed.

Experimental educational interventions, with control groups, have shown that education can improve critical thinking skills and dispositions, as measured by standardized tests. For information about these tests, see the Supplement on Assessment .

What educational methods are most effective at developing the dispositions, abilities and knowledge of a critical thinker? Abrami et al. (2015) found that in the experimental and quasi-experimental studies that they analyzed dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring each increased the effectiveness of the educational intervention, and that they were most effective when combined. They also found that in these studies a combination of separate instruction in critical thinking with subject-matter instruction in which students are encouraged to think critically was more effective than either by itself. However, the difference was not statistically significant; that is, it might have arisen by chance.

Most of these studies lack the longitudinal follow-up required to determine whether the observed differential improvements in critical thinking abilities or dispositions continue over time, for example until high school or college graduation. For details on studies of methods of developing critical thinking skills and dispositions, see the Supplement on Educational Methods .

12. Controversies

Scholars have denied the generalizability of critical thinking abilities across subject domains, have alleged bias in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, and have investigated the relationship of critical thinking to other kinds of thinking.

McPeck (1981) attacked the thinking skills movement of the 1970s, including the critical thinking movement. He argued that there are no general thinking skills, since thinking is always thinking about some subject-matter. It is futile, he claimed, for schools and colleges to teach thinking as if it were a separate subject. Rather, teachers should lead their pupils to become autonomous thinkers by teaching school subjects in a way that brings out their cognitive structure and that encourages and rewards discussion and argument. As some of his critics (e.g., Paul 1985; Siegel 1985) pointed out, McPeck’s central argument needs elaboration, since it has obvious counter-examples in writing and speaking, for which (up to a certain level of complexity) there are teachable general abilities even though they are always about some subject-matter. To make his argument convincing, McPeck needs to explain how thinking differs from writing and speaking in a way that does not permit useful abstraction of its components from the subject-matters with which it deals. He has not done so. Nevertheless, his position that the dispositions and abilities of a critical thinker are best developed in the context of subject-matter instruction is shared by many theorists of critical thinking, including Dewey (1910, 1933), Glaser (1941), Passmore (1980), Weinstein (1990), and Bailin et al. (1999b).

McPeck’s challenge prompted reflection on the extent to which critical thinking is subject-specific. McPeck argued for a strong subject-specificity thesis, according to which it is a conceptual truth that all critical thinking abilities are specific to a subject. (He did not however extend his subject-specificity thesis to critical thinking dispositions. In particular, he took the disposition to suspend judgment in situations of cognitive dissonance to be a general disposition.) Conceptual subject-specificity is subject to obvious counter-examples, such as the general ability to recognize confusion of necessary and sufficient conditions. A more modest thesis, also endorsed by McPeck, is epistemological subject-specificity, according to which the norms of good thinking vary from one field to another. Epistemological subject-specificity clearly holds to a certain extent; for example, the principles in accordance with which one solves a differential equation are quite different from the principles in accordance with which one determines whether a painting is a genuine Picasso. But the thesis suffers, as Ennis (1989) points out, from vagueness of the concept of a field or subject and from the obvious existence of inter-field principles, however broadly the concept of a field is construed. For example, the principles of hypothetico-deductive reasoning hold for all the varied fields in which such reasoning occurs. A third kind of subject-specificity is empirical subject-specificity, according to which as a matter of empirically observable fact a person with the abilities and dispositions of a critical thinker in one area of investigation will not necessarily have them in another area of investigation.

The thesis of empirical subject-specificity raises the general problem of transfer. If critical thinking abilities and dispositions have to be developed independently in each school subject, how are they of any use in dealing with the problems of everyday life and the political and social issues of contemporary society, most of which do not fit into the framework of a traditional school subject? Proponents of empirical subject-specificity tend to argue that transfer is more likely to occur if there is critical thinking instruction in a variety of domains, with explicit attention to dispositions and abilities that cut across domains. But evidence for this claim is scanty. There is a need for well-designed empirical studies that investigate the conditions that make transfer more likely.

It is common ground in debates about the generality or subject-specificity of critical thinking dispositions and abilities that critical thinking about any topic requires background knowledge about the topic. For example, the most sophisticated understanding of the principles of hypothetico-deductive reasoning is of no help unless accompanied by some knowledge of what might be plausible explanations of some phenomenon under investigation.

Critics have objected to bias in the theory, pedagogy and practice of critical thinking. Commentators (e.g., Alston 1995; Ennis 1998) have noted that anyone who takes a position has a bias in the neutral sense of being inclined in one direction rather than others. The critics, however, are objecting to bias in the pejorative sense of an unjustified favoring of certain ways of knowing over others, frequently alleging that the unjustly favoured ways are those of a dominant sex or culture (Bailin 1995). These ways favour:

• reinforcement of egocentric and sociocentric biases over dialectical engagement with opposing world-views (Paul 1981, 1984; Warren 1998)
• distancing from the object of inquiry over closeness to it (Martin 1992; Thayer-Bacon 1992)
• indifference to the situation of others over care for them (Martin 1992)
• orientation to thought over orientation to action (Martin 1992)
• being reasonable over caring to understand people’s ideas (Thayer-Bacon 1993)
• being neutral and objective over being embodied and situated (Thayer-Bacon 1995a)
• doubting over believing (Thayer-Bacon 1995b)
• reason over emotion, imagination and intuition (Thayer-Bacon 2000)
• solitary thinking over collaborative thinking (Thayer-Bacon 2000)
• written and spoken assignments over other forms of expression (Alston 2001)
• attention to written and spoken communications over attention to human problems (Alston 2001)
• winning debates in the public sphere over making and understanding meaning (Alston 2001)

A common thread in this smorgasbord of accusations is dissatisfaction with focusing on the logical analysis and evaluation of reasoning and arguments. While these authors acknowledge that such analysis and evaluation is part of critical thinking and should be part of its conceptualization and pedagogy, they insist that it is only a part. Paul (1981), for example, bemoans the tendency of atomistic teaching of methods of analyzing and evaluating arguments to turn students into more able sophists, adept at finding fault with positions and arguments with which they disagree but even more entrenched in the egocentric and sociocentric biases with which they began. Martin (1992) and Thayer-Bacon (1992) cite with approval the self-reported intimacy with their subject-matter of leading researchers in biology and medicine, an intimacy that conflicts with the distancing allegedly recommended in standard conceptions and pedagogy of critical thinking. Thayer-Bacon (2000) contrasts the embodied and socially embedded learning of her elementary school students in a Montessori school, who used their imagination, intuition and emotions as well as their reason, with conceptions of critical thinking as

thinking that is used to critique arguments, offer justifications, and make judgments about what are the good reasons, or the right answers. (Thayer-Bacon 2000: 127–128)

Alston (2001) reports that her students in a women’s studies class were able to see the flaws in the Cinderella myth that pervades much romantic fiction but in their own romantic relationships still acted as if all failures were the woman’s fault and still accepted the notions of love at first sight and living happily ever after. Students, she writes, should

be able to connect their intellectual critique to a more affective, somatic, and ethical account of making risky choices that have sexist, racist, classist, familial, sexual, or other consequences for themselves and those both near and far… critical thinking that reads arguments, texts, or practices merely on the surface without connections to feeling/desiring/doing or action lacks an ethical depth that should infuse the difference between mere cognitive activity and something we want to call critical thinking. (Alston 2001: 34)

Some critics portray such biases as unfair to women. Thayer-Bacon (1992), for example, has charged modern critical thinking theory with being sexist, on the ground that it separates the self from the object and causes one to lose touch with one’s inner voice, and thus stigmatizes women, who (she asserts) link self to object and listen to their inner voice. Her charge does not imply that women as a group are on average less able than men to analyze and evaluate arguments. Facione (1990c) found no difference by sex in performance on his California Critical Thinking Skills Test. Kuhn (1991: 280–281) found no difference by sex in either the disposition or the competence to engage in argumentative thinking.

The critics propose a variety of remedies for the biases that they allege. In general, they do not propose to eliminate or downplay critical thinking as an educational goal. Rather, they propose to conceptualize critical thinking differently and to change its pedagogy accordingly. Their pedagogical proposals arise logically from their objections. They can be summarized as follows:

• Focus on argument networks with dialectical exchanges reflecting contesting points of view rather than on atomic arguments, so as to develop “strong sense” critical thinking that transcends egocentric and sociocentric biases (Paul 1981, 1984).
• Foster closeness to the subject-matter and feeling connected to others in order to inform a humane democracy (Martin 1992).
• Develop “constructive thinking” as a social activity in a community of physically embodied and socially embedded inquirers with personal voices who value not only reason but also imagination, intuition and emotion (Thayer-Bacon 2000).
• In developing critical thinking in school subjects, treat as important neither skills nor dispositions but opening worlds of meaning (Alston 2001).
• Attend to the development of critical thinking dispositions as well as skills, and adopt the “critical pedagogy” practised and advocated by Freire (1968 [1970]) and hooks (1994) (Dalgleish, Girard, & Davies 2017).

A common thread in these proposals is treatment of critical thinking as a social, interactive, personally engaged activity like that of a quilting bee or a barn-raising (Thayer-Bacon 2000) rather than as an individual, solitary, distanced activity symbolized by Rodin’s The Thinker . One can get a vivid description of education with the former type of goal from the writings of bell hooks (1994, 2010). Critical thinking for her is open-minded dialectical exchange across opposing standpoints and from multiple perspectives, a conception similar to Paul’s “strong sense” critical thinking (Paul 1981). She abandons the structure of domination in the traditional classroom. In an introductory course on black women writers, for example, she assigns students to write an autobiographical paragraph about an early racial memory, then to read it aloud as the others listen, thus affirming the uniqueness and value of each voice and creating a communal awareness of the diversity of the group’s experiences (hooks 1994: 84). Her “engaged pedagogy” is thus similar to the “freedom under guidance” implemented in John Dewey’s Laboratory School of Chicago in the late 1890s and early 1900s. It incorporates the dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring that Abrami (2015) found to be most effective in improving critical thinking skills and dispositions.

What is the relationship of critical thinking to problem solving, decision-making, higher-order thinking, creative thinking, and other recognized types of thinking? One’s answer to this question obviously depends on how one defines the terms used in the question. If critical thinking is conceived broadly to cover any careful thinking about any topic for any purpose, then problem solving and decision making will be kinds of critical thinking, if they are done carefully. Historically, ‘critical thinking’ and ‘problem solving’ were two names for the same thing. If critical thinking is conceived more narrowly as consisting solely of appraisal of intellectual products, then it will be disjoint with problem solving and decision making, which are constructive.

Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives used the phrase “intellectual abilities and skills” for what had been labeled “critical thinking” by some, “reflective thinking” by Dewey and others, and “problem solving” by still others (Bloom et al. 1956: 38). Thus, the so-called “higher-order thinking skills” at the taxonomy’s top levels of analysis, synthesis and evaluation are just critical thinking skills, although they do not come with general criteria for their assessment (Ennis 1981b). The revised version of Bloom’s taxonomy (Anderson et al. 2001) likewise treats critical thinking as cutting across those types of cognitive process that involve more than remembering (Anderson et al. 2001: 269–270). For details, see the Supplement on History .

As to creative thinking, it overlaps with critical thinking (Bailin 1987, 1988). Thinking about the explanation of some phenomenon or event, as in Ferryboat , requires creative imagination in constructing plausible explanatory hypotheses. Likewise, thinking about a policy question, as in Candidate , requires creativity in coming up with options. Conversely, creativity in any field needs to be balanced by critical appraisal of the draft painting or novel or mathematical theory.

• Abrami, Philip C., Robert M. Bernard, Eugene Borokhovski, David I. Waddington, C. Anne Wade, and Tonje Person, 2015, “Strategies for Teaching Students to Think Critically: A Meta-analysis”, Review of Educational Research , 85(2): 275–314. doi:10.3102/0034654314551063
• Aikin, Wilford M., 1942, The Story of the Eight-year Study, with Conclusions and Recommendations , Volume I of Adventure in American Education , New York and London: Harper & Brothers. [ Aikin 1942 available online ]
• Alston, Kal, 1995, “Begging the Question: Is Critical Thinking Biased?”, Educational Theory , 45(2): 225–233. doi:10.1111/j.1741-5446.1995.00225.x
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• Association for Informal Logic and Critical Thinking (AILACT)
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• Critical Thinking Across the European Higher Education Curricula (CRITHINKEDU)
• Critical Thinking Definition, Instruction, and Assessment: A Rigorous Approach (criticalTHINKING.net)
• Critical Thinking Research (RAIL)
• Foundation for Critical Thinking
• Insight Assessment
• Partnership for 21st Century Learning (P21)
• The Critical Thinking Consortium
• The Nature of Critical Thinking: An Outline of Critical Thinking Dispositions and Abilities , by Robert H. Ennis

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