Clarion Call No. 212
Next to “diversity,” used as a synonym for discrimination by race, a favorite euphemism at universities today is “critical thinking.” The usual occasions for its use, however, are rather ironic — to stymie rather than stimulate critical thinking.

The university itself is generally regarded as a place to stimulate critical thinking. Along with, and in many minds superior to, preparing students for their respective fields, universities are expected to teach students how to think critically and by doing so prepare them to be better citizens. In other words, it goes without saying that college courses are to teach students how to think critically about the subject matter.

Or it ought to go without saying. When it is said explicitly, then — as is the case for any unnecessary statement of defense — it invites skepticism. After all, why would one feel compelled to explicate what is already expected? It’s not as if classes without the phrase are looking to teach uncritical thinking.

Yet too frequently we find academics going to rhetoric well of “critical thinking” to justify their courses. Often, and not coincidentally, they’re frivolous or heavily politicized courses. Often the same folks who hide behind the verbal shields of “tolerance” and “diversity” to denounce intolerance among conservatives and try to get Christian student organizations to eradicate their beliefs from their organizational documents are the same ones hailing “critical thinking” that students dare not question.

For instance, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is revising its curriculum, and one of the revision subcommittees is on “U.S. Diversity.” This subcommittee recommended in January 2001 that “[C]ourses that meet the US diversity requirement should impart skills of analysis and critical thinking that can productively be applied to the study of cultural differences far beyond the US context.” As they explain, the courses “must consistently engage … at least two, and possibly more, of the conceptions of diversity,” those being “race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class, region, and disability” (note no questioning of those “conceptions of diversity”); “must consistently challenge students to move from what they know — or think they know — about other peoples to question those assumptions and preconceptions” (note the questioning is of the students’ own “assumptions and preconceptions”); and “must consistently address issues of diversity in relation to questions of inequality, justice and power … we want students to explore the further implications of living in a diverse culture” (note no questioning of the Marxist “questions” of diversity or the professors’ conception of “a diverse culture”).

The apparently necessary justification of encouraging critical thinking also features in several of Carolina Journal’s Course of the Month selections, UNC-CH’s Summer Reading Program, and numerous other “studies” class descriptions.

Now, suppose you were a university student looking to hone his critical thinking skills but have grown syllabus-shy after having been severely disappointed by other classes promising to encourage your critical thinking skills (apparently by, as you later found out, showing you pornographic films and assigning you to “deconstruct” Super Bowl commercials according to their portrayal of women). What could you do?

Well, you could consult the university library, or better yet (and if you’re lucky enough), you could consult with professors you know to have great experience at actual critical thinking. You could also check out “The Baloney Detection Kit,” by Michael Shermer and Pat Linse of the Skeptic Society (www.skeptic.com), which might also serve you in future courses.

The Baloney Detection Kit builds on the late astronomer Carl Sagan’s “Ten Tools for Baloney Detection,” all sound principles for healthy skepticism. They include seeking independent confirmation of the facts presented, avoiding being impressed from arguments based on authority (a prevalent trap on campus), crafting several hypotheses while avoiding personal identification with them, seeking quantification, minding Occam’s Razor, and checking whether a proposition is falsifiable.

The latter (Sagan’s No. 9) is another prevalent trap on campus (see, literary critics’ idea that language is too imbued with cultural, political, gender, racial and other prejudices for any text to mean what it appears to mean, or the global warming theorists’ readily accepting as proof of their theory any proposed meteorological event, including global cooling). There is another name for the unfalsifiable theory: the Procrustean bed, named after that unpleasant fellow of legend, Procrustes, whose joy it was to waylay travelers and tie them to his bed, which was truly one-size-fits-all. If the traveler were too short, he was stretched till he “fit,” and if he were too tall, his dangling appendages were lopped off (an apt description of what the proponents of an unfalsifiable theory do to facts).

The Baloney Detection Kit also provides Shermer’s 10 questions for baloney detection, which discusses such things as confirmation bias (in which evidence counter to the theory are rejected), the need to question how the theory fits with “what we know about the world and how it works” (a particularly nasty stumbling block for Marxists), and the importance of asking whether the theorists’ “personal beliefs drive the conclusions, or vice versa.”

Particularly useful is the section on “How Thinking Goes Wrong,” which lists 25 fallacies to avoid. These are subdivided into categories of “problems in scientific thinking,” “problems in pseudoscientific thinking,” “logical problems in thinking,” and “psychological problems in thinking.” As one would expect, this section discusses such problems as that of observation changing the observed, anecdotal evidence, the burden of proof, post hoc argumentation, ad hominem argumentation, circular reasoning, reductio ad absurdum, and ideological immunity.

The Baloney Detection Kit also lists “Eight Sample Syllabi: How to Teach a Course in Science & Pseudoscience,” which includes a course offered in North Carolina. Entitled “Skepticism, Pseudoscience, & the Scientific Method,” the course is said to be “designed to improve critical thinking skills” — but the course description goes further: “In particular, it is the goal of this course to encourage us to think of all the ways in which we can be fooled by others and fool ourselves.”

The course is taught by Dr. Eric Carlson at Wake Forest University.