Thinking?

The vast majority of the public, including those very well paid to do so, can not really think clearly or reason. It is a daily annoyance listening to them express their ideas and opinions when their reasoning is easily shown to be in error, incomplete, or unreasonable. It does, however,  keep me thinking...and sometimes entertained in the lobby. For some I just nod and smile, as their position is so superficial or preposterous that ANY discussion will be pointless and frustrating. 

Occasionally-thankfully, some DO remind me to 'check my premises'. :)

from Criticalthinking.org

"...We figure things out better if we can monitor what we are doing, intellectually, in trying to figure them out, so that we go beyond simply using logical structures, so that we go beyond simply making logical moves, so that we start to intentionally, deliberately, and willfully examine and take apart the logical structures we are using, so that we designedly, purposively, and alertly assess our use of the structures in everyday situations, and, of course, so that we do these things well: clearly, accurately, precisely, etc.

To understand logical structures is to integrate them, to establish logical connections between them, to make it possible for the mind to make an extended series of nuanced inferences, deductions, and derivations. “This is so, therefore that also is so, and that, and that.” The logical structures implicit in an educated person’s mind are highly systematized. The well-educated person is able to reason quite directly and deliberately, to begin somewhere, know where one is beginning, and then reason with awareness from that point to other points, all with a given question in mind, with specific evidence in mind, with specific reasons to advance, with specific conclusions to support, with consciousness of one’s point of view and of contrasting points of view. The good reasoner is always reasoning within a system that disciplines and restrains that reasoning.

When the logical structures by which a mind figures out the world are confused, a jumble, a hodgepodge, a mere conglomeration, then that figuring out is radically defective, typically in any of a variety of ways: incomplete, inaccurate, distorted, muddled, inexact, superficial, rigid, inconsistent, and unproductive. Then the mind begins it knows not where, takes things for granted without analysis or questioning, leaps to conclusions without sufficient evidence to back them up, meanders without a consciousness of its point of view or of alternative points of view. Then the mind wanders into its own prejudices and biases, its own egocentricity and socio-centricity. Then the mind is not able to discipline itself by a close analysis of the question at issue and ignores the demands that the logic of that question puts on it and us as rational, logic-creating, logic-using animals.

{Taken from Paul, R. (1993). Critical Thinking: What Every Student Needs to Survive in A Rapidly Changing World, Dillon Beach, CA: Foundation For Critical Thinking)."

I particularly do not love speaking with those so adamant about their beliefs who, when shown other equally (or more) valid ways of thinking about it, respond with a series of logical fallacies and ad hominem attacks. Especially the "You are just a guard, what do you know." Trumped! I am abashed! [and saddened...]

However I am energized and joyful when someone shows me that I have not completely thought something through, that I believed to be "true". Thanks, really!! (as I am prone to depression by my daily lobby interactions.)
[What is, is... I'm done whining now Sergeant Major!]