About Critical Thinking

Dearest MJ,

Just a couple of points to wrap up my last rant post.

While the Catholic church advocates blind faith and infallible teachings, thereby creating a suppressive environment, in Buddhism, the Buddha himself "undermines the scriptural authority of his own words when he exhorts his followers not to accept the validity of his teachings simply on the basis of reverence to him." (His Holiness the Dalai Lama, "The Universe In A Single Atom," 2005, p. 24) In other words, you just can't take someone's word for it just because someone said so; it's about Critical Thinking, aka understanding based on reason and experience.

Typical clichéd picture of The Thinker because I'm talking about thinking.

A great example of the dangers of not doing your due diligence when accepting things as fact is what's happening with the #StopKony campaign from Invisible Children, (IC) a nonprofit organization. This will probably (and hopefully) not be around by the time you read this, but to sum up, basically, this company produced a heartstring-pulling 30 minute viral video that got 100 million hits and blew up the internet with calls for slacktivism. This video got TONS of people talking and wanting to take action and buy bracelets to put someone in jail. BUT, the problem is that a lot of people got caught up in the emotional narrative of this campaign without digging deeper to see if 1) Kony was the real problem 2) IC's proposed solution was the real solution 3) to ensure that any well-intentioned actions that one might take might actually do more harm than good. I should know, I was one of those people. In fact, this is a problem that I've had for a long time and have only really recognized not too long ago; I suspect that this might have something to do with growing up in a Catholic environment where you must respect your elders and listen to what they say and not talk back.

Now, I'll probably get pissed if you talk back at me or your mother, but I'll do my best to ensure that the only reason I get pissed off is because of disrespect. So, your mother and I will do our best to ensure that any disagreements we have are handled in a respectful and reasonable manner so that it doesn't even get to that point. Basically, my hope for you is that you have a critical mind of your own and that you are as unrelenting with seeking the truth as you currently are when you want to get something out of your reach. We'll do our best to explain things to you in a rational, logical manner so that you are satisfied with the answers you get when you reach your "Why?" phase. When you get older, I will expect that you call out ANYONE AND EVERYONE (including myself) on imposing any kind of oppressive language. And that's the thing. If you simply accept someone's word for it, they have a power over you and this opens the door for letting someone take advantage of you. That's bad.

So, what's the most important key to critical thinking? Three letters: W-H-Y. Always ask "why?" Always question assumptions. Now, this quest for the truth is a lifelong endeavour. Thus, you need to understand that what you might have considered to be true one day, might be completely wrong the next. This will not rock your world too badly if you adhere to one of the basic fundamentals of critical thought, which is an openness to all possibilities. This also has a lot to do with being able to "let go," which is a post I'll be writing about in the near future.

So, I don't know much of anything, especially Critical Thinking, but I do recognize that this is something I'm trying to improve and that this might help you to develop the skills necessary to be a critical thinker. This is important because you will be able to reason "at the highest level of quality in a fair-minded way.  People who think critically consistently attempt to live rationally, reasonably, empathically."

Love,


-Dad