Critical Thinking in the 21st Century

Critical Thinking for Homeland Security

Everyone navigates their way through the world using a set of preconceived ideas, stereotypes, notions and beliefs concerning how things work and how others will behave in any given situation. Not surprisingly, many people are surprised and even shocked to learn that some of the things they have firmly believed to be true all of their lives are inaccurate or even false. These frailties of the human condition mean that the search for the truth is ongoing and learning how to find it represents a critical part of the skill set needed in the 21st century. This paper provides a discussion and comparison of "elements of truth" and the "right questions" that should be asked in any given situation to discern the facts, followed by a summary of the research and important findings concerning these issues in the conclusion.

Review and Discussion

Not only does every side have two stories, each side of the story can have countless permutations depending on the individual perspective. Indeed, it is entirely possible for eyewitness accounts of an event by 100 people to be completely truthful, sincere and faithful yet still differ on all important points. These constraints to developing a single "pure truth" concerning events and situations make it important for researchers of all types to recognize the limitations that are involved when evaluating evidence and sources as well as using the right questions to ferret out the facts.

In their book, Asking the Right Questions, Browne and Keeley (2012) maintain that the right questions to ask in a given situation to determine the facts include the following:

What are the issues and the conclusions?

What are the reasons?

Which words or phrases are ambiguous?

What are the value and descriptive assumptions?

Are there any fallacies in the reasoning?

How good is the evidence?

Are there rival causes?

Are the statistics deceptive?

What significant information is omitted?

What reasonable conclusions are possible?" (p. 9)

By contrast, the "elements of truth" that are related to a given situation include the following:

Purpose: goal, objective

Question at issue: problem, issue

Information: data, facts, observations, experiences

Interpretation and inference: Conclusions, solutions

Concepts: theories, definitions, axioms, laws, principles, models

Assumptions: presupposition, taking for granted

Implications and consequences

Point-of-view, frame of reference, perspective, orientation

The foregoing right questions are compared to the elements of truth in Table 1 below.

Table 1

Comparison of Elements of Truth with the Corresponding Right Questions

Element of Truth

Right Question

Analysis

Question at issue: problem, issue

What are the issues and the conclusions?

These seek to identify the core problem/issue that is involved.

Purpose: goal, objective

What are the reasons?

These seek to discern the source of the issue.

Interpretation and inference: Conclusions, solutions

Which words or phrases are ambiguous?

These components seek to determine the influence of subjective analysis on the interpretation of the evidence or event.

Assumptions: presupposition, taking for granted

1. What are the value and descriptive assumptions?

2. Are the statistics deceptive?

3. What significant information is omitted?

These components seek to identify underlying subjective assumptions and factual information.

Point-of-view, frame of reference, perspective, orientation

Are there any fallacies in the reasoning?

Element of truth is intended to discern individual worldview while the right question seeks to identify basic flaws in rationale.

Information: data, facts, observations, experiences

1. How good is the evidence?

2. What reasonable conclusions are possible?

The right questions place a higher priority of the quality of the evidence and its implications than the element of truth component.

Concepts: theories, definitions, axioms, laws, principles, models

Are there rival causes?

Both of these components are concerned with identifying potential multiple causes of a problem.

Conclusion