Critical Thinking in many ways forms the backbone of Science because it uses logic and reason to come to conclusions devoid of emotional influences. Personally I have a hard time seeing how people can see this as a problem because quite simply “it works”, yet I’m often dismayed by a substantial portion of the public specifically because they do not embrace Critical Thinking. Perhaps this is because it (and Science for that matter) gets only cursory exposure in our basic education system, but I suspect the main culprit is parents and the way they raise their children. Political and Religious ideologues completely ignore Critical Thinking, instead valuing what I like to call “Emotional Thinking.” No doubt there’s a time and a place for emotions, but when it comes to understanding reality or seeking truth, emotions can be horribly unreliable.
The author of a previous video on Open Mindedness has posted a new video about Critical Thinking that’s an excellent primer on the concept and shows why it’s not only effective but something we should all strive to do.
There’s an old saying around defense circles: don’t bring a knife to a gun fight. The obvious point is that if you’re going to engage in combat, make sure you’re matched on at least an equal level with your weapon, otherwise you’re choosing to fight with an inherent disadvantage. I should mention that a variation on this saying came from soldiers making fun of law enforcement’s obsession with sub-machine guns: don’t bring a pistol caliber to a rifle fight. But I digress.
There’s an interesting story going around gun circles today about a blogger who reacted to a potential mugging by tossing his hot cup of coffee at his knife wielding aggressor as he reached for and drew his concealed pop-gun (sorry, I can’t help but call tiny .25 Autos pop-guns). You can click the link to read the full story, but I’ll just comment on some snippets here.
The blogger was walking to his car with a cup of coffee when he was approached by a man with a knife. The blogger carries a very small, concealable Berretta Jetfire (yes, concealed carry is legal in many states). Once he determines that the knife wielder is threatening him and is within a close enough distance, he decides to toss his hot coffee at him. This is actually a really smart move. People will often raise their hands when threatened as a natural reaction to show that they in turn are not a threat, but throwing the hot coffee at the guy turns the tables a bit. He has now taken the initiative, forcing the mugger to react to him and not the other way around. By reacting, whether that means moving out of the way or unconsciously flinching to avoid the hot coffee, this allows the blogger a split second to get ahead of the mugger’s OODA loop. He uses that time to draw his pistol, thereby establishing himself as the dominate threat to the mugger. In a way, this is also a form of posturing – like a lizard that puffs up its neck to scare off a potential attacker.
But the important thing is that he doesn’t fire. The blogger makes a split-second assessment now that the tables have been turned and acknowledges that he is no longer under threat – the mugger is running away.
Why do I comment on this incident? Well, I think this is a good example of reacting to a potentially threatening situation and turning the tables against the attacker without skipping directly to lethal force. Instead, a lightning fast escalation of force was applied with a very clever use of a “beverage you’re about to enjoy is very hot.”
Over the years I’ve often had people tell me that I need to be more open minded when it comes religion, science and understanding the world around us. I have a huge problem with this and on the surface anyone opposing the concept of open mindedness would appear to be an authoritarian dolt. But I think invoking “open mindedness” instead creates a somewhat politically correct atmosphere where no one gets their feelings hurt even when they’re just flat out wrong. It makes sense that open mindedness is seen as a personal freedom of sorts and when the subject is one that’s entirely subjective to personal opinion, open mindedness has a place. Think about it. How can one person say “Only Modern Art is truly beautiful” when the reality is that different art forms means different things to different people. This is why philosophy is often the domain of subjective and somewhat intangible ideas and concepts.
Science is a wholly different matter. It actually thrives on open mindedness, but there are a few simple rules that must be followed. Most important is that you need evidence to support your ideas and resorting to calls for open mindedness in fact hurts the progress of ideas. If someone were to publish a scientific theory about the existence of ghosts without providing testable evidence, the idea would be tossed aside by the community. In that case it’s purely a hypothesis and not a scientific theory, yet we hear claims from folks pushing pseudo-science such as Astrology or UFOs, arguing that the scientific community is biased and needs to have an open mind to these things.
On this subject, I found the above video to be an excellent demonstration of why open mindedness is problematic when it comes to scientific knowledge.
There’s an old saying around defense circles: don’t bring a knife to a gun fight. The obvious point is that if you’re going to engage in combat, make sure you’re matched on at least an equal level with your weapon, otherwise you’re choosing to fight with an inherent disadvantage. I should mention that a variation on this saying came from soldiers making fun of law enforcement’s obsession with sub-machine guns: don’t bring a pistol caliber to a rifle fight. But I digress.