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Bowell, Tracy, Gary Kemp. Critical Thinking: A Concise Guide
2014, Routledge; 4 edition.
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Added by: Berta Grimau
Publisher's note: We are frequently confronted with arguments. Arguments are attempts to persuade us - to influence our beliefs and actions - by giving us reasons to believe this or that. Critical Thinking: A Concise Guide will equip students with the concepts and techniques used in the identification, analysis and assessment of arguments. Through precise and accessible discussion, this book provides the tools to become a successful critical thinker, one who can act and believe in accordance with good reasons, and who can articulate and make explicit those reasons. Key topics discussed include:
  • Core concepts in argumentation.
  • How language can serve to obscure or conceal the real content of arguments; how to distinguish argumentation from rhetoric.
  • How to avoid common confusions surrounding words such as 'truth', 'knowledge' and 'opinion'.
  • How to identify and evaluate the most common types of argument.
  • How to distinguish good reasoning from bad in terms of deductive validly and induction.

Comment: Appropriate for complete beginners to logic and philosophy. Adequate for an introduction to critical thinking. It doesn't presuppose any previous knowledge of logic. Moreover, there is an interactive website for the book which provides resources for both instructors and students including new examples and case studies, flashcards, sample questions, practice questions and answers, student activities and a test bank of questions for use in the classroom.

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Waters, Anne. That Alchemical Bering Strait Theory: America’s Indigenous Nations and Informal Logic Courses
2004, In American Indian Thought: Philosophical Essays, ed. Waters, A., pp.72-83, Blackwell Publishing
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Added by: Franci Mangraviti
Abstract:

The chapter portrays how contextual examples are relevant to methods of teaching that empower understanding. Focusing on argument from Vine Deloria, jr’s Red Earth, White Lies, Native students inspire one another to learn critical thinking skills, as they discover ways to determine whether Deloria’s concerns with the logic of Western thought are shown to be justified. In the context of teaching about a particular critical thinking fallacy, students grasp the application of logical skills in their own meaningful
cultural context. The point driven home is that the meaningful and culturally relevant contextual content of examples used to teach critical thinking can excite and inspire Native students to learn. Thus philosophers can reinforce the acquisition of critical thinking skills for Native students by using meaningful, familiar content to reinforce understanding and praxis, for the recognition of cognitively false conclusions. This chapter implies an ethical maxim: using examples only from Western thought to teach critical thinking skills may prejudice students of other traditions in their acquisition of these skills.

Comment: A natural pick for a course on teaching philosophy, or that involves a discussion of epistemic injustice in philosophy education.

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