Origins of critical thinking

- Congratulations on becoming part of a long tradition of using logic and reason to wisely navigate the future. A tradition that goes back over 2,500 years to Socrates. Talk about resilient ideas. A good, critical thinking question might be, "How do you know that critical thinking started "with Socrates and not Confucius?" for example. Now we could argue that question, but if you started arguing by asking questions, especially about fundamental concepts, theories or ideas, we would be using the Socratic method, named after Socrates. So we'll start with Socrates who introduced the idea of questioning beliefs, questioning authority, seeking evidence, and striving to live an examined life. These weren't commonly understood concepts, and he didn't write things down. Socrates was critical of the written word because he found writing to be inferior to dialogue as a way to seek the truth. But his ideas were later written down by his student Plato. Thank Plato for that, for platonic love, and for founding the first school of Western philosophy, the Academy, where Aristotle studied. We have Aristotle to thank for structured thinking. Things like classifying information, organizing and analyzing arguments, identifying fallacies, which are logical errors in thinking, and rhetoric, structured persuasive arguments. When you start with a general observation, like good leaders are curious and curious people appreciate questions, and then you reach a specific conclusion. Therefore, good leaders appreciate questions. You have Aristotle to think for deductive reasoning. Critical thinking and scientific thinking came from its parent philosophy, love of wisdom. Between Plato and Francis Bacon, the father of the scientific method, There was a lot of thinking about thinking going on by the 1500s, but Francis ushered in the scientific revolution. So a critical thinking mindset should include a hat tip to Francis. Over 400 years ago, Francis Bacon was concerned with what we now call cognitive biases. When you're trying to figure out what to believe without deceiving yourself or ignoring evidence, thank him. When you're using a general observation, like my team has their best ideas in Monday morning meetings and then you draw a conclusion from that observation, like my team's creativity benefits from being away from work over the weekend. You have Frances to thank for inductive reasoning. When questioning, thinking, arguing, doubting and testing are a natural part of your comfortable, critical thinking mindset, also thank Francis. Hey, history is tricky. When you apply a critical thinking mindset to history, you uncover all kinds of things that are otherwise missed, new evidence, new perspectives, and unsung heroes. When developing a critical thinking mindset, it helps to be able to thank some of the minds who laid the foundation for this way of thinking.