The hiatus 20 Jun 2012 I have been filling a badly needed gap in the blogosphere lately, for which I apologise. My work situation has been extreme (we had two weeks to organise an international workshop, prepare a textbook draft and do various other things associated with navigating the US military bureaucracy. By the way, the correct way to reform a military bureaucracy is to raze the building to the ground, exile the workers, and salt the site. In a century or so it will become useful again. This is by far the quickest method, as the Romans demonstrated at Carthage). I’m just off to Berkeley for the workshop aforementioned. So you know what this is, it has to do with trying to figure out ways to teach critical thinking so that at the end of the course the students are measurably better at thinking than they were when they went into the class. Traditional methods, and in particular the teaching of fallacies, have no measurable improvement. Upon my return to the Lucky Land, I get to be the very first cab off the rank at the Australasian Association of Philosophy conference in Wollongong. After that I get to write, read, drink and prepare a lecture, so fun (for philosophical values of “fun”)! After that I should blog some more. Meanwhile go visit some of the blogs on the blogroll. Administrative
Administrative Empirical Perspectives 8 May 20128 May 2012 Jim Goetz, frequent commenter here, has started up what looks to be a physics and science blog at Empirical Perspectives. Go visit and make rude comments. Read More
Administrative Knees, ligaments and evolving thoughts 5 Oct 2012 I’m really sorry I’ve been quiet so long. It’s not for lack of thoughts. First I went to Sydney to work on my Nature of Classification book and then attend a workshop on the future of history and philosophy (and social studies) of science in Australia. And then I came… Read More
Administrative Sorry for the absence 11 Sep 2010 I’m preparing my semester’s teaching. It starts Monday so I may be a little quiet for a while. Contribute to a discussion or write a HPS piece for Whewell’s Ghost. Read More
Have fun at LAX. It will help you to keep calm to bear in mind that the queue that you stand in for the first hour at immigration is not the queue you will be in when you finally get to the front, so don’t worry about the fact that it won’t move discernibly. See you in the ‘Gong!
Have fun with that critical thinking bit. And do report back if you find a good way of teaching it. It has long seemed to me that critical thinking is learned as a young child, usually from parental encouragement. By the time they get to university, it might be too late.
I think those who can do it natively learn it early. The issue is how to teach those who do not; and it must be a bit like learning calculus: lots and lots of practice.