Amidst misinformation, critical thinking needs a 21st century upgrade

[BootinUp]

In 2013, the University of California, Berkeley, debuted a course to teach undergraduates the tricks used by scientists to make sense of the world, in the hope that these tricks would prove useful in assessing the claims and counterclaims that bombard us every day.

It was launched by three UC Berkeley professors — a physicist, a philosopher and a psychologist — in response to a world afloat in misinformation and disinformation, where politicians were making policy decisions based on ideas that, if not demonstrably wrong, were at least untested and uncertain.

The class, Sense and Sensibility and Science, was a hit and convinced the professors to write a book based on the class that provides tips not only on how to systematically wade through the noise around us to seek the truth, but also how to work with those holding different values to come to a consensus on how to act.

The book, Third Millennium Thinking: Creating sense in a world of nonsense (Little, Brown, Spark), will be published today, March 26 — just in time for the 2024 election season, which promises to be more bluff and bluster than rational argument.

The course, now co-taught with Amy Lerman, UC Berkeley professor of public policy and political science, currently enrolls 300 students for Zoom lectures and additional smaller, in-person discussion sections. Courses based on the UC Berkeley curriculum have been adopted at Harvard University and UC Irvine, and, this spring, by the University of Chicago. A high school course is currently being developed and classroom-tested as well. Berkeley News sat down with Perlmutter, Campbell and MacCoun to discuss the book and why the world needs a science-based approach to critical thinking and decision making.

https://news.berkeley.edu/2024/03/26/amidst-misinformation-critical-thinking-needs-a-21st-century-upgrade

[Blue Owl]

1. MAGA is the enemy of critical thinking

[TwilightZone]

5. It far predates MAGA and it's much more extensive than that.

The GOP has been undermining the teaching of critical thinking skills for decades.

Social media and our short-attention-span culture are also significant factors in the plague of misinformation infecting society. People can't be bothered with spending even 30 seconds checking to see if something is true or not, and that's not a problem confined solely to the right.

[Faux pas]

2. Kickin'

for the morning when my critical thinking cap is at its very best

[erronis]

3. Heather Cox Richardson this morning talks exactly about the misinformation explosion

https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/march-29-2024

On Wednesday the nonprofit, nonpartisan Institute for the Study of War published a long essay explaining that Russia’s only strategy for success in Ukraine is to win the disinformation war in which it is engaged. While the piece by Nataliya Bugayova and Frederick W. Kagan, with Katryna Stepanenko, focused on Russia’s war against Ukraine, the point it makes about Russia’s information operation against Western countries applies more widely.

The authors note that the countries allied behind Ukraine dwarf Russia, with relative gross domestic products of $63 trillion and $1.9 trillion, respectively, while those countries allied with Russia are not mobilizing to help Russian president Vladimir Putin. Russia cannot defeat Ukraine or the West, they write, if the West mobilizes its resources.

This means that the strategy that matters most for the Kremlin is not the military strategy, but rather the spread of disinformation that causes the West to back away and allow Russia to win. That disinformation operation echoes the Russian practice of getting a population to believe in a false reality so that voters will cast their ballots for the party of oligarchs. In this case, in addition to seeding the idea that Ukraine cannot win and that the Russian invasion was justified, the Kremlin is exploiting divisions already roiling U.S. politics.

Americans are generally very gullible and naive about the "information" that is given to them - whether by cable T.V. or their buddies at the sports bar.

[erronis]

4. Also another excellent post: Critical Thinking and Intellectual Honesty and logical fallacies

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100218568198

[catnipcoffee]

6. thanks for osting this...

Ordered a copy and will report back (if anyone's interested) once I finish it.

Fair warning: the publisher is only providing DRM-protected e-books, so be sure to buy from a service that you trust (if you go that route).