"Tools for skeptical thinking.
What skeptical thinking boils down to is the means to construct, and to understand, a reasoned argument and—especially important—to recognize a fallacious or fraudulent argument. The question is not whether we like the conclusion that emerges out of a train of reasoning, but whether the conclusion follows from the premise or starting point and whether that premise is true."
Among the tools for thinking:
- Wherever possible, confirm of the “facts.”
- Can you find independent sources that report the same thing?
- Consider evidence provided by knowledgeable people or groups.
- Do they tell you how they got the evidence?
- Are the methods they used to gain the evidence reasonable & valid?
- Are the ways in which they analysed and presented their evidence transparent & reasonable?
- Be careful about arguments from authority. “Authorities” have made mistakes in the past. They will do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are no authorities; at most, there are experts.
- Respect expertise, but be ready to question it based on the evidence presented, or methods used.
- Spin more than one hypothesis.
- If there’s something to be explained, how many different ways could it be explained.?
- Use "tests" which you might systematically disprove each of the alternatives.
- What survives, the hypothesis that resists disproof, will have more chance of being the right answer than if you had simply run with the first idea you liked.
- Try not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because it’s yours. It’s only a way station in the pursuit of knowledge.
- Ask yourself why you like the idea.
- Compare it fairly with the alternatives.
- See if you can find reasons for rejecting it. If you don’t, others will.
Adapted from" Carl Sagan 1996 "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection." Chapter 12 in Sagan (1996) The Demon-Haunted World - posted on Carl Bergstrom & Javin West's Calling Bullshit course syllabus: Week 2 - Sptting Bulllshit (2017).
