I’ll be teaching critical thinking next month (September). Learn some easy tools of Bayesian reasoning, how to spot and correct for cognitive biases, how to reason more logically and evade fallacies, and how to better question your decisions and beliefs constructively. Skills everyone should have and hone! And that you might be able to teach to your fellow citizens in the coming dark years.
This will also be your chance to propose and discuss the critical thinking skills you think everyone should adopt.
The course text will be Logically Fallacious: The Ultimate Collection of Over 300 Logical Fallacies, New Academic Edition, by Bo Bennett. Get your copy now!
And register today! Class starts September 1.
Or spread the word. Tell any of your friends or contacts who might be interested. Lots of people will want to hone their knowledge and skills in this domain. And this class is all about helping people do that, and very affordably.
Learn the basics you need in logic, cognitive science, and reasoning about probability, to be a better, sharper thinker, about everything that matters in your life!
Here is the official course description…
Richard Carrier (Ph.D., Columbia University) will provide instruction and advice on the new skills now needed to become a good critical thinker in the 21st century in his new course “Critical Thinking in the 21st Century: Essential Skills Everyone Should Master.”
Based on Dr. Carrier’s acclaimed presentation for the Secular Student Alliance, this course will:
- Teach students standard skills in traditional logic and fallacies.
- Cover cognitive biases and how to detect & avoid them, including motivated reasoning and the political brain.
- Bayes’ Theorem, and Bayesian problem solving, for the non-mathematician, and other skills in reasoning about probability.
- Learning how to see things from someone else’s perspective.
- Useful skills of self-examination, self-critique, and personal improvement in thinking & reasoning, for personal belief development and the acquisition of lifelong wisdom.
Each student will be left with a whole toolbox of ideas and information to work with, which will make them sharper thinkers in every domain. You will also get to ask any questions you’ve ever had on the subject, of an expert with decades of experience studying and applying these skills. And be introduced to helpful resources on critical thinking knowledge that you can bookmark and continue to use.
You can register for the class here.
You can procure the required course text here (print or kindle).
All other materials will be provided.
Study and participate on your own time. And participate as much or as little as you want.
How often does this class meet? Every day of the week in Sept? How long does the class last? An hour or more? What time of day? I’ve never done this before. Elaine Olson
It’s at-your-own-pace. As the Registration page says, there are no scheduled or live meetings or events. You can login anytime you want, and participate as much or as little as you want.
The structure is: each week has assigned readings, sometimes recorded videos, and you can study those as much or as little as you have time for, and at any time that suits your own schedule; then there are forums, where you can post your own answers to study questions, and post any and all questions you want to ask, and you can do that anytime. I then check in every day at random times to evaluate and comment usefully on answers, and answer questions in useful detail (and you can then keep asking follow-up questions as much as you need). You can also interact with other students there, but it’s always on your own time, like any other type of online forum, only these have no trolls, only serious folks who want to educate or learn.