Critical Thinking Disposition Self- Rating Form. - Pearson Learning ...

that person never worked for an organization like
ours before. It’s a tough choice. But I’m thinking
that probably the second person would
be the best of the three for us to hire since
innovative ideas are more important to
us than experience or enthusiasm.
• In the past whenever the TV news
programs in Chicago ran headline
stories featuring a sketch artist’s
drawing of a fugitive, the Chicago
Police Department (CPD) hotline
received over 200 phone calls
from people all over the city who
said that they spotted the person.
Tonight the Chicago TV news
programs are going to feature
a sketch artist’s drawing
of a fugitive whom the police
are trying to locate. This will
probably yield hundreds of
calls to the CPD hotline.
• Suppose we imagine electricity
flowing through wires
in the way that water flows
through pipes. With this analogy in mind, it would be reasonable
to infer that wires that are larger in circumference
should be capable of carrying greater electrical loads.
Cosmos series, which you can access at www.
mythinkinglab.com.
Watch the Video on mythinkinglab.com
Sagan tells us that Aristarchus
“deduced that the Sun had to be
much larger” from “the size of the
Earth’s shadow on the Moon
during a lunar eclipse.” Aristarchus
used deduction to infer
that the Sun was much larger
than the Earth because there
was no other possible explanation
for the size of the shadow
of the Earth on the Moon during
a lunar eclipse than that
the shadow is being made by a
hugely larger source of light shining
toward the Earth and the Moon from a
very great distance away.
DEDUCTIVE
REASONING
Drawing inferences in which it
appears that the conclusion cannot
possibly be false if all of the premises are true is called
deductive reasoning.
Here are some examples:
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Inductive reasoning is used when we are trying to diagnose
what the problem might be or deciding which of several promising
options would be the most reasonable to select. Scientists
use inductive methods, such as experimentation, and
inductive tools, such as statistics. The Nurses’ Health Study
report was an example of scientific findings derived inductively.
When we base our predictions on our past experiences
about how things will happen in the future, we are using inductive
reasoning. Reasoning by analogy, exemplified in the
example about electricity being like water, is inductive. In
strong, inductive reasoning, the evidence at hand gives us a
reasonable assurance that the conclusion we are drawing is
probably true. As long as there is the possibility that all the
reasons for a claim could be true and yet the claim itself could
turn out to be false, we are in the realm of inductive reasoning.
COSMOS VS. CHAOS
The idea that the earth is a planet revolving around the sun is
often attributed to the fifteenth-century Polish astronomer-priest
named Copernicus. But, in fact, the first scientist known to have
reasoned to that view of the solar system was the Greek astronomer
mathematician Aristarchus, who lived more than two
millennia earlier. Centuries before telescopes were invented,
Aristarchus had only his eyes and, of course, his mind. Carl Sagan
describes the reasoning Aristarchus used in a clip from the
• San Francisco is west of Denver. Denver is west of Detroit
and Newark. Therefore, we can infer with deductive
certitude that San Francisco is west of Newark.
• Every successful president of the United States was both
diplomatic and decisive. General Dwight D. Eisenhower
served in WWII as the Commander of the Allied Armies
in Europe and then went on to become a successful U.S.
president. Therefore, President Eisenhower was decisive
and diplomatic.
• Either we attended the campus Halloween party last year
or we were in Texas visiting your folks that day. We did not
go to Texas at all last year. So, we must have attended the
campus Halloween party last year.
• Assume that ‘a,’ ‘b,’ and ‘c’ are any three numbers. Where
‘w’ and ‘y’ are numbers, assume that ‘f’ is a mathematical
function such that ‘fwy’ yields ‘z’ where ‘z’ is the number
that is the product of ‘w’ multiplied by ‘y.’ It follows
deductively then that ‘(fa(fbc))’ yields to the product of ‘a’
multiplied by the product of ‘b’ multiplied by ‘c.’
• If God intended marriage for the sole purpose of human reproduction,
and if same-sex couples are entirely incapable
of human reproduction, then it follows that God did not
intend marriage for same-sex couples.
• Not every argument is of equal quality. Therefore, at least
one argument is better than at least one other argument.
Skilled and Eager to Think
Think Critically, by Peter Facione and Carol Ann Gittens. Published by Prentice Hall. Copyright © 2013 by Pearson Education, Inc.