I’ve always been a suspicious, cynical person. It’s only recently that I realized these traits are a product of something more profound. At the same time, I’ve noticed how gullible people can be and how easy it is to mislead them.
As the amount of “information” available to us expands exponentially, I see this trend of people being misled growing. As a father, I worry for my children’s generations (without oversharing, my kids’ ages span 15 years).
It’s only recently that I’ve found a unifying concept that helps explain my cantankerous personality and my near depression at the general inability to push back on obvious bullsh*t: critical thinking.
There has probably always been a lack of critical thinking in all societies. My perception is that it’s getting more expensive. To wit:
Online Shopping Scams: Fake stores lure customers with low prices, leading people to lose money because they fail to verify the legitimacy of the seller.
Phishing and E-mail Scams: Fraudulent emails or texts trick individuals into revealing personal information, causing identity theft or financial loss due to a lack of skepticism.
Fake News on Social Media: Misinformation circulates online, reinforcing pre-existing beliefs and deepening societal divides when people don’t check the credibility of sources.
Fad Diets, Detoxes, and Health Misinformation: People adopt extreme diets based on celebrity endorsements without investigating the scientific validity, risking their health.
Cryptocurrency Scams: Scammers take advantage of the hype around cryptocurrency, and people lose money by failing to critically assess the legitimacy of these investments.
Get-Rich-Quick Schemes: Individuals get drawn into pyramid schemes or fraudulent opportunities, making poor financial decisions because they don’t analyze the business model.
Groupthink in Professional Settings: In business decisions, team members may suppress their doubts to maintain harmony, leading to poor choices that haven't been critically evaluated.
It’s brutal out there.
What is critical thinking?
Critical thinking is a competency that involves analyzing, evaluating, and synthesizing information objectively to make well-reasoned judgments. It requires identifying biases, recognizing assumptions, and considering alternative perspectives. By systematically questioning both evidence and the underlying reasoning, critical thinkers solve complex problems, make informed decisions, and navigate uncertainty effectively. This competency is essential for adapting to change, fostering innovation, and ensuring sound decision-making in both professional and personal contexts.
As a product manager, critical thinking is particularly important because we are bombarded with so much information and are in a position to regularly make important decisions. That doesn’t mean that we as a community stand out as particularly good critical thinkers. I hope to help change that. My goal is to create a series of blogposts addressing critical thinking and providing actionable guidance and practices for thinking more critically. In this post, I’d like to define critical thinking and remind my readers why it’s important (in case the list above fails to make the point).
The next post in this series addresses the conditions that should elicit our critical thinking reflex.
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