PHIL& 115 - Critical Thinking

• Examine, evaluate, and revise material, ideas, or data using appropriate attitudes and skills.
• Support a position with appropriate and compelling evidence.
• Evaluate different evidence-based perspectives in the formulation and analysis of a problem or question.
• Explain key theoretical concepts in critical thinking.
• Recognize the role and importance of cultural variables including language, traditions, beliefs, privilege, social status, and early childhood experiences on critical thought processes.
• Identify, define, and apply vocabulary terms such as argument, premise, conclusion, bias, verbal thinking, deduction, induction, and fallacy.
• Organize and evaluate informal argumentation within classic literature, media reports, and current events within the context of cultural diversity, traditions, and awareness.
• Employ the standards of critical thinking to recognize the possibility of revision in one’s own ideas, systems of belief, and epistemological principals.
• Formulate and appraise characteristics of good argumentation both in oral and written formats while recognizing sensitivity and awareness of diverse variables such as culture, gender identity, sexual orientation, language, traditions, and socioeconomic status.

1. Sensation, perception, intuition
2. Cognition and the brain
3. Bloom’s Taxonomy and critical thinking standards
4. Elements and types of language, types of definitions
5. Critical thinking standards and argumentation
6. Argumentation, evaluation, truth, and evidence
7. Above topics are discussed in ancient terms (i.e., readings such as Gorgias of Leontini’s Encomium of Helen) and against the backdrop of contemporary issues and current events (i.e., legislation changes, political events)