has occurred starting with Andrew Brown at the Guardian, and splashing onto PZ's place.
Brown makes some interesting characterizations of a group he includes as "New Atheists", and PZ denies pretty much everything Brown claims except the part where he quotes the individuals involved. PZ does mention "critical thinking" and doesn't define it in anyway; that's probably understandable given the situation and context. But as far as I know, he never, ever defines what sort of process he considers to be critical thinking. He just avers that he has it, those other religious (enter any of PZ's terms of denigration here) don't have it. Perhaps as I have previously supposed, it is a tautology for PZ: if he says it, it is "critical thinking" by definition.
5 comments:
Of course, PZ never stated nor implied that "critical thinking" is simply what he says it is. That kinds of blows your whole post.
PZ's entire approach to the world is that he is the critical thinker, and those who disagree with that are [fill in the terms of denigration]. His arrogations of critical thinking are indeed unsupported and unsupportable in the world of true critical thought processing. Perhaps you don't read PZ very much. Or perhaps you share his mindset.
Here is what I do know: PZ Myers never stated nor implied that "critical thinking" is simply what he says it is.
Here is what else I know: A false premise does not magically change into a true premise merely because you keep repeating it.
I do read PZ's blog on a regular basis. I have an RSS feed collection page (actually I have four different pages covering different kinds of RSS feeds) with something like two dozen or so feeds from various blogs that I'm interested in keeping an eye on. The fact that I read PZ's blog does not imply that I agree with PZ on everything (in fact, it doesn't imply that I agree with him on anything; however, I do happen to agree with a lot of what he writes about).
So on top of you asserting and using a false premise, that PZ says that critical thinking is what he says it is by definition, then you attempt to criticize my criticism asserting another false premise: I share his mindset (that critical thinking is what PZ says it is).
Apparently you're using some form of argument-by-casting-false-aspersions, which, last time I checked, is not considered part of what we call critical thinking.
Now, if you really had a point, then what you should be doing is quoting PZ, showing exactly where he has said that critical thinking is what he says it is, instead of merely re-asserting your claim. If you can back up your assertion, that's something that would actually be relevant.
I admit to sometimes being intemperate when being niggled about nothing whatsoever. In this case perhaps a more basic detailed outline of the logic involved is warranted.
Let's say Protagonist A claims that Antagonist B has no justification for a claim made by Antagonist B, because Antagonist B has no [quality Y]. The inference is properly made that Protagonist A feels that he (a) knows what [quality Y] is; (b) has it himself; (c) is a proper judge of whether or not Antagonist B has [quality Y]; (d) claims that [quality Y] is necessary for the ability to make or refute the claim.
However, since Protagonist A does not define his concept of [quality Y], one is left to presume that Protagonist A assumes that [quality Y] is part and parcel of Protagonist A's every argument. But the truth of this is actually unknowable since [quality Y] is found to be in a position of relativity to the unstated opinion of Protagonist A, and is therefore a relativistic property that is undefined except in the mind of Protagonist A.
Barring serious deliberative future input, this thread is closed.
Post a Comment