The Benefit and Manner of Asking the Right Questions:

1 .Some values that critical thinkers have are adventure, ambition, autonomy, comfort, excellence, justice, rationality, tolerance, and spontaneity. To be honest, I didn’t hear any of these discussed along with our going over the classroom agreement. I would say though, that autonomy and tolerance are up there on the list of things to value within this class because within the class agreement are things like being non-judgemental and being respectful of others’ ideas and opinions.

2. The difference between strong sense and weak sense critical thinking is that weak sense is used for the sole purpose of defending beliefs and strong sense is used to evaluate beliefs, even the ones that we, ourselves, hold. I think strong sense critical thinking, to speak from experience, is harder to use because as a christian I didn’t want other points of view to contaminate my own. I didn’t want my judgement clouded so I rejected all other opinions other than my own. As a christian I held my beliefs closely and judged everyone around me for being the way they were. If anyone tried to question my beliefs I was quick to rebuke them with beliefs formed from the words of a book written 2000 years ago. Recent events though have caused me to re-evaluate my position and I have opened up to the possibility of there being no god and my judgements were for nothing. This will open me to new ways of thinking. Although christianity did give me useful values like prudence and tolerance, and compassion and peace and goodwill toward men, those values were very closed off by the judgements that religion had me take up. Now I can use those values in a whole world of people that might have different ways of thinking and being that before I would’ve just, potentially, dismissed. Also, If I was still a christian, taking this class, this book would’ve gotten me down quite a bit. The way it talks of rebelling against those that try to get you to believe a certain way or to be a certain way would have thrown me into the belief that the writer of this book is anti-christ and this book would have been in one ear and out the other. This book also called most christians weak minded through the use of the weak sense critical thinking because they don’t likely stray from the faith and will guard it tooth and nail, which I would say is still a pretty strong way of thinking and the book insults that way of life. Most of the ways of thinking in this book is dangerous to christians and that is why they won’t likely open up to the strong sense critical thinking, but now that I am not a christian I find this a breath of fresh air, freeing, and invigorating.

3. An argument in this class is a way to harness and grow our conclusions and those of others. It is a learning experience based on evidence, not a way to verbally abuse someone or put someone down. The books’ definition of an argument does not rely on “me” being right, whereas, often, in arguments between parents or friends, the outcome relies on who’s right and who’s wrong.

4. Everyone has there own opinion of how or why, things should be done. In my opinion there are many, “right answers,” and the one we choose should be respected unless it endangers someones’ life.

“Why Questioning?”

1. I can relate to this chapter. In the deciding to come back to college I answered a huge question. I haven’t been the most successful person, to say the least. I was looking at my life and asked myself, “where am I going to be in ten years?”Am I going to still be working dead end jobs, trying my best just to survive? I want a wife, kids, a house, and other nice things. I can’t get any of that being a loser. I need to do something, and fast. So I applied for college and decided I am going to be a doctor. I am going to work my ass off to get what I want.
2. I think it has a lot to do with the beliefs that are thrown at us growing up. If the answers are already in us, what’s the point of asking questions? Just do what has already been laid out for us. Also, I think it has to do with our insecurities. If we constantly believe we can’t achieve what others have and more, then we slink into what’s comfortable and stop striving. No more questions. “I can’t do that, that dream is way to big.” Then I tell you the dream is truly dead. Until you start thinking otherwise and just go for it. Bezos, Jobs, and Einstein obviously didn’t let poor thinking get in the way of them reaching the heights that they achieved.
3. As a student I have to ask questions to succeed. I have to ask questions to gain the knowledge that I need to do well in anything that I aspire to do. As a doctor, I guess one question I should ask right now is, “do I want to be the kind of doctor that uses old techniques to diagnose and treat patients, or do I want to be the kind of doctor that will discover and build new ways of diagnosing and treating patients?”