Critical Thinker Academy: Learn to Think Like a Philosopher

Critical Thinker Academy: Learn to Think Like a Philosopher, available at $109.99, has an average rating of 4.53, with 210 lectures, 29 quizzes, based on 5855 reviews, and has 68589 subscribers.

You will learn about fundamental concepts of critical thinking (logic, argument analysis, rhetoric, reasoning with probabilities, the importance of background knowledge, etc.) the importance of critical thinking for personal development, participation in democratic society, and the pursuit of wisdom the role that critical thinking principles play in good essay writing how cognitive biases make us prone to errors in how we form beliefs and make judgments how our tribal psychology and political polarization affect our ability to think critically how debates in science often turn on the meanings of key terms, like "theory", "fact", "hypothesis" and "law" and much more! This course is ideal for individuals who are anyone who thinks that critical thinking is important and would like to learn more about it or anyone who is required to think and write argumentatively or anyone interested in the psychology of belief, judgment and persuasion or anyone interested in philosophy and who would like to learn more about philosophical ideas and methods or anyone taking a logic or philosophy class who would like to brush up on their basic logic and argumentation skills or anyone interested in scientific debates, or the philosophy of science or anyone interested in tribalism and contemporary politics It is particularly useful for anyone who thinks that critical thinking is important and would like to learn more about it or anyone who is required to think and write argumentatively or anyone interested in the psychology of belief, judgment and persuasion or anyone interested in philosophy and who would like to learn more about philosophical ideas and methods or anyone taking a logic or philosophy class who would like to brush up on their basic logic and argumentation skills or anyone interested in scientific debates, or the philosophy of science or anyone interested in tribalism and contemporary politics.

Enroll now: Critical Thinker Academy: Learn to Think Like a Philosopher

Summary

Title: Critical Thinker Academy: Learn to Think Like a Philosopher

Price: $109.99

Average Rating: 4.53

Number of Lectures: 210

Number of Quizzes: 29

Number of Published Lectures: 207

Number of Published Quizzes: 29

Number of Curriculum Items: 239

Number of Published Curriculum Objects: 236

Original Price: $109.99

Quality Status: approved

Status: Live

What You Will Learn

fundamental concepts of critical thinking (logic, argument analysis, rhetoric, reasoning with probabilities, the importance of background knowledge, etc.)
the importance of critical thinking for personal development, participation in democratic society, and the pursuit of wisdom
the role that critical thinking principles play in good essay writing
how cognitive biases make us prone to errors in how we form beliefs and make judgments
how our tribal psychology and political polarization affect our ability to think critically
how debates in science often turn on the meanings of key terms, like "theory", "fact", "hypothesis" and "law"
and much more!

Who Should Attend

anyone who thinks that critical thinking is important and would like to learn more about it
anyone who is required to think and write argumentatively
anyone interested in the psychology of belief, judgment and persuasion
anyone interested in philosophy and who would like to learn more about philosophical ideas and methods
anyone taking a logic or philosophy class who would like to brush up on their basic logic and argumentation skills
anyone interested in scientific debates, or the philosophy of science
anyone interested in tribalism and contemporary politics

Target Audiences

anyone who thinks that critical thinking is important and would like to learn more about it
anyone who is required to think and write argumentatively
anyone interested in the psychology of belief, judgment and persuasion
anyone interested in philosophy and who would like to learn more about philosophical ideas and methods
anyone taking a logic or philosophy class who would like to brush up on their basic logic and argumentation skills
anyone interested in scientific debates, or the philosophy of science
anyone interested in tribalism and contemporary politics

For long-term success in school, business and life, learning HOW to think is far more important than learning WHAT to think.

Yet rather than serve as the core of any education worthy of a rational human being, we have relegated the teaching of logic, argument analysis and critical reasoning to specialty courses in universities that reach too few students, too late in their education.

In this course I share my growing understanding of these topics, with a focus on what is practically important and useful for developing as independent critical thinkers.

Currently the course contains over 200 videos totalling over 19 hours of viewing time!

Among the topics you will learn:

why critical thinking is important
the difference between logic and argumentation
what makes an argument good or bad
the importance of background knowledge for critical thinking
techniques of argument analysis and reconstruction
what our growing understanding of the human mind tells us about how we actually form beliefs and make decisions
how tribalism and political polarization affect our ability to think critically
how scientific debates often turn on the meanings of key terms, like “theory”, “law”, and “hypothesis”
how to reason about chance and uncertainty
how to write a good argumentative essay
how to cite sources and avoid plagiarism in your writing

and much more! This content is drawn from a variety of teaching resources I’ve developed over the past few years, including a video podcast.

It’s important for you to know that I am continuing to add videos and course modules on a regular basis. This course will continue to grow and grow — I have a LOT OF GROUND that I want to cover! This is ONLY THE BEGINNING!

Course Curriculum

Chapter 1: Introductions

Lecture 1: What People Are Saying …

Lecture 2: How to Use The Course Materials

Chapter 2: Why Critical Thinking is Important

Lecture 1: Why Critical Thinking is Important – PDF Ebook

Lecture 2: Logical Self-Defense

Lecture 3: Personal Empowerment

Lecture 4: Liberal Democracy and Civic Duty

Lecture 5: Philosophy and the Search for Wisdom

Chapter 3: The Five Pillars of Critical Thinking

Lecture 1: The Five Pillars of Critical Thinking – PDF Ebook

Lecture 2: The Five Pillars of Critical Thinking

Lecture 3: Logic for Critical Thinkers

Lecture 4: Argumentation versus Rhetoric

Lecture 5: Critical Thinking's Dirty Secret

Lecture 6: What Critical Thinkers Can Learn From Good Actors

Chapter 4: Cognitive Biases and Critical Thinking

Lecture 1: Cognitive Biases and Critical Thinking – PDF Ebook

Lecture 2: Cognitive Biases: Introduction

Lecture 3: Cognitive Biases and the Authority of Science

Lecture 4: Cognitive Biases and the Evolution of Reason

Chapter 5: Tribalism, Polarization and Critical Thinking

Lecture 1: Introduction

Lecture 2: Belief, Identity and Resistance: Introduction to the Core Belief Model

Lecture 3: What is Tribalism? Why is it Dangerous?

Lecture 4: Our Tribal Intelligence: Personal vs Group Knowledge

Lecture 5: In Our Tribe We Trust: How Group Identities Shape Our Thinking

Lecture 6: Appendix to "Our Tribal Intelligence": The Knowledge Illusion

Chapter 6: Cognitive Biases, Tribalism and Politics

Lecture 1: Value Pluralism: We Care About Many Kinds of Values

Lecture 2: Tribalism and the Focusing Illusion

Lecture 3: Polarization and Politics: How it Impairs Our Critical Thinking Faculties

Chapter 7: Special Topic: Critical Thinking About Science: The Vocabulary of Science

Lecture 1: Introduction

Lecture 2: Is Evolution a Theory, a Fact, or Both?

Lecture 3: Overview

Lecture 4: An Important Distinction: Epistemically Loaded versus Neutral Language

Lecture 5: "Theory" as Down-Player

Lecture 6: "Theory" as Up-Player

Lecture 7: Why We Need an Epistemically Neutral Concept of "Theory"

Lecture 8: A Neutral Definition of "Theory": A Classical (but incomplete) Story

Lecture 9: A Neutral Definition of "Theory": A More Sophisticated Story

Lecture 10: "You Can't Deny the Facts": An Epistemically Loaded Definition of "Fact"

Lecture 11: "I Had the Facts Wrong": An Epistemically Neutral Definition of "Fact"

Lecture 12: Can There Be Theoretical Facts?

Lecture 13: Epistemically Loaded Definitions of "Law"

Lecture 14: Examples of Laws in Biology and Psychology

Lecture 15: Examples of Laws in Astronomy and Physics

Lecture 16: Unpacking the Neutral Concept of "Law"

Lecture 17: But Are There Any Laws?

Lecture 18: A Quick Word: Are Laws Explanatory?

Lecture 19: "That's Just a Hypothesis": An Epistemically Loaded Definition of "Hypothesis"

Lecture 20: An Epistemically Neutral Definition of "Hypothesis"

Lecture 21: Introduction: What is a Model?

Lecture 22: Maps and Models

Lecture 23: Models as Tools For Reasoning About the World

Lecture 24: How Equations Can Be Models

Lecture 25: Is There a Difference Between a Model and a Theory?

Lecture 26: Introduction: Theories, Models, Truth and Reality

Lecture 27: The Challenge of Interpreting Scientific Theories

Lecture 28: Prediction and Truth: Lessons from Ptolemy

Lecture 29: Prediction and Truth: Lessons From the Kinetic Theory of Gases

Lecture 30: Assignment: Critique a 7 Minute Video on the Vocabulary of Science

Lecture 31: Here's the Video: "Fact vs. Theory vs. Hypothesis vs. Law … EXPLAINED!"

Lecture 32: 1. The Motivation For the Video

Lecture 33: 2. "Scales of Truthiness"

Lecture 34: 3. The Fundamental Error

Lecture 35: 4. The Problem With Defining Facts in Terms of Observations

Lecture 36: 5. Problems With Defining Hypotheses as Starting Points For Inquiry

Lecture 37: 6. Problems With Defining Theories as Well-Supported

Lecture 38: 7. Problems With Defining Evolution as an Observable Fact

Lecture 39: 8. Problems With Defining Laws in Terms of Observations

Lecture 40: 9. Can Laws Explain, or Do They Just Describe? Kepler, Newton and Einstein

Lecture 41: 10. Analyzing the Last Slide

Lecture 42: 11. Who is to Blame?

Chapter 8: Special Topics

Lecture 1: Critical Thinking About Conspiracies – PDF Ebook

Lecture 2: Critical Thinking About Conspiracies (I): Introduction

Lecture 3: Critical Thinking About Conspiracies (II): The Argument for Default Skepticism

Lecture 4: Critical Thinking About Conspiracies (III): Mind Control and Falsifiability

Lecture 5: Causation, God and the Big Bang – PDF Ebook

Lecture 6: Causation, God and the Big Bang

Lecture 7: Five Reasons to Major in Philosophy – PDF Ebook

Lecture 8: Five Reasons to Major in Philosophy

Chapter 9: Basic Concepts in Logic and Argumentation

Lecture 1: Basic Concepts in Logic and Argumentation – PDF Ebook

Lecture 2: What is an Argument?

Lecture 3: What is a Claim, or Statement?

Lecture 4: What is a Good Argument? (I)

Lecture 5: Identifying Premises and Conclusions

Lecture 6: The Truth Condition

Lecture 7: The Logic Condition

Lecture 8: Valid vs Invalid Arguments

Instructors

Kevin deLaplante
PhD, Philosopher, Founder of the Critical Thinker Academy

Rating Distribution

1 stars: 59 votes
2 stars: 97 votes
3 stars: 623 votes
4 stars: 1970 votes
5 stars: 3106 votes

Frequently Asked Questions

How long do I have access to the course materials?

You can view and review the lecture materials indefinitely, like an on-demand channel.

Can I take my courses with me wherever I go?

Definitely! If you have an internet connection, courses on Udemy are available on any device at any time. If you don’t have an internet connection, some instructors also let their students download course lectures. That’s up to the instructor though, so make sure you get on their good side!

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