While thinking of something meaningful, something that both truly plagues the world, and actually captures my interest, several ideas flipped through my mind. Originally, I thought a climate-oriented topic was prudent and topical, given the class this assignment is for. Through that, issues such as water use, food waste, wildlife preservation, and energy renewability all had their moment as potential candidates. Following that, I thought it was necessary to expand my criteria, look beyond a topic I already knew I had passion for. I looked through my secondary interests; matters of human behavior and psychology, and politics. The former is much too improbable to tackle, given the scope of the assignment, so it was quickly eliminated. The latter, politics, had no shortage of potential topics. The (nonpartisan) options included: policy knowledgeability, political intelligence, belief justification, etc.
The issue I was left with was the fact the all of these were pretty cool to me, and I wouldn’t scoff at a research position regarding any of these topics. This project, however, lacks both the resources and innate enthusiasm that a research project would not have to worry about.
After passively pondering a few days, I began seeing the links between all of these issues. Such concrete issues as climate change, proper actions that cannot reasonably be discoursed. The links crossed into every issue I thought about, like the current fake news epidemic threatening our first amendment freedoms, a government that is almost entirely against the wishes of those who voted them in, and blatant, verifiable lies told by the leader of the free world, one of (if not: THE) most powerful person alive. Political rant over, all of these run into the same problem:
Americans (and likely the entire world), lack critical thinking skills. Not to call the average citizen stupid, as there are legitimate distinctions between smart, intelligent, and knowledgeable. The first two are relatively innate, unfortunately (barring environment effects, such as diet, local environment, etc). Being knowledgeable, however, is something we Westerners are severely lacking. Disinterest in education, as well as little desire to dig into deeper meanings, leave far too many Americans to being entirely satisfied with being told the “truth” without any argument.
Pretension aside, my issue is at the core of many issues plaguing the world, a foundational fix that will trickle upward if successfully implemented. Educating people on the simple skills of argumentation and discourse, as well as identifying and eliminating fallacies within their logic, will cure much of the issues at hand. After watching debates of pro and anti-climate change “experts,” I’ve noticed most of the argument from the anti side is simply engaging in fallacy, which fools enough of the voting members of society to erase it from their issue list. Without a doubt, this is grandiose, and possibly even too societal to even implement, however I feel it is important enough to try and to something to try and curb the outright lack of logical skills and reasoning that complicates such simple concepts, twists truths, and creates everlasting conflict.
Sources:
https://www.thepensters.com/blog/smart-intelligent-educated/
https://www.wired.com/2011/03/the-importance-of-logic-critical-thinking/
http://www.thereadingclinic.co.za/e/importance-logical-thinking.htm
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/