At Work Newswire

By Jefferson Flanders

American colleges and universities currently fall quite short in developing clear thinkers and persuasive writers, at least according to some of those closest to the issue.

Derek Bok, Harvard’s former president, has expressed his concern that “[m]ost undergraduates leave college still inclined to approach unstructured ‘real life’ problems with a form of primitive relativism, believing that there are no firm grounds for preferring one conclusion over another.” The American Institutes for Research recently reported that more than half of graduating seniors at four-year colleges could not correctly summarize a newspaper editorial. And a 2006 survey of hiring managers (sponsored by The Conference Board and other organizations) surfaced significant deficiencies in the writing and critical thinking skills of high school and college graduates entering the workforce.

The academics, business leaders, government officials, and others worried about these trends have focused on how critical thinking skills are crucial for success in a knowledge-based economy. If Americans want to compete globally, they argue, our workforce must be able to think and communicate clearly.

Yet any erosion in our collective ability to think clearly presents other dangers. Democratic countries need citizens and leaders who are clear thinkers. A liberal education should also prepare citizens to evaluate evidence, look for biases, and question premises, assumptions, and conclusions in the political arena; they must be able to distinguish between truth and what comedian Stephen Colbert has called “truthiness” (“the quality of stating concepts or facts one wishes or believes to be true, rather than concepts or facts known to be true”).

The purpose of clear thinking

There is, then, a greater purpose in developing clear thinking than just preparing tomorrow’s labor force. Properly taught, clear thinking equips individuals to seek the truth (however narrowly or broadly that is defined) in all of their societal roles (student, worker, parent, consumer, citizen, etc.). Of course the idea of “finding truth” makes some (mostly academics) quite uneasy. Postmodernist thought has challenged the very notion of objective truth; cultural relativists, drawing on the insights of anthropologist Franz Boas, have also questioned the universality of truth. This at times makes for difficult discussions on campus; columnist Mark Steyn notes the challenges in arguing with a cultural relativist: “There is no longer enough agreed reality. It’s like playing tennis with an opponent who thinks your ace is a social construct.”

Common sense and basic human experience suggest, however, that the postmodernists have it wrong. As a practical matter, we need to know what is true and what is not. As Princeton philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt observes, truth “often possesses very considerable practical utility.” Journalist and political commentator Walter Lippmann has argued that the pursuit of truth can “bring to light the hidden facts, to set them in relation with each other, and make a picture of reality on which men can act.”

Having an accurate picture, a truthful picture, matters. We want the engineering specifications for our buildings and bridges to be true; we want our political leaders to make policy based on the objective facts; we want to rely on judges and juries to sort out the truth in matters civil and criminal; we want to trust the accuracy of the movie schedule in the daily newspaper; we want our colleagues to level with us. Simply put, we must establish what is true (or some close approximation of it) and depend upon it to go about our daily routines. Postmodernist skeptics do this, too; when they enter a university classroom, they assume the ceiling won’t collapse, implicitly relying on the accuracy of the civil engineers and architects who designed the building.

Some complications

However getting at the truth, even a provisional truth, isn’t easy. There are complications. Often when someone talks about truth, they mean their truth; but certainty is no guarantee of validity. (Whenever I hear the phrase “speaking truth to power” I wince, because it usually means “speaking opinion to power,” not talking about evidence or premises, assumptions, and conclusions.) Clear thinkers, however, do have some tools to help in assessing “truth claims.”

If someone advances assertions of truth, they should be able—and willing—to explain how they arrived at their conclusions. What evidence exists? What are the sources of that information? How credible are they? What are the implicit assumptions that lead to the given conclusion? What are alternative explanations? Are the conclusions reasonable? Logical? Are they supported by the preponderance of the evidence?

Ask enough questions, and bogus evidence or muddled logic or “truthiness” becomes apparent. Extreme claims (such as those made by Holocaust Deniers or 9/11 conspiracy theorists) founded on delusion or falsehood can be exposed and debunked. Appeals to emotion, or ideology, or authority can be surfaced and challenged. That isn’t to say that agreement will always be reached on what is true; it is possible to agree on the facts but not on their interpretation, to differ on the weight or importance of evidence, or to part company on underlying assumptions.

Clear thinking gets us closer to establishing the truth, or truths, in what historian John H. Arnold calls “their contingent complexity.” We may not completely discern the truth; we may have an imperfect understanding of it; we may have to change our premises, assumptions, or conclusions based on new evidence; but we should take heart from something the American singer Elvis Presley once said: “Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t goin’ away.”

Jefferson Flanders is an author, educator and independent journalist. He blogs on issues of the day at Neither Red nor Blue.

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