Rules of Thinking, The

RULE 100

Opinions aren’t facts

I know I said in the introduction to this section that there’s no place for emotion in critical thinking. However I should point out that a lot of ‘rational’ arguments are in fact emotional and not rational at all. You need to be able to identify them, whether it’s your own view or someone else’s.

Here in the UK, the argument over whether we should be part of the European Union has been raging for about half a century. At any stage – do we join, do we leave, do we sign this or that treaty – people on both sides of the debate put forward their arguments passionately. You would have thought, wouldn’t you, that by now the country would have worked out which was the right answer. Where the weight of argument fell. ...