Contextual Debiasing and Critical Thinking: Reasons for Optimism

Topoi 35 (1):1-9 (forthcoming)
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Abstract

In this article I argue that most biases in argumentation and decision-making can and should be counteracted. Although biases can prove beneficial in certain contexts, I contend that they are generally maladaptive and need correction. Yet critical thinking alone seems insufficient to mitigate biases in everyday contexts. I develop a contextualist approach, according to which cognitive debiasing strategies need to be supplemented by extra-psychic devices that rely on social and environmental constraints in order to promote rational reasoning. Finally, I examine several examples of contextual debiasing strategies and show how they can contribute to enhance critical thinking at a cognitive level.

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reprint Correia, Vasco (2018) "Contextual Debiasing and Critical Thinking: Reasons for Optimism". Topoi 37(1):103-111

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Vasco Correia
Universidade Nova de Lisboa

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References found in this work

Thinking, Fast and Slow.Daniel Kahneman - 2011 - New York: New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory.Dan Sperber - 2011 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 34 (2):57.
Lectures on the history of political philosophy.John Rawls - 2007 - Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Edited by Samuel Richard Freeman.

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