The Philosopher’s Toolkit: How to Be the Most Rational Person in Any Room

Overview

Learn how to sharpen your problem-solving skills and make better decisions and arguments in this dynamic course that helps you put philosophy’s most practical tools into action.

Course No. 4253

Thinking is at the heart of our everyday lives, yet our thinking can go wrong in any number of ways. Bad arguments, fallacious reasoning, misleading language, and built-in cognitive biases are all traps that keep us from rational decision-making. What can we do to avoid these traps and think better?

Is it possible to think faster, more efficiently, and more systematically? The Philosopher’s Toolkit: How to Be the Most Rational Person in Any Room, taught by award-winning Professor Patrick Grim of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, arms you against the perils of bad thinking and supplies you with an arsenal of strategies to help you be more creative, logical, inventive, realistic, and rational in all aspects of your daily life.

Video Lectures

• How We Think and How to Think Better

33 min

Thinking is fundamental to our daily lives, and this introduction surveys the philosopher’s toolkit, strategies to improve our thinking—visualization, simplification, the principles of debate, and techniques for social reasoning.

• Cool Rationality and Hot Thought

30 min

Which is a better tool for decision-making, reason or emotion? Both have their place, and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of each can help us make better decisions.

• The Strategy of Visualization

30 min

Pull out your pen and paper and use “conceptual visualization” to solve daunting puzzles, from the Pythagorean theorem to Special Relativity.

• Visualizing Concepts and Propositions

30 min

Explore the basic elements of thought, expressed by words and illustrated by Venn diagrams and concept trees, providing a structural framework for conveying information.

5. The Power of Thought Experiments

29 min

Harness your imagination with strategies for solving real-world problems through thought experiments, drawing lessons from economics, business, ethics, and physics.

• Thinking like Aristotle

30 min

Discover Aristotle’s “square of oppositions” and how it connects visualization with rational argument.

7. Ironclad, Airtight Validity

31 min

Delve into Aristotelian logic and learn how propositions form airtight arguments using Venn diagrams to enhance deductive reasoning.

8. Thinking Outside the Box

29 min

Engage in a workshop on creative, sideways thinking to break standard habits and solve problems innovatively.

9. The Flow of Argument

30 min

Explore the logical flow of complex arguments and tools to determine an argument’s strengths and weaknesses.

• Simple Heuristics That Make Us Smart

31 min  

Discover heuristics—simple rules of thumb that guide us through decisions when time is limited.

• Why We Make Mistakes

29 min  

Understand systematic errors in thinking due to biases and learn compensatory strategies.

• Rational Discussion in a Polarized Context

30 min  

Develop negotiation strategies to have rational discussions with those holding radically different viewpoints.

• Rhetoric versus Rationality

30 min  

Learn to guard against manipulative rhetoric by understanding ethos, pathos, and logos.

• Bogus Arguments and How to Defuse Them

28 min  

Explore common logical fallacies and test your knowledge against a variety of examples.

• The Great Debate

29 min  

Hone your argumentative skills by evaluating a debate on freedom and democracy and analyzing its rhetoric.

• Outwitting the Advertiser

30 min  

Cut through advertising manipulation to understand the psychological techniques used to entice consumers.

17. Putting a Spin on Statistics

32 min  

Learn how to evaluate statistics critically to draw your own conclusions rather than accept misleading information.

18. Poker, Probability, and Everyday Life

29 min  

Study probability to navigate chances more rationally, including concepts such as the law of large numbers and the gambler's fallacy.

19. Decisions, Decisions

30 min  

Focus on decision theory as a way to make the most rational choices based on expected utility.

20. Thinking Scientifically

30 min  

Distinguish between real science and pseudoscience, exploring pitfalls to avoid in evaluating scientific claims.

• Put It to the Test—Beautiful Experiments

31 min  

Learn about good experimental design, including control groups and randomized testing.

• Game Theory and Beyond

30 min  

Explore decision-making techniques in a social context, examining cooperation and competition.

• Thinking with Models

30 min  

Synthesize earlier strategies and understand the benefits of thinking with models for various applications.

• Lessons from the Great Thinkers

33 min  

Conclude with insights from renowned thinkers like Plato, Aristotle, Darwin, and Einstein, and tips to enhance your own thinking.