Critical Thinking is a comprehensive introduction to the essential skills of good reasoning, refined and updated through seven editions published over more than two decades. This concise edition offers a succinct presentation of the essential elements of reasoning that retains the rigor and sophistication of the original text. The authors provide a thorough treatment of such central topics as deductive and inductive reasoning, logical fallacies, how to recognize and avoid ambiguity, and how to distinguish what is relevant from what is not. A companion website provides a range of interesting supplements, including interactive review materials, supplemental readings, and writing tips.

A much-needed guide to thinking critically for oneself and how to tell a good argument from a bad one. Includes topical examples from politics, sport, medicine, music, chapter summaries, glossary and exercises.

This introduction to critical thinking focuses on an integrated, universal concept of critical thinking that is both substantive and practical. It provides students with the basic intellectual skills they need to think through content in any class, subject, or discipline, and through any problems or issues they face. Now available from Rowman & Littlefield, Richard Paul and Linda Elder's Critical Thinking: Learn the Tools the Best Thinkers Use focuses on the most basic critical thinking concepts. It includes activities that allow readers to apply these concepts within disciplines and to life. An added feature to this brief book is a focus on close reading and substantive writing. Content highlights include: Think for Yourself activities Discovering the parts of thinking and the standards for thinking Learning to formulate clear and substantive questions Making the design of a course work for you Close reading and substantive writing Becoming a fairminded thinker

Lewis Vaughn's Concise Guide to Critical Thinking, Second Edition, offers a compact, clear, and economical introduction to critical thinking and argumentative writing. Based on his best-selling text, The Power of Critical Thinking, Sixth Edition, this affordable volume is more manageable than larger textbooks yet more substantial than many of the smaller critical thinking handbooks. Optimize Student Learning with the Oxford Insight Study Guide All new print and digital copies of Concise Guide to Critical Thinking, Second Edition, include access to the Oxford Insight Study Guide, a data-driven, personalized digital learning tool that reinforces key concepts from the text and encourages effective reading and study habits. Developed with a learning-science-based design, Oxford Insight Study Guide engages students in an active and highly dynamic review of chapter content, empowering them to critically assess their own understanding of course material. Real-time, actionable data generated by student activity in the tool helps instructors ensure that each student is best supported along their unique learning path. Visit www.oup.com/he/vaughn_concise2e for a wealth of additional digital resources for students and instructors.

"William Hughes's Critical Thinking, recently revised and updated by Jonathan Lavery, is a comprehensive and accessible introduction to the essential skills required to make strong arguments. Hughes and Lavery give a thorough treatment of such traditional topics as deductive and inductive reasoning, logical fallacies and how to spot them, the importance of inference, how to recognise and avoid ambiguity, and how to assess what is or is not relevant to an argument. But they also cover a variety of topics not always treated in books of this sort - special concerns to keep in mind when reasoning about ethical matters and how the nature of a language can affect the structure of an argument. The book gives a lucid treatment of the differences between descriptive and evaluative meaning: one person's freedom fighter is another person's terrorist." "For the fourth edition, Jonathan Lavery has added a new chapter on scientific reasoning, expanded the treatment of analogies, added numerous examples, and revised and updated the text throughout."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

The Critical Thinking Book covers not only standard topics such as definitions, fallacies, and argument identification, but also other pertinent themes such as consumer choice in a market economy and political choice in a representative democracy. Interesting historical asides are included throughout, as are images, diagrams, and reflective questions. A wealth of exercises is provided, both within the text and on a supplemental website for instructors.

Jeff McLaughlin’s How to Think Critically begins with the premise that we are all, every day, engaged in critical thinking. But as we may develop bad habits in daily life if we don’t scrutinize our practices, so we are apt to develop bad habits in critical thinking if we are careless in our reasoning. This book exists to instill good thinking habits: attentiveness to word choice, avoidance of fallacies, and effective construction and assessment of arguments. With relatable and often amusing examples included throughout, the book adopts a degree of technical sophistication that is rigorous and yet still easily applied to ordinary situations. Readers are presented with a traditional step-by-step method for analysis that can be applied to all argument forms. Hundreds of exercises (with solutions) are included, as are several random statement generators which can be used to create thousands of additional examples. Venn diagrams, truth tables, and other essential concepts are presented not as definitions for academic study but as tools for better thinking and living.