Brandon Royal - The Little Blue Reasoning Book: 50 Powerful Principles for Clear and Effective Thinking

THE
LITTLE BLUE
REASONING BOOK

50 Powerful Principles
for Clear and Effective
Thinking

Brandon Royal

Published by Maven Publishing

2010 by Brandon Royal

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the author or publisher.

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Published by:

Maven Publishing
4520 Manilla Road
Calgary, Alberta, CanadaT2G 4B7
www.mavenpublishing.com

Correspondence Address in Asia:

GPO Box 440
Central, Hong Kong

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication:

Royal, Brandon

The little blue reasoning book : 50 powerful principles of clear and effective thinking / by Brandon Royal.

ISBN 978-1-897393-62-8 (eBook)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2009909356 (paperback)

In addition to this eBook edition, this book is available in paperback and in the Adobe PDF file format.

Technical Credits:

Cover Design: George Foster, Fairfield, Iowa, USA

Editing: Jonathan K. Cohen, Irvine, California, USA

Illustrations: Ashley Vercekaites, Calgary, Canada

This books cover text was set in Minion. The interior text of the paperback edition was set in Scala and Scala Sans.

Contents

Preface

Introduction

Quiz

Selective Perception

The Magic of Coincidence

The Four Classic Mindsets

Overview

Lateral Thinking

Divergent vs. Convergent Thinking

Mind Maps

Devils Advocate Technique

Idea Killers and Idea Growers

Brainstorming

Reframing Problems

Selling Creative Ideas

Overview

Pros-and-Cons Analysis

Matrixes

Decision-Event Trees

Probability Trees

Weighted Ranking

Utility Analysis

Sunk Costs

Hypothesis Testing

Prisoners Dilemma

Overview

The ABCs of Argument Structure

Evaluating Arguments

The Five Common Reasoning Flaws

Testing Critical Reasoning

Putting It All Together

Overview

If Then Statements

No-Some-Most-All Statements

Mutual Inclusivity and Exclusively

Statements of Logical Equivalency

Testing Logic-based Reasoning

Quiz Answers

Selected Bibliography

About the Author

Preface

Henry Humidor purchased a box of very rare, very expensive cigars and insured them, among other things, against fire. Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of cigars, he filed a claim against the insurance company. In his claim, Henry stated the cigars were lost in a series of small fires. The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason: he had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion.

Henry sued and won!

In delivering the ruling, the judge agreed that the claim was frivolous. He stated that the man nevertheless held a policy from the company in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure against fire, without adequately defining what is considered to be an unacceptable fire, and was obligated to pay the claim.

Rather than endure a lengthy and costly appeals process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid Henry $15,000 for the rare cigars he lost in the fires.

But

After Henry cashed the check, the insurance company had him arrested on twenty-four counts of arson! With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case used against him, Henry Humidor was convicted of intentionally setting fire to his insured property and was sentenced to twenty-four months in jail and a $24,000 fine.

Welcome to the wonderful world of reasoning.

Introduction

Some 2,500 years ago, Socrates gave birth to the art and science of what we now call critical reasoning. Through a system of inquiry, known as the Socratic method, Socrates used a series of probing questions to obtain answers and then critique those answers. In this manner, he sought to reveal the key issues behind perplexing problems, to uncover the merit and flaws in commonly held ideas, and to expose those contradictory beliefs that often hide behind smooth-sounding but empty rhetoric. It is indeed humorous to reflect on Socrates observation that one cannot necessarily rely on the sound judgment of those individuals occupying positions of authority; they may be prone to think in a muddled, whimsical, or irrational manner.

Critical reasoning, also referred to as critical thinking, may be defined broadly as the process by which we evaluate information. Often, the information we seek relates to problems or opportunities, and the process relates to how we arrive at our conclusions based upon the information we have. Individuals who possess critical thinking skills can identify problems or opportunities, gather relevant information, analyze information in a proper way, and come to reliable conclusions by themselves, without necessarily relying on others.

Notwithstanding our ability to read, no other single skill is more important than our ability to reason. Yet, strangely, no required course dedicated to reasoning skills exists as a part of our regular school curriculum or as part of any on-the-job training program. This book provides a distillation of the most useful academic and real-life reasoning concepts. Teaching in our school systemsprimary, secondary, and post-secondaryhas traditionally been skewed toward instructing us what to think as opposed to how to think. An all-rounded education must balance the teaching of course content with new and better ways of understanding and interpreting the material at hand.

This book contains fifty reasoning tips interspersed throughout five sections. Perception & Mindset (chapter 1) provides an initial framework for reasoning. We live in a world of imperfect information and of imperfect abilities, where subjectivity is a key ingredient. As no two individuals have the same perspective or mindset, we must makes allowances for this when mastering the tools of reasoning and logic.

Creative Thinking (chapter 2) introduces non-traditional thinking methods. Creative thinking is subjective or non-linear thinking, and is often referred to as out-of-the-box thinking. One of the most useful topics is reframing problems. An important step in problem solving involves asking, Is the perceived problem really the problem? The ability to use creativity to better define problems bolsters the ability to solve problems.

Decision Making (chapter 3) focuses on applied reasoning and introduces various tools, the major benefit of which is to structure or quantify the decision-making process. The basic toolsboxes and treesare devices that allow problems to be approached in an efficient, organized manner. Other tools, such as weighted ranking and utility analysis, allow us to quantify qualitative decisions (e.g., hiring decisions, career choices), which may or may not involve monetary considerations.

Analyzing Arguments (chapter 4) shows us how to break arguments down according to classic argument structure: conclusion, evidence, and assumption. The ability to understand, attack, and defend arguments is one of the most fundamental uses of reasoning skills. Mastering Logic (chapter 5) contains some of the more technical material in this book, but it also provides the foundation for understanding some of the most relevant examples of reasoning flaws found in everyday conversation and speech.