Basic characteristics and differences between Critical

thinkers and uncritical thinkers

 There are a lot of characteristics of critical and uncritical thinkers that
makes them different to one another.
Critical thinkers
 Some of the characteristics of critical thinker include
1 They have self-knowledge
 Self-knowledge: - the awareness of one’s felling, abilities, motivations,
and limitations (Article by, Mc Gill university)
 It is a term used in psychology to describe the information that an
individual draws up on when finding answers to the question “what
am I like” and “who am I “and it requires on going self-awareness and
self-consciousness (Wikipedia)
 This means critical thinkers are self-aware and know their strength and
weaknesses, limitations and their level of knowledge.
 Critical thinkers don’t just have self-knowledge they are also honest
with their selves and others. They don’t hide their weaknesses and are
not afraid to expose them. This helps them to learn from their
mistakes, acknowledge what they know and recognize their errors and
take experience from others for their future life.
2 See problems and criticism or controversial questions as a challenge .
 “turn your obstacles into opportunities and your problems in to
possibilities” (Author, Roy T. Bennett)
 “innovation is the ability to see change as an opportunity, not as a
treat” (Steve Jobs)
 “victory comes from opportunist in problems” (Philosopher, San Tzu)
 These are some quotes about how critical thinkers see and over came
their problems in life.
 Critical thinkers don’t see problems as problems, they see it as an
exiting challenge. This helps them to not give up and to solve their life
problems and turn them to opportunities that will make then
successful.
 Critical thinkers are also very good on handling criticisms that came
from other peoples. They are open for criticism and this characteristic
helps them learn more and be more aware of their selves.
3 They are really curious and strive for understanding.
 Curiosity: - is people’s desire to learn more.
 Critical thinkers see curiosity as a base to discover the secret of the
world, exploration, investigation and learning.
 “curiosity has its own reason for existence” (Albert Einstein)
 By using their curiosity as a tool critical thinker expand their knowledge
and skills.
4 Base judgment on evidence rather than emotion.
 Critical thinkers are known for their good judgment. They base their
judgment on evidence rather than emotion.
 Judgment: - is the process of forming an opinion or reaching a
conclusion based on the available material.
 When making a judgment the available material we use should be
evidence rather than emotion or gut reaction.
 Critical thinkers use evidence as a main tool to make a good judgement
and are also ready to change their judgment if a new evidence came.
5 They are good listeners.
 Critical thinkers are a good listener. They listen to other people opinion
and ideas.
 Rather than relaying only on their opinion only they listen and consider
other people’s opinions and ideas.
 “there is as much wisdom in listening as their id in speaking” (Actor,
Daniel Dan Kim)
6 They are fair minded.
 This means they give equal opportunity and value for every one’s ideas
and opinions and also considers the risks that their judgment may
Couse.
 They avoid favoring because it may result to poor dissension making.
7 Self-control
 Critical thinkers control their felling than being controlled by it.
 Self-control: - the ability to regulate and alter your response to avoid
undesirable behavior, increase desirable ones, and achieving long term
goals.
 Self-control helps to not make decisions by emotion, to think clearly, I
though situations, and also to make logical and critical decision.
 “the person with self-control makes a deliberate choice of behavior
with a good aim in mind, and stick to that good aim” (by Aristotle)
 So, self-control is a tool used by critical thinkers to make the most
logical and critical decision.
Uncritical thinkers
Uncritical thinkers
 Here are some characteristics of uncritical thinkers.
1 Lack of self-knowledge
 Unlike critical thinkers, uncritical thinkers lack self-awareness they
need to recognize their strength, limitations and their level of
knowledge.
 They often pretend that they know more than they do. This leads them
to delusional tough that makes them view things they do as error less
and absolute.
 This type of people are hard to work with since they are also ignorant
of their limitations making them delusional and irrational when dealing
 with problems. because they always blame others for their own
mistakes since they consider their work error less and absolute.
2 They are not open minded
 This means they are not good at taking criticisms unlike those who are
critical thinker.
 They see criticism as a direct attack on them rather than a mean of
improving themselves. Rather than listening and considering criticism
as a mean of improving they will see it as a treat and respond
accordingly.
 This makes them very slow or even late for a very small and easy
improvement that they need to make in order to solve their problems,
leading for the easy problem to be more and more complicated.
3 Have no effort to learn
 Unlike critical thinkers those who see complexity as an exciting
challenge, uncritical thinkers try to avoid them by any means. They
have no courage to learn and remain confused rather than make an
effort to understand.
 “curiosity killed the cat” is their way of avoiding controversies and
complexities that happen in their life.
 They have more simplistic view of the world compered to critical
thinkers.
4 Not being judgment on evidence
 This is a common problem seen on uncritical thinkers.
 They often base judgment on first impression, emotion or what they
call gut reaction.
 This is due to having less self-control.
 If judgment is giving conclusion or forming opinion on something using
the materials provided, then the material should be evidence not
emotion, first impression or gut reaction.
5 Not fair minded
 Not being fair minded means not giving every one and their opinion
equal value. This leads to favoring one’s opinion higher than the other
one. This can Couse them to be ignorance on the other opinion or even
manipulated by the one that they favor leading to regret at the end.
6 Lack of self-control
 This is very big problem seen in uncritical thinkers that leads to the
other problems that we have seen previously.
 This type of behavior leads peoples to be controlled by their emotions
instead of controlling their emotions. These makes them react to
certain situations impulsively and aggressively and doing a thing that
they will regret later.
 This problem can be the source for other problems that uncritical
thinkers have.