Overcoming limitations and hindrances to critical thinking

The only way to overcome the lack of essential background knowledge in a field is to do the necessary reading and
studying in that field.
Overcoming the social pressure to conform is difficult. The first step toward conquering this hindrance is to
recognize that it is a problem. Ask yourself if it is conformity that is motivating you to believe something.
Awareness of the problem won’t eliminate it and challenging one’s friends (or one’s boss, etc.) is not always to
one’s advantage. You must know your priorities. If challenging
the boss might mean the loss of a job you desperately need,
then it may be wise to keep your ideas to yourself. The critical
thinker must ask “do I believe this only because of fear of being
rebuked or of being thought disagreeable?” The question itself
(or one like it) shows an awareness of the power of the desire to
conform. It is difficult to know, however, whether one’s answer to the question is honest or reflects self-deception
and wishful thinking. One thing is certain, though; if you’re not aware of this hindrance and don’t remind yourself
of it, you will never overcome it to any degree.
The tendency to be uncritical of claims made by authorities, experts, and people we admire is also difficult to
overcome. One method professional journals use to prevent prejudice from clouding a referee’s judgment is to send
out a paper for evaluation without letting the referees know who wrote the paper. Some teachers have their students
use codes rather than their names on their essays. We will return to this subject in detail in chapter three, so here
we will only say that awareness of the problem is a necessary step toward overcoming it.
Overcoming laziness and the desire for quick results, and thinking in terms of slogans and stereotypes, can
only occur if one makes a conscientious effort to do so. This is true also of those physical hindrances that are in our
power to control, such as the use of brain-altering drugs. Controlling the stress in one’s life, however, is more
complex. Stress-causing events are often beyond one’s control, e.g., the death or serious injury or illness of a loved
one. Other stressful events are partly in one’s control, but may be necessary, e.g., a divorce or separation, or caring
for an elderly parent. In any case, whatever the source of the stress, what is important is how one deals with it. You
may not be able to change yourself or an external source of stress, but you may be able to change how you respond
to the stress. Instead of seeing obstacles and troubles, you might force yourself to see challenges and opportunities.
While it would be unreasonable to expect us to control our emotions all of the time, we should be able to
control ourselves enough so that we do not make important decisions while angry, upset, jealous, etc. For example,
you might leave the room to avoid saying something you might later regret.
Overcoming social or political repression of information and ideas is often difficult because we may find the
repressed ideas repulsive. Since we don’t like the ideas being repressed, we don’t object to the repression. We may
regret our inaction later, when it is our ideas that are being repressed.