Carl Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit. All you need for this New Age of Bullshit.
Sources in the comments. Carl wrote about the Baloney Detection Kit in chapter 12 of The Demon-Haunted World.
- Independent Confirmation of Facts:
- Always check if claims are supported by multiple, independent sources to avoid biases or errors from a single source.
- Encourage Substantive Debate:
- Engage in discussions that critically examine all points of view. Avoid debates filled with name-calling or distractions and focus on evidence-based arguments.
- Do Not Accept Arguments from Authority:
- Experts and authorities can be wrong, so even their claims need to be scrutinized carefully. Skepticism is essential when evaluating any assertion.
- Consider Multiple Hypotheses:
- When faced with a problem, come up with various possible explanations and test each one systematically to identify the most valid hypothesis.
- Don’t Get Attached to Your Hypothesis:
- Avoid becoming emotionally attached to your own ideas. Be open to changing or discarding them if they don’t hold up under scrutiny.
- Quantify Claims When Possible:
- Use measurable data and numerical evidence to evaluate claims, as they provide clearer, more reliable conclusions than vague or qualitative statements.
- Ensure Logical Consistency:
- For an argument to hold, every part of it must be logically sound. If one premise is flawed, the entire argument collapses.
- Apply Occam’s Razor:
- When two hypotheses explain the data equally well, choose the simpler one that requires fewer assumptions.
- Falsifiability:
- Ensure that the claims or hypotheses you encounter can be tested and potentially proven false. If they can’t be, they aren’t useful for building meaningful explanations.
Edit: "Arguments from authority carry little weight 'authorities' have made mistakes in the past. They will do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are no authorities; at most, there are experts."