2. Objectives and Outcomes

On this blog, I have one clear objective and one associated outcome:

Objective
To improve information literacy and critical thinking skills (hopefully in an engaging way)

"Information literacy" and "critical thinking" are, and have been, educational buzzwords for years. With the expansion of the reach of the internet, though, efforts to improve these skills in as many people as possible have seemed even more important of late. There are many variations of the definitions of each of these terms.

In my vernacular, information literacy includes (but not exclusively) the ability of a person to identify how credible a source is, and thus also to know multiple ways that sources can come to be trusted. I trust an information literate person to have developed a rigorous threshold for themselves that they would be able to articulate. So, at least, if I wanted to have a productive conversation with that person about whether or not a piece of information was true, we could at least understand each other's standard of truth. Thus, perhaps, at least we could arrive at an "agree to disagree" conclusion instead of debating pointlessly for hours without real hope of convincing the other that one's own conclusion is more accurate.

For example, I think an information literate person would use a web search engine to research a particular fact, but they would prioritize efforts looking for peer-reviewed research articles published in scholarly journals instead of an unfamiliar news website (or social media post) that provides no references to the sources for the fact. Other aspects of the source might also be scrutinized, like how old (and potentially out-of-date) the source is, and the extent of independent agreement on the fact.

To me, a critical thinker is always dubious of a claim and performs further evaluations and fact-checking before reaching a conclusion. One aspect of critical thinking is the urge to ask, "does this fact make sense?" In some situations, a claim might seem reasonable at face value, but the skeptic will delve deeper. A potentially poor example, but a favorite of mine, involves foods that are labeled "99% Fat Free." Of course the manufacturer wanted to put the words "Fat Free" on the label, but is the product? Of course not. 99% fat free is the same as printing "1% fat," which might not sell as well.

Another facet of critical thinking, which can be difficult to develop, is the ability to initially reject a proposed hypothesis or explanation and to come up with an alternate explanation that you think explains an observation or fact just as well (or better).

Another potential aspect at the intersection of critical thinking and information literacy is considering the potential motivations of the source(s) of the information. In my domain, that can include inquiring about who funded a particular research project, to look for potential financial conflicts of interest.

So, as we explore facts, I will emphasize the warning signs to watch for that might signal innocent or deceptive information, as well as techniques and methods for supporting or refuting that initial skeptical stance.

Outcome
The main produce of each post here will be to publish a curated list of references that, together, either support or refute a published piece of information.