Errors in Thinking

In this world, it is important for us to think correctly and to avoid any errors in thinking. This is important no matter who you are because if you don't think correctly, you will end up doing mistakes and that mistakes may cause something. Here I put some of the common errors in thinking and hopefully you'll always aware of it and avoid it from happening at all cost.

The Thinker pose.

1. Partialism. This is the major error in thinking where the thinker, only thinks about one part of the problem/thing. Usually happens because inadequacy/insufficiency of perception and information. May be intentional or unintentional.
2. Time scale: This is another type of partialism in which the thinker only include a narrow slice of time. For example, an IT undergraduate students sees that his friend who works in a small business obtained RM2000++ per month without having a diploma certificate decided to leave his study and join the business. He didn't think that in the next 5 years after he graduate, he will not only get a degree certificate, but even a higher starting salary than his friend and even a faster promotion.
3. Egocentricity: The thinker only think about how the situation is going to affect his own self personally. Example, you are an important person in your company and everyone in the company loves and respects you. But out of the blue you receive an offer from the other company with a higher salary and decide to leave. The error is unable to trace the effect of your action to others as everything is about you.
4. Arrogance and Conseit: Arises when there is a logic explanation for something and that logic explanation is taken to be the right explaination. For example, government said that science and mathematics should be teached in English but the standard of science and math dropped after the process begins. So the logic explanation is science and math should not be taught in English as they drop the standard of the subjects and thus academic performance.
5. Initial Judgement: When an idea arises, the thinker quickly judge the idea as good or bad. This error in thinking may happen due to like/dislike/position or based on social/emotion/belief. For example, when we saw a person is using a brand new car, we immediately think that he must be CEO of a company when the truth is the person borrowed his sister's car without her knowing it.
6. Adversary thinking: In this process, rather than think together, the thinker always try to prove others wrong. He doesn't need to prove that his right to show that others is wrong. Example, if A claims that B is wrong, automatically people will think that A is right although he is not actually right.
7. Ego-involvement: In this thinking, the thinker usually think just to protect his own ego or pride. It is usually practised by someone who is smart and famous such as politician, a teacher,professor, lecturers or managers. Usually they do this because they don't want to admit that they have made a mistake. For example, a teacher is solving a math equation using completing the square method but there is some error in the solution. A student raise their hand to say that the teacher's wrong but instead of admit his/her own mistake they say "who's the teacher here? Me or you?."
8. Magnitude error: This type of error happen when the thinker can't or forgot to include the problem on the larger scale. For example, since most of the criminals are male, preventing male from going outside at night might be logic as an answer. But on the larger scale, not all male are criminals. So the answer although it is logic, it can't be used as an answer to this problem.
9. Extreme thinking: This error happen when the thinker is pessimistic all the time. The pessimistic person always think of something bad although the thing is good. For example, if there is suggestion that weapon system should be introduce as one of a course in university, extreme thinker will say that if people take that course, the student will think like a terrorist and thus the next future leader is also terrorist and also cause the nation to approve terrorism.

It is important that you avoid all these errors when applying your thinking hat. If you can avoid these errors, creativity and a good solution for a problem may come out.


Source:

http://www.psychology4all.com/Thinking-Errors.htmhttp://www.educ.uvic.ca/epls/faculty/rowles/typesoferrors.htm

Abby Marks-Beale, “Study Skills, The Tools for Active Learning,”Chapter 13 Developing Critical Thinking Skills – Some Common Mistakes In Thinking,Delmar Publishers Inc.,1994