Glossary of Critical Thinking Terms

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argument

A rationale or information structure that includes reasons for believing in some conclusion

autonomy in thinking

"Autonomy in thinking" refers to maintaining awareness, choice, and self-governance about the qualities of one's thinking one wishes to keep or change.

burden of proof

obligation that is normally attributed to a speaker or writer to provide credible or plausible reasons for his or her major claims. See also Burden of Proof

claim

A statement that is asserted as true with an argumentative or explanatory rationale. A Claim can be a premise or a conclusion.

conclusion

A claim in an argumentative or explanatory context. In arguments, conclusions are claims are the part of the rationale for which the premises provide reasons. In explanations, the conclusion is the claim that the explanation pruports to explain.

deduction

A kind of inference in which a conclusion is presented as a necessary consequence of some premises. Contrast to induction.

explanation

A rationale in which some phenomena or fact (stated in the conclusion) is given an account which satisfies doubt about how the phenomena or fact came about.

induction

A kind of inference in which facts warrant a degree of confidence in some conclusion without entailing it. Induction depends upon finding patterns in our experience from which we can generalize or otherwise infer some conclusion. Induction includes any common inference from experience.

rationale

Any information structure in which reasons or explanations are offered for a claim (the conclusion).

reason

Within critical thinking, a reason is any consideration or evidence that helps support an inference to a conclusion.

reflective/deliberative context

Any situation (face-to-face or mediated) in which reasons are offered for conclusions.

reflective persona

The pattern of roles and preferences you express in reflective/deliberative contexts. Your "reflective style" or personality in situations in which reasons are being given.

validity

A property of deductive arguments which have the sort of logical structure which guarantees that if the premises are true, then the conclusion will be. This is a "conditional guarantee" of the truth of the conclusion, since the premises must still be true for the conclusion to follow.