Universities raise ambassadors of critical thinking

The state of democracy is weakening, academic freedom is narrowing, and the culture of public debate is becoming more polarised. That is why the importance of critical thinking in today’s world cannot be overstated, stated the University of Oulu’s Vice Rector for Education Mirja Illikainen in her opening remarks at the critical thinking seminar.

Universities are not standing idle in the face of this. Henri Pettersson, university lecturer in education at the University of Oulu, sees that students who have acquired critical thinking skills act as a kind of secret agents and ambassadors of critical thinking — in their private lives, at work, on social media, and in conversations.

“There are no shortcuts to this, but it is part of the educational mission that I believe belongs to all universities,” says Pettersson.

Critical thinking can be a draw for universities

The idea is not entirely new. Roe Fremstedal, professor of philosophy at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), described how at his university alone, 7,000 students from all faculties complete the Examen philosophicum course each year. It is an introduction to generalist and critical thinking. Its roots lie in a compulsory course of the same name established at the University of Copenhagen in 1675.

“At that time, the medieval tradition of generalist education before specialising as a priest, lawyer, or physician was still visible in universities. Today, a course shared by all students is also a way for universities to brand themselves as it is for us.”

What do we mean when we talk about critical thinking? Pettersson summarises that critical thinking refers to an individual’s mental capacities and dispositions that lead them to engage in reason-based belief formation and reasoning-centred decision-making. He says that everyone holds a vast number of unconscious beliefs about what the surrounding world and other people are like.

“Critical thinking is about what principles and rules we must follow so that our belief formation operates in a disciplined and sustainable way, and to ensure that we arrive at the most well-reasoned positions possible.”

For this reason, Pettersson does not consider critical thinking to be just one learning objective among others. He draws a comparison with the many terms in circulation today: media and information literacy, as well as analytical, reflective, and creative thinking.

“Perhaps critical thinking is the foundational concept through which we can understand what media literacy and the rest are about. They are applied critical thinking in a specific, bounded context.”

The significance of interaction in teaching comes to the fore

Where Pettersson referred to universities producing thinking agents, Tuukka Tomperi, senior university researcher at the Faculty of Education and Culture at Tampere University, saw in the seminar a university network carrying the culture of critical thinking throughout society.

“Universities sustain the core of critical thinking in the culture of the whole of society.”

Tomperi points out that everyone, regardless of educational background, practises critical thinking. For him, critical thinking means an intervention, a pause, that awakens a reflective process.

“Critical thinking is good judgement and its development; an evaluative orientation that develops our understanding.”

He says that critical thinking skill does not exist without knowledge of the subject area in question. It is needed when significant new pieces of knowledge are attached to our worldview. University studies are full of exactly this. According to Tomperi, critical thinking is already doing well in Finnish universities, so the question is simply how universities can teach it even better.

For Tomperi, critical thinking is above all dependent on collective, communal practices.

“As university teachers, we should be able to create situations and interactive settings in which students can naturally, in a safe environment, practise listening to others, showing respect, disagreeing, making mistakes respectfully, and acknowledging them.”

Text: Juha-Pekka Honkanen