Rating: 
Summary: Excellent.. read this a couple of months ago
Review: An excellent book on how to think critically. It's full of detailed examples of erroneous thinking, and that's why I believe some people tend to think the authors are misrepresenting through the straw man fallacy. If you've ever read any other books on critical thinking, you would know that very few of them use detail examples of error tendencies, and instead use specificial examples and then move on to the next error. Schick and Vaughn go into great details of the error, and then go on to show us WHY it is an error. In order for them to do this, they have to give us background knowledge of the example.. and i believe it is this process that some, who for whatever reason (ie, to protect themselves from dissonance), come to see their methods as the strawman fallacy. There is no way they could include every argument into every example.. otherwise their book would be the size of the Britannica Encyclopedia. But they do an excellent job in presenting a fair argument.I remember when I first started reading it... i didn't like it either.. mainly because I found it insulting and hurting to find some of my beliefs were so illogical. But now I am a better person for it.
Rating: 
Summary: One of the better books about critical thinking
Review: Excellent and entertaining discourse on how to judge what one hears, sees, and reads. This book should be required reading in college, if not high school
Rating:
Summary: The Best Book I've Read on Critical Thinking
Review: For three reasons this book is the best I've read on the subject. First, its guidelines for critical thinking are more complete than I've seen elsewhere. Second, the book includes a wider range of examples than most. (I liked both Sagan's "Demon-Haunted World" and Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things," but thought their examples were too narrow in scope.) Third, the writing is straightforard and easy to read. I'm giving this book five stars because it's the best I've read on the subject. After I finished reading it, I typed four pages of notes that are helpful enough for me to review periodically. I do agree with one other reader who said that the book fails to make an important distinction between fact and value.
Rating: 
Summary: Hmmm, is this the same book?
Review: I don't know if the book I have is the same as the one that got five stars in other reviews. I guess it is, it has the same title, the authors are the same... But the book I'm holding does not deserve more than two stars - most of the examples and explanations are anecdotal, many of them are simplified or even turned into straw men. The style of the book is suitable for 12 year old children, if you are above the age you will probably find it irritant - heck, if you are above it you probably know most of the things better then they are represented in this book. Do not be misguided by the extensive table of contents (as I was). Only the last part, the case studies, are wort something. And the appendix, with some of the most common fallacies, should've been chapter one, not the end. All in all, good concept (judging by the table of contents), but very very poor execution.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent primer to how scientists think
Review: I first read the previous edition of this book when I was in high school. A friend of mine had gotten a job working for James "the Amazing" Randi, and somehow the professional complimentary copy got passed on from Randi to him to another friend to me. I read it over and over until it was practically falling apart, and I have recommended it to many people over the years, because it had such a major and positive influence on my own thinking. I am currently about halfway done with my Ph.D. in chemistry. I credit this book for giving me an appreciation for the beauty of the scientific process, as well as helping to convince me that I wanted to be a part of it myself. It is true that the book necessarily simplifies the scientific process for the sake of not overburdening the reader with technical jargon and information overload. It should definitely be considered as an INTRODUCTION to critical thinking, as opposed to an all-inclusive and exhaustive text. However, I can't recommend this book highly enough to anyone who wants to understand the beauty and ideal of how science works at its glorious best.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent primer to how scientists think
Review: I first read the previous edition of this book when I was in high school. A friend of mine had gotten a job working for James "the Amazing" Randi, and somehow the professional complimentary copy got passed on from Randi to him to another friend to me. I read it over and over until it was practically falling apart, and I have recommended it to many people over the years, because it had such a major and positive influence on my own thinking. I am currently about halfway done with my Ph.D. in chemistry. I credit this book for giving me an appreciation for the beauty of the scientific process, as well as helping to convince me that I wanted to be a part of it myself. It is true that the book necessarily simplifies the scientific process for the sake of not overburdening the reader with technical jargon and information overload. It should definitely be considered as an INTRODUCTION to critical thinking, as opposed to an all-inclusive and exhaustive text. However, I can't recommend this book highly enough to anyone who wants to understand the beauty and ideal of how science works at its glorious best.
Rating:
Summary: enjoyable, substantiated, and applicable
Review: I like this book; it's fairly short and enjoyable, raises many important issues, and is surprisingly fair in it's treatment of "weird" subjects. I note that the negative reviews (2 as of this writing) don't appear to have read the book very closely, though that's conjecture on my part. I'd recommend the book to anyone, especially kids. The tools the book gives are as applicable to the weirdest claims as to television advertising or the latest news.
Rating:
Summary: Good Premise, but Difficult to Read
Review: I think that is fairly safe to say that the majority of people with good reasoning skills and the ability to think objectively will have no problem with this book's thesis. I certainly found it very easy to agree with most of the content. But I felt that the text was simply too basic to be of much use. The explanations it offers for how to think about weird things are more or less obvious in most cases. For example, I did not need to be told I should be skeptical of a miracle cure until there was good, scientific evidence in its favor. Most of the book is written in a vacuum, not being addressed to any specific "weird thing" but acting as a guide for how to address all strange phenomena. Maybe if this was being used as a textbook in a class, that would be fine, but for pleasure reading, it causes the book to get very dry, very fast. The times that the authors do address specific beliefs or events, I usually found the exploration of an issue to be too brief to be of much help. Do I agree that science is the best tool we have for finding out about the world? Yes. Should we be skeptical of things that seem paranormal or supernatural, or otherwise "weird"? Yes. The book is trying to teach what I believe to be the correct conclusions, but I am skeptical that many people will have the patience to read it all the way though.
Rating:
Summary: The best introduction to critical thinking
Review: I'm suprised by the negative reviews as I thought this book was much more open minded on controversial subjects than other critical thinking books. More importantly, this book makes what is usually a dry and difficult topic interesting. This is a much easier and useful book than most critical thinking texts.
Rating:
Summary: Buy this book. Read this book.
Review: If I could make everyone read this book, I would. It would make everyday life so much more livable.
I can't tell you how many times I've had to bite my tongue in social situations in reaction to the amazing amount of erroneous, yet believed, information that comes out of peoples' mouths. I mean seriously! How many times do I have to hear that one's children are "bouncing off the walls because they ate too much sugar?" This is simply not true, but it is widely believed by most Americans. Sugar is NOT a stimulant in any shape or form.
But I digress. This book teaches you how to think for yourself. It gives you the tools to evaluate conclusions that are fired at you by those who think they know. Most people just accept and then regurgitate information without ever wondering if it is accurate.
This is a tightly packed, dense book, that you won't be able to skim through with any quickness. However, the authors do a fantastic job at using real-world examples and call-outs on nearly every page to illustrate concepts as required.
Unfortunately, this book will only remotely appeal to those who are already suspicious that most people live in a haze of accepted misinformation. They already acknowledge the idea that one can climb above this haze in order to see how the world REALLY is.
| 
