Lessons in Critical Thinking (2 of 12)

A Comparative process.

Having established that there is a God and that there are absolutes, the next part of critical thinking is the process of comparing all assertions to what is known to be true and right. How do you know if one dollar bill is a real one dollar bill or a counterfeit dollar bill? You compare it to what you know to be a real one dollar bill. Likewise, how do you know if a theory is true or counterfeit? How do you know if a hypothesis is true or counterfeit? You compare each to what you know is true.

We know there is a God, and we know what is true because He has given us what is true, His Word, that book we call the Bible. When theories and hypotheses are put forth as being true, we are to compare them to what we know is true, the Word of God, the Bible. The Apostle Paul writes, “Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so” (Acts 17:11 (ESV)).

It is neither meet, right or salutary, or wise for that matter, to blindly believe others. As we are daily bombarded with messages from newspapers, television, radio, books, family and friends, churches, cults, sects and would be religions personalities, we would do well to not believe everything we read, see or hear. We would do well to take what we read, see and hear and compare it with what we know to be true.

Interestingly enough, people who work to distinguish real from counterfeit money spend most of their time looking at what is real. This makes it easier to distinguish the counterfeit. Taking this as a lesson, we would do well spending most of our time reading what is true, that is reading, studying, hearing, meditating on the Word of God, the Bible, and less time thinking about what is counterfeit, so that we will be able to rightly distinguish what is true, right and from God, that is what is an absolute and what is not.