How to Think Critically I: Extraordinary Claims (March 30, 2007)
Assertions should be examined with greater skepticism in proportion to the amount of previously established knowledge they contradict.
How to Think Critically II: Salience (May 22, 2007)
Most people consistently overestimate the probabilities of rare events and underestimate the probabilities of common events.
How to Think Critically III: Randomness (July 28, 2007)
A failure to grasp statistical principles of randomness and chance leads people to develop all kinds of superstitious beliefs.
How to Think Critically VI: Bayes’ Rule (February 22, 2008)
The mathematical principle called Bayes’ rule is a tool for assessing conditional probabilities, which people are usually not very good at estimating by intuition.
How to Think Critically XII: Anchoring (December 1, 2010)
The brain’s tendency to use the first number it sees as a basis for all subsequent estimates is well-known and widely exploited by marketers.
