10+ Best Articles on Critical Thinking
The most useful articles on critical thinking from around the web—beginners to advanced—curated by thought leaders and our community. We focus on timeless pieces and update the list whenever we discover new, must-read articles or videos—make sure to bookmark and revisit this page.
Top 5 Critical Thinking Articles
At a glance: these are the articles that have been most read, shared, and saved on critical thinking by Refind users in 2023 so far.
How to ...?
How to have better arguments
Arguing well isn’t just about winning. A philosophical approach will help you and the other person get much more out of it
«the one who loses in a philosophical dispute gains more the more he learns»
How to Improve Critical Thinking
The way we're taught critical thinking is terrible. Here's a different strategy to improving your ability to think clearly and make smart decisions.
Trending
These links are currently making the rounds on critical thinking on Refind.
Thinking Models: 5 Little-Known Concepts to Navigate the World
A reflection on five thinking models to help you navigate the world of problem-solving and decision-making. If you know their limitations.
Short Articles
Short on time? Check out these useful short articles on critical thinking—all under 10 minutes.
Rapoport’s Rules: How to Criticise Constructively
A reflection on Rapoport's Rules. It's the most effective way to criticise you've never tried (and probably for good reasons).
«You should mention anything you have learned from your target. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism.»
Five Habits of the Master Thinker: How to Upgrade Your Mind
A breakdown of the five habits of the master thinker, practices worth cultivating proposed by a former CIA analyst.
«In summary, to earn the title of a master thinker we must develop the following five habits:»
10 Propaganda Techniques: How to Manipulate the Masses (Part 1)
A reflection on propaganda techniques; methods used to manipulate perception and opinion to further an agenda. But it's not that simple.
«Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) is a form of propaganda used to manipulate public opinion by creating a sense of, well, fear, uncertainty and doubt. Fear is a potent motivator. This is why it’s often popular with businesses and political groups as a means to discredit their opponents or spread false information»
Curse of Knowledge: How to Be an Approachable Genius
An exploration of the Curse of Knowledge, a phenomenon that makes us lose touch with those who lack the wisdom we acquired five minutes ago.
«get out of your own perception and into someone else’s perspective»
Master the 3 Basics of Critical Thinking
Critical thinking is a whole lot harder than it looks.
«If you can begin to see the patterns in causes and their effects, you can start thinking ahead with insight. Ultimately, that’s the key to better decision-making.»
Long Articles
These are some of the most-read long-form articles on critical thinking.
Top 25 Interesting Ideas and Concepts Everyone Should Know
A collection of the most interesting ideas on critical thinking, philosophy and storytelling to help you make better sense of the world.
«Black Swan events are characterised by their extreme rarity, their severe impact, and the widespread insistence they were obvious in hindsight.»
Evaluating Information: Find the Signal in the Noise
Richard Feynman offers a list of seven tricks that you can use to quickly sort important from irrelevant information and focus on what matters.
«Tests to determine whether people who go on the day that they are not supposed to go are worse off or not have never been made by the astrologers.»
We don’t have a hundred biases, we have the wrong model
Behavioral economics has identified dozens of cognitive biases that stop us from acting 'rationally'. But instead of building up a messier and messier picture of human behavior, we need a new model.
Old thinking will break your brain.
Why updating the way we look at the world is so critical now, and so hard, and how we can get better at doing it.
Why is Critical Thinking Important in Daily Life?
Critical thinking is vital in our daily lives because it allows us to spot what we don't know and thus helps us make better decisions.
What is Refind?
Every day Refind picks the most relevant links from around the web for you. Picking only a handful of links means focusing on what’s relevant and useful. We favor timeless pieces—links with long shelf-lives, articles that are still relevant one month, one year, or even ten years from now. These lists of the best resources on any topic are the result of years of careful curation.
How does Refind curate?
It’s a mix of human and algorithmic curation, following a number of steps:
- We monitor 10k+ sources and 1k+ thought leaders on hundreds of topics—publications, blogs, news sites, newsletters, Substack, Medium, Twitter, etc.
- In addition, our users save links from around the web using our Save buttons and our extensions.
- Our algorithm processes 100k+ new links every day and uses external signals to find the most relevant ones, focusing on timeless pieces.
- Our community of active users gets the most relevant links every day, tailored to their interests. They provide feedback via implicit and explicit signals: open, read, listen, share, mark as read, read later, «More/less like this», etc.
- Our algorithm uses these internal signals to refine the selection.
- In addition, we have expert curators who manually curate niche topics.
The result: lists of the best and most useful articles on hundreds of topics.
How does Refind detect «timeless» pieces?
We focus on pieces with long shelf-lives—not news. We determine «timelessness» via a number of metrics, for example, the consumption pattern of links over time.
How many sources does Refind monitor?
We monitor 10k+ content sources on hundreds of topics—publications, blogs, news sites, newsletters, Substack, Medium, Twitter, etc.
Can I submit a link?
Indirectly, by using Refind and saving links from outside (e.g., via our extensions).
How can I report a problem?
When you’re logged-in, you can flag any link via the «More» (...) menu. You can also report problems via email to hello@refind.com
Who uses Refind?
250k+ smart people start their day with Refind. To learn something new. To get inspired. To move forward. Our apps have a 4.9/5 rating.
Is Refind free?
Yes, it’s free!
How can I sign up?
Head over to our homepage and sign up by email or with your Twitter or Google account.