Research lectures, seminars and events
The events listed in this area are research seminars, workshops and lectures hosted by Durham University departments and research institutes. If you are not a member of the University, but wish to enquire about attending one of the events please contact the organiser or host department.
Research Seminar: Critical Thinking and the Ends of Education
This will be a virtual seminar using Zoom. Contact ed.research@durham.ac.uk for detail about how to take part.
The development of skills of critical thinking is now ubiquitously cited as a prominent learning outcome for courses, especially in the humanities, and some philosophers make so bold as to claim that enabling students to think critically is the principal end of education. This paper examines what it means to think critically and explores the relation of critical thinking to other worthy pedagogical ends, such as the growth of knowledge and the cultivation of intellectual virtue. I shall argue that (i) the epistemological foundations of critical thinking are not as well understood as its adherents claim, and (ii) insofar as can speak of the end of education critical thinking is a poor candidate for that august position. We should set pedagogical sites rather higher.
Contact ed.research@durham.ac.uk for more information about this event.
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