"...crafted in an elegant manner. Nickerson considers the problems people face when attempting to understand arguments. He documents some of the errors in logic and judgment that occur during the reasoning process, and he points out ways of overcoming these difficulties. All in all, the book is provocative, well-written, and provides an excellent framework for considering seminal issues in everyday reasoning." —Nancy Stein University of Chicago
"...lively, straightforward and very practical; it is also thought provoking and intellectually solid. This book is probably the best available introduction to the implications of cognitive science for current classroom practice. Any educator unfamiliar with its contents is behind the times and sadly undereducated." —Jack Lochhead University of Massachusetts
"Ray Nickerson has done an excellent job assembling and lucidly explaining many of the principles fundamental to reasoning and critical thinking. His book can and should serve as a valuable resource to teachers concerned ... with emphasizing analytic reasoning and critical thinking in all subject areas at all grade levels ... I hope it is widely disseminated and read." —Richard Paul Sonoma State University
PREFACE, FOREWORD, 1. INTRODUCTION, 2. REASONING IN PERSPECTIVE, 3. BELIEFS, 4. ASSERTIONS, 5. ARGUMENTS, 6. STRATAGEMS, 7. SOME COMMON REASONING FALLACIES, 8. CONCLUSION, APPENDIX A: ANSWER KEY
Raymond S. Nickerson, retired senior vice president of Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc. and research professor at Tufts University, is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, and the Society of Experimental Psychologists. He is the founding editor of The Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, the founding and series editor of Reviews of Human Factors and Ergonomics, an annual publication of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, and the author of several books, including Mathematical Reasoning: Patterns, Problems, Conjectures, and Proofs (Psychology Press, 2010).