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Critical Thinking Process Question & Responses (Word Document)

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Critical Thinking Process Question & Responses (Word Document)

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by Tracy Leonard and Sean Hogan

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by Sean Hogan

Definition: A bias, a cause, an event or an element that is the root for belief but can not be explained.

Connection: This image is related to the belief of angels and in a stronger power that looks over us, however this belief is present in many cultures and religions, and still remains a mystery.

image from: https://pixabay.com/en/angel-statue-figure-cemetery-stone-2403401/

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by Tracy Leonard

Definition:
Ideology is a set of ideas that form a person’s beliefs and decisions.

Connection:
A tragic story of ideology and a parent’s decision, is the story of Ezekiel Stephan, who died a preventable and tragic death. His parents, David and Collet Stephan, believed in natural health, and were against vaccinations.  Ezekiel contracted meningitis, and ended up dying because he was not vaccinated, and when he got sick, his parents opted not get proper medical treatment, even though they were advised to.

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An Alberta couple whose son died of meningitis after being treated with natural remedies were told to take their son to a doctor a day before his death, court heard Tuesday.

David Stephan, 32, and his wife, Collet Stephan, 35, have pleaded not guilty to failing to provide the necessaries of life for 19-month-old Ezekiel, who died in March 2012.

As the trial continued for a second day in Lethbridge on Tuesday, David Stephan kept his arm wrapped around his wife's shoulders for most of the day.

Just days before his death, Ezekiel fell asleep in the bathtub, the court heard.

Worried, his mother called a friend who is a registered nurse. That friend, Terrie Meynders, told the court she didn't see anything obviously wrong with the toddler, who was sleeping when she came by.

'Knowledge is power'

However, Meynders said she told Collet Stephan it could be meningitis and she should take the boy to see a doctor.

"I always say that knowledge is power," she told the court. "In my mind, if he was sick, it would be helpful to find out why."

The court heard that the Stephans did not seek medical help until the next day, when the toddler stopped breathing.

Ezekiel was airlifted to a hospital in Calgary and, after five days, doctors took him off life-support.

The Stephans are charged with failing to provide the necessaries of life by failing to get their child medical attention.

In the days leading up to his death, they had treated Ezekiel with a number of home remedies, including water with maple syrup, juice with frozen berries and finally a mixture of apple cider vinegar, horseradish root, hot peppers, mashed onion, garlic and ginger root as his condition deteriorated.

Would now go to doctor 'without hesitation'

A social worker who interviewed the couple in hospital while their brain-damaged toddler was on life-support testified that she asked the Stephans what they would do if their other son became sick.

They told her "without hesitation" that they'd bring him to a doctor, she said.

The trial continues in Lethbridge.

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Parents charged in toddler's meningitis death told by nurse to consult doctor, court hears | CBC News

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An Alberta couple whose son died of meningitis after being treated with natural remedies were told to take their son to a doctor a day before his death, court heard Tuesday. David Stephan, 32, and his wife, Collet Stephan, 35, have pleaded not guilty to failing to provide the necessaries of life for 19-month-old Ezekiel, who died in March 2012.

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by Tracy Leonard

Definition:
Patternicity is when a person finds meaningful patterns in mediums; things they hear, they see, etc.

Connection:
When the NASA’s Curiosity Rover took photos of Mars, people started seeing things on the surface, like rats, people, and even army helmets. The original photos show rocks, but when they are magnified onto the specific rocks, and the seen items are pointed out, it appears clearly that these items do exist. This is an example of patternicity.

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Since it's dramatic landing on August 6th, 2012, NASA's Mars Curiosity Rover has been sending back incredible images back to Earth. Conspiracy theorists have been trawling through the publicly accessible photos taken by Curiosity and discovering mysterious objects that they say are proof of life on Mars. These objects include a skull, an iguana (or perhaps another type of lizard), a pyramid, a rat, a spine, a hovering alien sphere, a humanoid deep in thought, and more.

In some cases, the resemblance to these objects is uncanny.

Play the slideshow to see the "evidence" for Life on Mars

[foogallery id="7972″]

NASA has of course denied that any of these images are concrete evidence for life (past or present). They say it's just the shape of the rocks, the shadows, or our mind playing tricks us.

But the rat really does look like a rat. And the pyramid really does look like a pyramid.

So what's going on?

Humans are really good at detecting patterns out of seemingly random noise. As David Hume once said,

"There is an universal tendency among mankind to conceive all beings like themselves, and to transfer every object, those qualities, with which they are familiarly acquainted, and of which they are intimately conscious. We find human faces in the moon, armies in the clouds; and by a natural propensity, if not corrected by experience and reflection, ascribe malice or good will to everything, that hurts or pleases us."

This phenomenon - detecting something seemingly clear and distinct from apparently obscure stimulus or noise - is called " pareidolia ".

In its first year on Mars, Curiosity sent back over 190 gigabits of data and 72,000 images. That's a lot of noise to sift through, and the more noise, the greater the probability that someone will find something that looks familiar

Having a name for this phenomenon is handy, but why are we making this cognitive error? Michael Shermer, in his 2008 post in Scientific American, explains it like this (note, this has been slightly edited for brevity):

"Why do people see faces in nature, interpret window stains as human figures, hear voices in random sounds generated by electronic devices or find conspiracies in the daily news?

One cause might be the " priming effect ", in which our brain and senses are prepared to interpret stimuli according to an expected model. UFOlogists see a face on Mars. Religionists see the Virgin Mary on the side of a building. Paranormalists might hear dead people speaking to them through a radio receiver. Conspiracy theorists think 9/11 was an inside job by the Bush administration.

Is there a deeper ultimate cause for why people believe such weird things? There is. I call it " patternicity," or the tendency to find meaningful patterns in meaningless noise. "

In a September 2008 paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, "The Evolution of Superstitious and Superstition-like Behaviour," Harvard University biologist Kevin R. Foster and University of Helsinki biologist Hanna Kokko tested my theory (of patternicity) using evolutionary modeling. They demonstrated that whenever the cost of believing a false pattern is real is less than the cost of not believing a real pattern, natural selection will favor patternicity.

For example, believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is only the wind doesn't cost much, but believing that a dangerous predator is the wind may cost an animal its life.

The cost of believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is just the wind is relatively low compared with the opposite. Thus, there would have been a beneficial selection for believing that most patterns are real. Through a series of complex formulas that include additional stimuli (wind in the trees) and prior events (past experience with predators and wind) the authors conclude that "the inability of individuals - human or otherwise - to assign causal probabilities to all sets of events that occur around them will often force them to lump causal associations with non-causal ones. From here, the evolutionary rationale for superstition is clear: natural selection will favour strategies that make many incorrect causal associations in order to establish those that are essential for survival and reproduction."

Such patternicities, then, mean that people believe weird things (like there's rats on Mars, even though there's no food source in sight for hundreds of miles... or usable water... or any clear images... or, or, or...) because of our evolved need to believe non-weird things.

Similarly, Carl Sagan hypothesized that, as a survival technique, human beings are "hard-wired" from birth to identify the human face. This allows people to use only minimal details to recognize faces from a distance and in poor visibility but can also lead them to interpret random images or patterns of light and shade as being faces.

In 1976, the Viking Orbiter 1 acquired some images of the Cydonia region of Mars as part of the search for a potential landing site for the Viking Lander 2. One of the images included a shot of a region that looked remarkably similar to a face. The image was released to the public by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory as part of their public relations effort.

Shortly after the images were released, some people (mostly in lay literature) argued that the face was artificially created, and that this was concrete evidence for either past or present intelligence on Mars. The rock formation indeed looked so similar to a face - how could it not have been designed by an intelligent architect?

Some believed the face was created by Martians, others said it was a tomb, or part of an ancient city. Others believed that NASA was involved in a conspiracy to cover up the true nature of the Face - all part of a secret space program... a grand conspiracy.

Mac Tonnies went so far as to say that the Face was a "genuine scientific enigma". After NASA released new images of the Face in 1998, he claimed that the "experts either don't understand the workings of their own instruments or else feel somehow threatened by the Face's enduring mystery."

The 1976 version does look like a face, and if you strain your eyes, you might still see a face in the 1998 version. But what about the high resolution 2001 version?

Let's look even closer at the 2001 version, just to be sure:

In 1976, the imaging technology was inferior to today's, and the resolution of the images was significantly lower. Even compared to 1998, the resolution of space images increased dramatically. Compare the Face from lowest to highest resolution: at the highest resolution, you need to slide the goalposts pretty wide to see a face.

If we had the resources to retake Curiosity's pictures, it's probably safe to assume that these objects would reveal that (somewhat sadly) they really are nothing more than rocks, shadows, and optical illusions.

At least, that's what they would like for you to believe...

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Has NASA's Curiosity Rover found photo evidence of life on Mars?

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Since it's dramatic landing on August 6th, 2012, NASA's Mars Curiosity Rover has been sending back incredible images back to Earth. Conspiracy theorists have been trawling through the publicly accessible photos taken by Curiosity and discovering mysterious objects that they say are proof of life on Mars.

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by Sean Hogan

Definition: The use of older traditions to convince people that a certain claim, treatment or theory is more acceptable than real science, because it has been around for many years.

Connection: Believers in the Theory that the Earth is flat even with scientific evidences that this theory is incorrect.
image from: https://www.quora.com/How-does-the-sun-move-in-the-flat-earth-model

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by Tracy Leonard

Definition:
Mystical energy is a claim that an object contains magical energy that travels through the universe and transforms into a positive or negative energy that effects the person in it’s presence.

Connection:
There are tons of claims that things work because of Mystical Energy. One of these, which is very popular, is Reiki. Reiki is a type of massage that originated in Japan. Rei means "Higher Power" and Ki means "life force energy". Reiki is a technique where, with your hands and very little touch, you can provide an energy fuelled massage that is stress reducing, relaxing, and healing. There is absolutely no proof that Reiki actually works. Because of this, it's important that a person who choses to use Reiki does not substitute traditional medicine for Reiki.

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What is Reiki and can it help with pain or depression? Is it safe? Find out here.

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by Tracy Leonard

Definition:
The term “all natural” is a vague term that is used giving the illusion that a product is indeed all natural, safe, or even works.

Connection:
People get tricked into thinking that food and other products that are “all natural” are good for you. In March 2017, two people in California drank tea made by a herblist. The tea leaves were made from Aconite, which also goes by the name of monkshood, helmet flower, or wolfsbane. This is a natural product, but ended up making both of the people drinking the tea critically ill, and ended up killing one of them.

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Tea has been a popular all-natural treatment for weight loss, anti-aging and insomnia, but a San Francisco woman died after drinking a poisonous herbal blend.
Read: Can A Drink Prevent Skin Cancer? Drinkable Sunscreen Company Sued Over 'Osmosis' Protection Claims
California health officials say that two people became sick within an hour after drinking an herbal tea last month. The identities have not been released, though officials say the victims were a woman in her 50s and a male in his 30s. Post-tea they suffered from weakness and abnormal heart rhythms, which required resuscitation and hospitalization. The woman died Saturday after weeks in the hospital, and the man was recently released.

The San Francisco Department of Health believes they both bought tea containing aconite, a dangerous poison, from the same herbalist. According to information from the department of health, both brews were purchased from Sun Wing Wo Trading Company. Officials are working with the company to trace the source of contamination.
Read: Cancer Cure Research 2017: Vitamin C Targets And Kills Cancer, According To New Study
The United States National Library of Medicine says that aconite is a highly toxic plant found in the wild that can cause severe poisoning. It has been used in traditional Chinese medicine, but only after the roots have been processed to reduce the toxic alkaloid content. "Soaking and boiling during processing or decoction preparation will hydrolyze aconite alkaloids into less toxic and non-toxic derivatives. However, the use of a larger than recommended dose and inadequate processing increases the risk of poisoning," the organization writes on its website. It's also known by other aliases such as wolfsbane and monkshood.
Can I Prevent Dementia? Super Food Blueberries Help Preserve Brain Activity, Cognitive Function, According To Science Is It Dangerous To Swallow Essential Oils? Here's What You Need To Know
WebMD strongly advises against aconite as it has been proven unsafe. Despite health concerns, the plant has been used to treat facial paralysis, joint pain, gout, inflammation and hair loss. Though frequently ingested, the plant can be found in lotions, which the medical site also deems harmful as the poison can be absorbed through skin.

See Also:

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What You Need to Know About Aconite Poisoning

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Tea has been a popular all-natural treatment for weight loss, anti-aging and insomnia, but a San Francisco woman died after drinking a poisonous herbal blend. Read : Can A Drink Prevent Skin Cancer? Drinkable Sunscreen Company Sued Over 'Osmosis' Protection Claims California health officials say that two people became sick within an hour after drinking an herbal tea last month.

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by Sean Hogan

Definition: An abundance of evidence that overwhelms people to believe that the claim is true.

Connection: This article from Time Health (June, 2017), presents the controversy about the Himalayan salt, showing that the use of it does not add any special health benefits.

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Pink salt is everywhere: in salt grinders, craggy-looking lamps, sunset-hued slabs designed for cooking steak and even in "salt rooms" at spas. But is pink Himalayan salt worth all the attention? Wechecked out the science behind this recent health phenomenon.

The thing: Pink Himalayan salt is made from rock crystals of salt that have been mined from areas close to the Himalayas, often in Pakistan. It gets its rosy hue from trace minerals in the salt, like magnesium, potassium and calcium. Pink salt is often found as smaller crystals in salt grinders, as large, glowing pink or orange chunks in pink Himalayan salt lamps and in the walls of "salt chambers" at spas that promise an instant detox.

The hype: People claim the salt does all kinds of things. It's rumored to be healthier for its greater concentration of trace elements. In lamp form, companies claim that it eases symptoms of seasonal affective disorder (SAD), increases energy and improves sleep by cleansing the air from pollutants like dust and pollen. It supposedly does this by absorbing water molecules from the air and releasing negative air ions, which are said to get rid of particles like dust that can cause respiratory problems, like allergies and asthma, and affect mood. Sp as have also jumped on these claims to offer Himalayan salt-based therapies, where people sit in rooms and breathe deeply while tiny particles of salt are dispersed into the surrounding areas, ostensibly easing respiratory conditions.

"Marketers tout their supposed ability to release negative ions that may enhance physical and emotional health," says Dr. Andy Weil, the founder and program director of the University of Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine . This is based on the idea that air near moving water contains high levels of negative ions, which some researchers have suggested is one reason why spending time in nature has been linked to health benefits. Whether a man-made product can produce the same effect, however, is more dubious.

The research: Some data suggests that blasts of positive ions-like those from electronics or hot air- may impair mood and physical health by increasing feelings of stress and anxiety, and some studies show that negative ions in the air may do the opposite and improve people's mood. But this is not a definitive claim-and pink salt lamps have not been shown in studies to generate negative ions, anyway. "There is no scientific support for such claims related to Himalayan salt lamps," says Weil.

Even air purifiers that do generate negative air ions-so-called "ionizers"-are typically too small to be effective, and experts don't recommend them. The salt lamps may also come with a major unrelated downside. In January, 80,000 pink Himalayan salt lamps were recalled after it was discovered that they could shock people and catch fire.

As for the edible salt, some argue that it tastes better than the regular white variety when used in cooking, and that may well be true for some people. " All salts vary somewhat with respect to trace mineral content and texture," says Weil. Proponents claim that pink salt has more minerals than typical salt-but you aren't likely to get any extra health perks from eating it, Weil says. Pink Himalayan salt is nutritionally very similar to regular salt. It's just prettier and more expensive.

Salt therapies at spas are also not yet backed by solid evidence. "Salt therapy has been used and debated for centuries in medical practice, but it's been more recently used as a complementary or alternative medicine practice," says Dr. Lily Pien, an allergist at Cleveland Clinic. " At this time, it has not been definitely studied, and the true benefits are not well known." One possible benefit of the therapy may not come from the salt at all, she says. Giving yourself 30-45 minutes of quiet time is a known stress reliever.

The bottom line: If you want to add a pinch of pink salt to your food, go ahead, but you probably won't reap any special health benefits. There's even less evidence for basking in the glow of a pink Himalayan salt lamp or indulging in a salt-based spa treatment. The most you'll get out of this rock is eye candy, says Weil. "Some feel it offers decorative value," he says, but don't expect much else.

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Does Pink Himalayan Salt Have Any Health Benefits?

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Pink salt is everywhere: in salt grinders, craggy-looking lamps, sunset-hued slabs designed for cooking steak and even in "salt rooms" at spas. But is pink Himalayan salt worth all the attention? Wechecked out the science behind this recent health phenomenon.

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by Sean Hogan

Definition: is an argument which leads to fallacies of a person or object to be true without any evidences.

Connection: This video shows a person pretending to be an undercover police officer leading people to help him to catch a suspect. In this case, he just shows a fake badge to assume his authority.

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Assignment 1 - Red Flags and Reason to Believe

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Assignment 1 - Red Flags and Reason to Believe

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Made by Tracy Leonard & Sean Hogan