Epstein, in his book on Critical Thinking (2006) lists criteria for acceptance or rejection of claims. "Our most reliable source of information about the world" he says, "is our own experience." From the base of personal experience, we can first determine if we know the claim is true or false. The difficulty with this is to truly determine what is personal experience and what we have completely accepted because someone else in our past told us so. This is particularly true with what we have been told as children. These ideas become ingrained and we tend to see what happens to us from the viewpoint of those ideas. We place meaning where meaning may not exist.
Every now and then it's helpful to examine where the certainty came from. "I know it's true" may not be enough. By listening to different viewpoints, we can expand our vision and rediscover experience.
One of the most inaccurate testimonies in court is eye-witness testimony yet juries place great value on it. A transcription of of a talk by Tversky and Fischer (law professors at Stanford) relates several studies. Among them were studies that demonstrated false memory. One study involved asking participats about a stop sign when the sign had actually been a yield sign. The participants became convinced that it had been a stop sign.
Memory is fallible, and we need to keep that in mind. Our own experience is still the best teacher.
http://agora.stanford.edu/sjls/Issue%20One/fisher&tversky.htm Retrived 6/26/2010
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