Black and White Thinking

Blocks to critical thinking are those factors than impede people from arriving at sensible basis for belief. It is necessary for people to be aware of these obstacles in order to avoid following them blindly. Blocks to critical thinking can thwart a person’s effort to become an effective, critical thinker. Some of the blocks to critical thinking include black and white thinking, reliable on authority, labels, hasty moral judgment, cultural conditioning, frame of reference, and resistance to change. This paper will consider the summary of black and white thinking, including thorough explanation, an appropriate example of black and white thinking, getting rid of black and white thinking, and suggestions for its practical application.  

Black and White Thinking

Black and White thinking involves a situation in which a person considers only two alternatives. An individual fails to consider a range of alternatives and tend to think in extremes. A number of factors result in black and white thinking, one of which is the desire of human beings for certainty. There is exclusion of gradations between the two extremes. For instance, a person can say, “I thought we were allies, but all my allies were at my apartment yesterday and you were not there.” In this example, a person can consider those who arrived at his or her apartments as the only friends. This person does not consider those people who did not arrive at the apartment as his or her friends. Therefore, this person classifies the people who arrived at the apartment as friends and those who did not arrive at the apartment as enemies.

In reality, human beings are gray because no one is all bad or all good. For instance, there is a possibility that among those people, who arrived at the apartment, fifty percent are absolute enemies. On the other hand, those individuals, who did not arrive are good friends and will be beneficial in life. People should not classify others under two extremes as enemies and friend. It is always right for an individual to classify those people who are not their friends as enemies. People can lose opportunities for relationships by sticking to black and white thinking. An individual can gain many benefits and live comfortably by realizing that every person is unique.  

Getting rid of Black and White thinking

Therefore, it is necessary to get away from black and white thinking which is an informal fallacy affecting relationships negatively. There are many ways, through which individuals can get away from black and white thinking, namely accepting that they are not perfect, trying to find gray in one situation, and stopping and asking “why,” when they feel judgmental. Human beings make mistakes because they are fallible, imperfect, and vulnerable.

Practical application of Black and White thinking

People should not always assume that black and white dichotomies are never valid. Individuals can often categorize simple prepositions as true or false. For instance, a person can divide a group people into those who can be able to perform a task and those who are incapable of doing the task. Therefore, Black and white thinking is applicable in some instances.      

Technically, black and white thinking is a fallacy, which happens when there are only two options in an argument and it requires an individual to pick only one choice when in reality there are many options. In fact, the more people try to simplify their thinking into Black and White thinking, the worse they are going to make their own lives. Black and White thinking is applicable in some instances, but it is harmful in most instances. An individual can get away from the fallacy of black and white thinking by accepting that he or she is not perfect, trying to find gray in one situation, and stopping and asking “why,” when he or she feels judgmental.