Reason and emotion both play important roles in critical thinking. Reason involves using logic and evidence to support conclusions, while emotion can influence reasoning by motivating empathy, compassion, and better decision making. Both are necessary for fully evaluating problems and situations. While reason and emotion were traditionally viewed as separate, it is now understood that they interact in judgment and choice. Integrating the two allows for more informed decisions.

1. Chapter 2
Reason & Emotion
The aim of this tutorial is to help you learn the
basics of critical thinking and be able to identify
common barriers to effective critical thought.
Copyright © 2021 McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw-Hill Education.

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How Do Reason and Emotion Work
Together in an Activity Such as Skydiving?
Digital Vision/Getty Images

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Reason and Emotion Play Important
Roles in Critical Thinking
Reason is the process of supporting a claim or conclusion
based on evidence.
• It involves both the disciplined use of intelligence and the
application of rules for problem solving.
In logic, reasoning is presented in a structured form
supported by premises.
• However, everyday uses of reason are broader and require creative
thought and emotional discernment.

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Reasoning about Problems in a
Familiar Context
Left: Tracy Hebden/Getty Images; Right: Sebastian Vera/Getty Images

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Reason Contains a Number of
Important Components and Strategies
These components include the ability to engage in abstract
thinking and behavioral modification.
Reason also involves the embrace of different cognitive
strategies, such as deduction, generalization, and
imagination.
• It is also important in spatial-temporal problem solving in fields,
such as mathematics, engineering, and architecture.

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Great Chain of Being
For centuries Western scholars
accepted the view that humans
were a special creation infused with
the divine spark of rationality.
Digital Archive Japan/Alamy Stock Photo
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Reason Has Traditionally Been Linked
with Males in Western Thought
• Beginning with Aristotle, Western thought has generally
linked men to reason and women to the realm of nature.
• In order to be effective critical thinkers, we must be
willing to use reason to examine these assumptions
regarding gender and age.

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Reason Can Operate at Both the
Conscious and Unconscious Levels
• Traditionally seen as a conscious activity, recent
cognitive research suggests much of reasoning is in fact
unconscious and automatic.
• Studies of brain function indicate that dreams involve
cerebral activity related to reason and problem solving.
• Many important knowledge breakthroughs, such as the
creation of the periodic table by Russian chemist Dmitri
Mendeleyev, occurred through dream-inspired
guidance.

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Temple Grandin
Nancy Kaszerman/ZUMA/Corbis

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Your Brain on Video Games
Milkos/123RF

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Reason Is an Essential Component of
Critical Thinking
• Reason helps us analyze beliefs and evidence, to make
good life choice decisions, to cope with adversity, and to
resolve problems.
• In critical thinking, reason does not operate alone but
works together with other faculties, such as emotion.

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The Role of Emotion in Critical
Thinking 1
Emotion is a state of consciousness in which feelings
such as joy, anger, love, hate, and fear are experienced.
In Western culture, emotion has been traditionally viewed
as the opposite of reason.
• In contrast, other cultures have emphasized the importance of
positive emotions in the development of critical thinking skills.

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Can You Identify Which Emotions Are
Being Shown Here?
Left to right: First: Pixland/Getty Images; Second: Lars A. Niki; Third: Digital Vision/Getty Images; Fourth: Image Source/Getty Images; Fifth: Jose
Manuel Gelpi Diaz/123RF

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Hot or Not? 1
Do you think emotion or reason plays a
more pivotal role in critical thinking?

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The Role of Emotion in Critical
Thinking 2
As critical thinkers, we need to be aware of the dangers of
emotions, such as anger and fear, as barriers to critical
thought and the benefits of using emotions, such as
empathy and compassion, to enhance our critical thinking
abilities.

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Rosa Parks
Bettmann/Getty Images

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The Importance of Emotional
Intelligence
Emotional intelligence: The ability to perceive, appraise,
express, and regulate emotion is positively related to
abstract reasoning ability.
Emotions such as empathy, moral indignation, love,
happiness, and even guilt can have a positive effect on our
reasoning by influencing us to make better decisions.
An empathetic person is more flexible and open to other
perspectives.
• This openness motivates critical analysis of problems and situations
and helps formulate appropriate action plans and responses.

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Emotions Can Also Work against
Critical Thinking
Although emotions can motivate better decision-making,
they can also hinder it.
• Examples of the negative role emotions can play include the
presence of fear and anger in action plans.
Additionally, we are vulnerable to emotional appeals, such
as those in advertising and political campaigns.
• These appeals, often devoid of evidence and good reasoning, can
distract us from more important issues or encourage regrettable
actions.

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Integrating Reason and Emotion
Reason and emotion provide a double-pronged tool for
critical thinking.
Emotion alerts us to problems and other people’s
perspectives.
• Emotion also motivates action and problem resolution.
Using our emotions in conjunction with reason allows us to
make better-informed decisions.

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The Mozart Effect
Photodisc Collection/Getty Images

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Artificial Intelligence (A I), Reasoning,
and Emotion 1
Artificial intelligence is defined as “the study of
computations that make it possible to perceive, reason,
and act.”
• Its goals include the enhancement of human reasoning, the
creation of intelligent machines, and the development of sociable,
intelligent machines that can cooperate with people.

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Artificial Intelligence (A I), Reasoning,
and Emotion 2
Given recent advances in these endeavors, as critical
thinkers we need to move beyond questioning whether A I
is capable of reasoning and emotion and not hold A I to
higher standards of proof than we apply to humanity.
• A I possesses enormous potential to enhance our critical thinking
abilities.

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“Only a Human Can…”
UPMC

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Hot or Not? 2
Do some computers have the ability for
rational thought?

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Mother Teresa
Tim Graham/HultonArchive/Getty Images

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Faith and Reason
Faith involves not only belief in God, but also an act of
trust in and obedience to God.
• Traditionally, faith and reason have been seen as uneasy co-
inhabitants of the human mind.
• Whatever one’s personal beliefs, it is important for us as critical
thinkers to connect faith with reason, in order to balance belief and
doubt.
Integrating reason into faith allows us to evaluate the
competing claims of faith and revelation and to question
faith-based claims that are inconsistent with evidence or
reason.

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Three Approaches to Faith and
Reason
• Fideism argues that faith transcends reason and that
the divine is revealed through faith and revelation, not
through reason or empirical evidence.
• Rationalism argues that religious beliefs should be
consistent with reason and evidence.
• Critical rationalism argues that divine knowledge can
derive from both faith and reason, but that both sources
should be compatible with one another.

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Abraham and His Son Isaac
Time Life Pictures/Mansell/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Abraham making preparations to sacrifice his son Isaac at
God's command

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Albert Schweitzer
PhotoQuest/Getty Images

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Conclusions
As the previous slides have shown, effective critical
thinking requires exercise of both reason and emotion in
order to be most effective.
Also, reason and faith are compatible.
• Indeed, applying reason to faith is important for it protects us from
faith-based knowledge and arguments not supported by evidence.

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Perspectives on Reason and Proofs for the
Existence of God
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