8 pathological tendencies that critical thinkers recognize

In Richard Paul's and Linda Elder's book, Critical Thinking: Tools for Taking Charge of Your Professional and Personal Life, the authors explain the differences between natural thinking and critical thinking. They also identify the mind's pathological tendencies to recognize.

Natural thinking is when we are governed by our thoughts. Critical thinking, on the other hand, is governing the thoughts that govern us. Natural thinking is spontaneous and nonreflective, whereas critical thinking analyzes our thinking. Natural thinking is self-centered, but critical thinking exposes the roots of self-centered thinking to close scrutiny. As you continue to develop your critical thinking skills, learn to identify these pathological tendencies of the human mind:

1) Egocentric memory: the natural tendency to "forget" evidence and information that do not support our thinking and to "remember" evidence and information that do.

2) Egocentric myopia: the natural tendency to think in an absolutist way within an overly narrow point of view.

3) Egocentric righteousness: the natural tendency to feel superior in the light of our confidence that we possess the truth when we do not.

4) Egocentric hypocrisy: the natural tendency to ignore flagrant inconsistencies—for example, between what we profess to believe and the actual beliefs our behavior implies, or between the standards to which we hold ourselves and those to which we expect others to adhere.

5) Egocentric oversimplification: the natural tendency to ignore real and important complexities in the world in favor of simplistic notions when consideration of those complexities would require us to modify our beliefs or values.

6) Egocentric blindness: the natural tendency not to notice facts and evidence that contradict our favored beliefs or values.

7) Egocentric immediacy: the natural tendency to overgeneralize immediate feelings and experiences, so that when one event in our life is highly favorable or unfavorable, all of life seems favorable or unfavorable to us.

8) Egocentric absurdity: the natural tendency to fail to notice thinking that has "absurd" consequences.