The Critical Decline of Critical Thinking (and the 10 Forms Every Thinker Should Know)
Of every existential threat facing us right now, Eli Amdur opens the inaugural episode of Vantage Point with a deliberately absolute claim: artificial intelligence is the one that looms largest. Not because of what it might do to our jobs or our infrastructure, but because of what it can do to the thing that makes us human in the first place — our capacity to think.
That is the through-line of Episode 1, “The Critical Decline of Critical Thinking.” It is a case that the single skill we can least afford to lose is eroding at exactly the moment we need it most.
What critical thinking actually is
We use the phrase constantly and define it almost never. Eli’s first move is to fix that — and to correct a common mistake. Critical thinking is not a single skill. It is a trait — a disposition that integrates a whole set of mental habits working together:
- Analysis — breaking a claim into its parts
- Logic — following an argument without slipping
- Evaluation — weighing the quality of evidence, not just its existence
- Inference — reaching what the facts actually support
- Open-mindedness — holding a position loosely enough to change it
- Skepticism — withholding belief until it’s earned
- Reflection — turning the same scrutiny back on your own thinking
None of these is critical thinking by itself. The trait is what happens when they run at the same time, almost automatically. In the episode, Eli walks through ten categories of critical thinking in full — the complete taxonomy is worth hearing in his own words.
Where it went
The decline isn’t abstract. Eli spent fifteen years teaching graduate-level leadership and communication courses, and the episode draws on that front-row seat to describe — anecdotally and unsparingly — how the muscle has atrophied. We have outsourced more and more of our thinking: first to search engines, then to feeds that decide what we see, and now to systems that will write the answer for us if we let them.
The danger isn’t that the tools exist. It’s the quiet trade we make every time we reach for them without noticing.
The question we keep skipping: should we vs. could we
The sharpest turn in the episode is a reframe. As technology accelerates — AI, quantum computing, advances in space, even the manufacturing of human organs — we keep asking the wrong question.
“Asking ourselves the question, should we? — to replace the question, could we? We could do a lot of things.”
We could do almost anything now. Capability has outrun deliberation. Critical thinking is precisely the faculty that lets us pause on should before we sprint toward could — and it’s the faculty going quiet.
Three aphorisms worth keeping
Every episode of Vantage Point includes a few of Eli’s aphorisms. These three land hard on a single theme — that thinking starts with listening:
“Generally speaking, you aren’t learning much when your lips are moving.”
“Very few people ever got into trouble by listening too much.”
“You can easily identify the people who don’t know what they’re talking about. They’re usually the ones who insist they do.”
From great minds
Two of the clearest thinkers of the last century, on what thinking is really for:
“Imagination is more important than knowledge.” — Albert Einstein
“No, no, no. You’re not thinking. You’re just being logical.” — Niels Bohr
Bohr’s line is the whole episode in miniature: logic is a tool of thinking, not a substitute for it.
A “What If?” to sit with
Eli closes the segment with a thought experiment — the kind that built modern physics:
If I rode the first wave of a beam of light holding a mirror, would I be invisible in it?
It’s the question a teenage Einstein chased for years. The point isn’t the answer. It’s that a genuinely good question can do more for your thinking than a hundred ready-made answers.
Listen to Episode 1
“The Critical Decline of Critical Thinking” runs about 29 minutes. It’s the foundation the whole first season is built on — so it’s the right place to start.
Follow Vantage Point on your platform of choice so new episodes land automatically, and join the email list at eliamdur.com to get each one in your inbox.
Vantage Point — the podcast for critical thinkers. We’re not political, just critical.
This episode is supported by Vantage Point’s founding Executive Sponsor, Stephen Bozer, SVP of Human Health at Flavine.