[wccrawford]

"just let all the information wash over you" is one of the things that I think is required of someone that thinks well. I find that too many people either accept or (worse) reject information immediately without considering it. In that state, you either can't think critically about new information, or your old information, depending. I think the inability to look at "facts" and consider them unreliable is one thing that keeps people from being able to think well.

One of my biggest pet peeves is when someone learned something 20 years ago and absolutely refuses to accept that it might be wrong, simply because someone in authority taught it to them.

Authority means nothing in the end, and memories fail.