Ideas & critical thinking
Knowledge, expertise, persuasion and learning from disagreement.
Who Should Judge Work: Experts and Critical Judgment
A qualified argument that expertise is essential for some judgments of work, but that informed outsiders can contribute meaningfully when judging accessibility, public consequences, and ethical costs.
Learning from Agreement and Disagreement
An argument that learning depends less on whether people agree than on whether discussion makes room for evidence, challenge, and revision without coercion or hostility.
Facts and Emotion in Persuasion
An argumentative essay weighing the persuasive strengths and limits of facts, statistics, and emotional appeals, with examples from two presidential addresses.
Testing an Argument: Must It Persuade Someone Who Disagrees?
A model argumentative essay arguing that persuasion is a useful but inadequate test of argument quality. It distinguishes sound reasoning from audience response and shows why engaging opposing views matters.
Learning from Opposing Views: When Disagreement Teaches More
An argumentative essay on when people learn more from those who challenge their views, emphasizing trust, openness, and the quality of disagreement.
GRE Issue Essay on Beginners’ Contributions Versus Expertise
This essay argues that beginners are not generally more likely than experts to make important contributions: their fresh perspectives can expose assumptions, while expertise often helps test ideas and turn them into consequential work. Whether either group is more likely depends on the field’s needs and how it evaluates challenges.
Interdisciplinary Knowledge: Does Every Field Need Ideas from Outside It?
A qualified argument that specialized methods are indispensable, but significant progress on practical problems often requires bringing other kinds of knowledge and experience into the work.
GRE Issue Essay on Knowledge, Complexity, and Mystery
A qualified argument that knowledge makes some questions more answerable while exposing additional layers of complexity, especially when evidence concerns human choices, power, and competing interpretations.
GRE Practice: Commitment and Critical Thinking
An argumentative essay examines when commitment encourages rigorous self-criticism and when loyalty or self-interest makes it harder to recognize a policy’s failures.
GRE Issue Essay on Debate and Progress
An argument that disagreement can improve decisions when it tests assumptions, but that progress does not always require extended debate: urgency, shared evidence, and inclusive procedures determine when discussion helps.
Should Facts Be Mistrusted Because They May Change?
An argument that factual claims deserve calibrated scrutiny: evidence can be revised, but the possibility of revision is not a reason to reject it without examining how it was established.