Critical Thinking.prompt

---
description: "Run the full critical-thinking pass on a decision, claim, or recommendation — generate alternatives, check evidence, detect bias, test falsifiability"
lastReviewed: 2026-05-26
---

# Critical Thinking Pass

Apply the 7-discipline critical-thinking protocol to a specific decision, claim, or recommendation. The always-on `critical-thinking.instructions.md` keeps this discipline running in the background; this prompt forces a deliberate, visible pass for high-stakes work.

Skill: [critical-thinking](../skills/critical-thinking/SKILL.md). Always-on rule: [critical-thinking.instructions.md](../instructions/critical-thinking.instructions.md).

## When to Use

- Before committing to a technical approach with material consequences
- When a recommendation feels right but hasn't been challenged
- When the user says "are you sure?" or expresses doubt
- When consensus formed too quickly (groupthink signal)
- When evidence quality is in question

## Steps

1. **Restate the claim** in one sentence — what specifically is being asserted? If the claim is fuzzy, ask before continuing.
2. **Frame audit (Discipline -1)**: is the user's framing the right framing? Have you anchored on it because they stated it confidently? Surface a competing frame if one exists.
3. **Materiality gate**: confirm stakes are at least medium. If trivial, exit and say so.
4. **Run the 7 disciplines** from the skill body, generating visible markers as you go:
   - **Alternatives**: name at least one rival hypothesis with grounds (`Considered: A vs B — going with A because <specific reason>`)
   - **Missing data**: what evidence is absent that would change the conclusion?
   - **Evidence quality**: source, sample, recency, conflict-of-interest, reproducibility
   - **Bias detection**: anchoring? confirmation? availability? premature closure?
   - **Falsifiability**: state the specific evidence that would invalidate the claim (`Would revise if: <X>`)
   - **Adversarial review**: argue the strongest counter-position; if you can't steelman it, you don't understand the problem
5. **Surface the finding** — one of:
   - Claim survives the pass — proceed with calibrated confidence
   - Claim has a fixable weakness — propose the fix
   - Claim doesn't survive — propose the alternative

## Output Format