Hi! We're looking at ways to improve your
reading comprehension by thinking more critically.
One of the things you should do is
to see if the information is a fact or an opinion.
Oh, that's easy! Right? Well... there's a gray area there...
If someone says, "The Earth is flat."
Is that a fact or an opinion?
The answer might surprise you, so stick around and let's talk about
distinguishing fact and opinion.
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Hi! Welcome to Snap Language I'm Marc Franco.
If I say, "It's 30°C outside," you can verify the information.
All you need is a thermometer... or, well, your smartphone.
The information is objective. It's based on data and observation.
However, if I say, "It's very hot!" Now... that's an opinion.
Thirty degrees Celsius is a fact. It's objective information
that I can verify.
But you may think 30°C is comfortable.
Another person may say 30°C is really hot!
Each person can have a different opinion.
So, facts are verifiable and objective.
You can check the information and tell if it's true or untrue.
Opinions cannot be verified, and they're subjective;
they change according to a person's judgment.
It's a fact that it's 30°C, but each person may feel
differently about that.
When something's presented as a fact,
does it also mean it's true?
Well, these are separate issues.
In a passage, a writer can present information as a fact
even though it may be inaccurate or even flatout wrong.
It's up to you, as the reader, to examine the information
carefully to make sure it's relevant and accurate.
Let's look at this chart. It shows the average course grades
that students received in a course. Half of the students took
the course with Professor Ecks. The other half took it with Prof. Bee.
You can see their average course grades here.
We can make several statements based on this information.
For example, "Prof. Ecks's students earned an average
course grade of 95.
Prof. Bee's students earned an average course grade of 85."
These statements are presented as facts,
and the information is accurate.
I can check it right here in the graph.
"Prof. Ecks's students earned a higher average course grade
than did Prof. Bee's students."
Again, I can check the information in the graph.
It's presented as a fact.
"Students in Prof. Ecks's course earned a higher average
course grade. . . .
. . . . therefore, Prof. Ecks is a better instructor."
Okay... now, we get into a bit of a gray area.
We saw that this is a fact, but saying Prof. Ecks is
a better instructor is an opinion.
It is possible Prof. Ecks did a better job.
But it's also possible that Prof. Bee did a good job, too, but
his students didn't do very well for some reason.
This opinion is based on the fact that one
group of students did better than the other,
but it's still just an opinion.
"Prof. Ecks has more experience than Prof. Bee; in addition,
Prof. Ecks's students did better in the course.
Therefore, Prof. Ecks is a better instructor
than Prof. Bee."
Now, this is presented as a fact.
I trust that it's true,
but I can also verify it by looking at the instructors'
professional records.
We also have a fact here. His students did do better;
we can see it in the graph.
But this conclusion that he's a better instructor
is still an opinion.
It's a little stronger now because it's based
on two pieces of evidence. But it's still an opinion.
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So back to where we started,
if I say, "the Earth if flat," is that a fact or an opinion?
Well, the information is presented as a fact.
You can verify it, and you'll find that it's wrong.
So, when information is presented as a fact, it is verifiable and
objective—based on statistics, data, observations...
It could be right, wrong, or misleading.
It's up to you to verify the evidence.
When the information is presented as an opinion, you cannot verify it.
An opinion may be based on facts, but it's subjective;
it's based on feelings or judgments.
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Does that mean opinions are bad?
Not necessarily.
Opinions are weak when they're based
only on a guess or your personal feeling or judgment.
The more factual information you base your opinions on,
the stronger they are, and the more compelled you are
to agree with them.
Both facts and opinions are important parts of
sharing knowledge and ideas.
"In a study, researchers found that two-thirds of college seniors
failed a high-school grammar test.
This points to the poor state of higher education in the United States."
Let's see. This is presented as a fact.
I trust that there was a study and this is what they found.
This... this is problematic. It's just an opinion.
Yes, you can judge the quality of higher education based on
whatever you want, but others may disagree that
this information is a good measure of quality.
I can read the study to verify what these researchers found,
but I cannot verify that the quality of education is
high or low based on it.
An opinion based on fact is still an opinion.
Is it a strong opinion? Let's see, the study found that
these college seniors failed some high-school grammar test.
What was the test like?
Can a grammar test be used to judge
the quality of higher education?
Hmm... I'm not so sure about that...
Is there a better way to measure quality?
This is a somewhat weak opinion because
the evidence doesn't support it very well at all.
So, the point is that an opinion based on facts
is stronger than one that's based on just feelings or
personal judgment.
But... you must still ask questions about those facts.
Don't simply agree with someone's opinion
as if it were factual
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So, keep this in mind the next time you read something.
Oh... check in the descriptions
below the video for more materials.
One opinion I never question is when people like and share
my videos, so ... go ahead...
We'll be talking about other aspects of
critical thinking in the next videos.
So, until the next time,
thanks for stopping by and watching this video.
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