The perks of critical thought

Through an advertisement that this newspaper carried in its September 11 edition, the Higher Education Commission (HEC) highlighted its achievements over the last 15 years. These pertain to student enrolment, research, innovation, entrepreneurship and human resource and faculty development. The content appeared on the occasion of the HEC’s anniversary and in the backdrop of growing apprehensions that the institutions of advanced learning may become a hotbed of extremism.

These apprehensions draw sustenance from the involvement of students and graduates of universities in acts of terrorism. Saad Aziz – who, along with his accomplices, was convicted of perpetrating the carnage of more than 40 people at Safoora Chowk, Karachi in 2015 as well as masterminding the murder of human rights activist Sabeen Mahmud in the same year – was educated at institutions of high repute, including the Institute of Business Administration. Naureen Leghari, a medical student, was recruited by Daesh.

Earlier this year, Mashal Khan was lynched to death by a yobbish mob comprising his university fellows for allegedly committing blasphemy. Later, it turned out that he was put to death because he had threatened to lift the lid off corruption allegedly being practised by university staff. But the fact that university students were instigated in the name of religion to kill one of their own lays bare the hold that religious extremism has on the minds of the educated youth. Recently, Abdul Karim Sarosh, a student at Karachi University, has been found to be involved in the attempt on the life of MQM leader Izharul Hassan.

Seminaries are widely regarded as breeding grounds for religious extremism and the militancy that it inspires. This, no doubt, is a correct impression. The education imparted at the seminaries inculcates animosity towards rival creeds and sects among the students. Mainstreaming the seminaries – or at the very least monitoring their activities and curricula – has, therefore, been a long-standing demand of the civil society.

The National Action Plan also provides for the regularisation and reform of seminaries. However, like several other points of NAP, the reform of seminaries also remains unimplemented. 

With the government shying away from setting its teeth into keeping the seminaries in check, it was only a matter of time that extremism would infest mainstream academic institutions – so contagious this menace is. These institutions, unlike the seminaries, do not teach hatred in the name of religion. Nor do they sanctify or glorify faith-inspired violence. But they haven’t been able to prevent their students from being swept by religious extremism.

The involvement of a section of educated men and women in acts of terrorism strongly suggests that notwithstanding all the investment that has gone into research and human capital development, the mainstream education system is racked with serious problems. One problem is the lack of inductive or critical thinking.

More than anything else, science is an attitude towards the world that is born of empirical or inductive thinking. The other mode of thinking is deductive in nature. In deductive thinking, conclusions are drawn from a general proposition, which is assumed to be true. By contrast, inductive thinking consists of drawing up a principle on the basis of particular instances that are observed.

Here is an example. From the premise that departure from religion is always at the root of social decline, one may infer through a chain of reasoning that the enforcement of the Shariah is the magic wand which will bring about a metamorphosis in society. This is deductive thinking. On the other hand, someone may study Pakistan’s society dispassionately and then come up with the conclusion that there is no root and branch remedy for its problems. This is inductive thinking.  

Deductive thinking is used to defend well-established beliefs and institutions. Not surprisingly, a deductive logic has for centuries formed part of the curricula of advanced religious education all over the world. Inductive thinking is used to question and examine such beliefs and institutions. It consists of the willingness to see the flip side of the coin, which always exists.

Inductive thinking is the ability to question and review one’s basic position or assumptions, irrespective of where the process ends up. This mode of thinking does not necessarily lead to the rejection of established beliefs or institutions and they may also stand vindicated upon investigation. What is vital to inductive thinking is the spirit of free enquiry and scepticism.

In every society, both inductive and deductive thinking are used. In every society, deductive thinking tends to be the dominant mode of thinking. Societies, however, differ in the relative levels of the two modes of thinking. Thus, in a religious or totalitarian society, the level of inductive thinking is remarkably lower than what it is in a liberal, democratic society.

Inductive thinking goes hand-in-hand with freedom of expression. Threats to freedom of expression can stem from two sources: the government and society. A regime rooted in sheer force allows the people to only speak in favour of the established order. No one is supposed to question the legitimacy of the regime and this is often taken for granted.

In Pakistan, dictators like Ziaul Haq claimed that they had a divine mission to accomplish. As a result, any opposition to their regime was simply an opposition to Allah – the gravest of all sins. One may recall that in the 1984 presidential referendum, the people were asked to vote for the general if they preferred an Islamic system in the country. The referendum question was deduced from the assumption – whose truth was taken for granted – that support for the Zia regime was akin to support for Islam.  

A more serious threat to freedom of expression is an intolerant society. In such societies, ideas that run counter to traditional beliefs are simply branded as dangerous or heretic. Such societies are characterised by the uncritical acceptance of authority.

Education is a key instrument of promoting inductive thinking. But only those forms of education that foster a spirit of inquiry and scepticism among students can achieve this. Arguably, nothing is more dangerous to inductive thinking than an education system that is based on indoctrination where all teaching proceeds from certain ideas which are assumed to be as true as the axioms of mathematics.

An obvious example of this is the education imparted at seminaries. That is the reason their graduates, instead of developing a scientific attitude, acquire the incorrigible habit to defend, justify or impose a set of beliefs about their own creed through polemics or by force.

Regrettably, the mainstream academic institutions also cut a sorry figure in shaping up scientific attitudes among students. Far from being admired, critical thinking is frowned upon. In most cases, the members of the faculty – regardless of their glowing academic and research credentials – are not drawn towards inductive thinking as an attitude towards life and the system of rewards that is in vogue in colleges and universities does not places a high premium on such modes of thinking. The logical outcome is young people with highly impressionable minds, which are only a whisker away from being swept off their feet by a misconstrued yet alluring view of jihad. 

While the government may choose to keep a tight rein over the institutions of higher learning, inductive thinking needs to be promoted as the long-term solution to the problem of on-campus extremism. Is the HEC prepared to take up the task?

The writer is a freelance countributor.

Email: hussainhzaidi@gmail.com