Critical Thinking is the ability to think clearly and rationally about what to do or what to believe. It includes the ability to engage in reflective and independent thinking. Critical thinking is the analysis of available facts, evidence, observations and arguments in order to form a judgement by the application of rational, skeptical and unbiased analyses and evaluation. The application of critical thinking includes self-directed, self disciplined, self monitored and self corrective habits of the mind. Thus a critical thinker is a person who practices the skills of critical thinking or has been trained and educated in its disciplines.
Critical thinking is not simply a matter of accumulating information. A person with a good memory and who knows a lot of facts is not necessarily good at critical thinking. Critical thinkers are able to reduce consequences from what they know, make use of information to solve problems and to seek relevant sources of information to inform themselves.