Daniel Kahneman’s intriguing book Thinking, Fast and Slow has many applications and in today’s Pope Center piece, St. Lawrence University economics professor Steve Horwitz sees a connection to higher education. Most students enter college with their slow-thinking faculties little developed. That is, they’re apt to rush to judgments about an unfamiliar idea without taking time to ponder what that unfamiliar idea really means and whether it could possibly be correct.

One example Horwitz gives is the concept of spontaneous order. Many students, first confronting such thinking, dismiss it as lacking in concern or compassion. If they slow down — which is what the professor should get them to do — they will understand that unplanned orders often work far better than do ones based on top-down controls that purportedly aim at accomplishing good objectives.

Several weeks ago, I reviewed a book arguing that higher education should have a leftist bias. Nope. The only bias it should have is in favor of slow, deliberate, logical thinking.

Professor Horwitz’s conclusion is right on the money: “The human brain is just as much a product of evolution as the rest of our bodies, and the job of good liberal educators is to help students understand our evolved reactions and fast thinking and give them the tools to slow that thinking down and recognize those biases, as well as acting to correct them.”