Are you for or against the separation of church and state?

[Angrboda]

Fascinating, irrelevant, and arguably wrong. Did you have anything at all to say in response to what I actually wrote?

Yes, I would think the very proportion of people contributed significantly to nature science and who are without formal training in critical thinking is evidence that teaching critical thinking does in fact achieve something.

I'm not sure that you meant to say what you actually wrote. The fact is that historically, nearly all scientists received no specific training or education in critical thinking. Historically, university education for persons who went on to contribute to the sciences often included segments on philosophy, logic and rhetoric, but nothing that can be readily described as training in critical thinking, unless you choose to equivocate in order to make the term sufficiently broad as to be meaningless. In doing so, I'd say you're attempting to have your cake and eat it, too. Moreover, current training in the sciences typically does not include any required training in critical thinking per se, so it's probably a valid generalization to say that the bulk of scientific achievement occurred without any special education devoted to critical thinking among students of the sciences. I rather suspect that this is the opposite of what you wanted to imply. More to the point however, my question is not to the value of critical thinking so much as it is to question of the effectiveness or viability of teaching critical thinking itself, independent of domain specific knowledge, which is more broadly defined as simply "education," and whether doing so has any practical effect in terms of improving a person's ability to think critically in general, or even with respect to the individual's specialization. I think you've conflated the contributions of natural talent and intelligence, education generally, education in critical thinking specifically, and experience such that it's impossible to draw any conclusions from your example. I think you'll need a considerably finer bladed scalpel to tease apart a meaningful distinction here.