ABSTRACT
A great deal of research has been conducted on informal reasoning in a specific context, namely in reasoning about choices. Thus, it seems expedient to examine recent evidence on how well people reason in this context to see what implications can be gleaned concerning our prospects for developing a curriculum in informal reasoning. My purpose in this chapter is to discuss two lessons implied by this research. The first reflects positively regarding the possibility of teaching people to reason better, whereas implications drawn from the second are far less promising. Specifically, I demonstrate that, for one class of situations in which people reason poorly, in the sense that their choices imply contradictions, they can, at least in principle, be taught to reason better. Conversely, there is a second class of situations with respect to which it is not clear that we can either assist individuals or instruct them in resolving the contradictions reflected by their choices.
