Summarize the following:
Like emotions, assumptions create blind spots in your thinking. Lawyers seek evidence to prove every factual statement, and assume nothing is true without proof. You may have had experience with a young child who asked “why?” after everything you said. Although that can get annoying, it’s also part of thinking like a lawyer.  Lawyers refer to why a law was made as its ‘‘policy.’’ The policy behind a law can be used to argue that new facts or circumstances should also fall under the law. For example, suppose that in 1935, the city council enacted a law prohibiting vehicles in the public park. The law was enacted primarily for safety concerns, after a small child was hit by a car. In 2014, the city council was asked to consider whether the 1935 statute prohibited drones. Are drones vehicles? Would prohibiting drones advance the law’s policy? Why? If you’re asking those questions (and recognizing arguments that can be made on both sides), you’re thinking like a lawyer. Thinking like a lawyer also means not taking anything for granted. Understanding why something happened, or why a certain law was enacted, enables you to apply the same rationale to other fact patterns and reach a logical conclusion. Legal issues are seldom black and white. Life is too complex for legislators to account for every possibility when they write a law.  Ambiguities allow for flexibility, so laws don’t have to be rewritten every time a new scenario comes along. For example, the Constitution has been interpreted to relate to electronic surveillance, a technological advance the Framers couldn’t have imagined. Much of thinking like a lawyer involves being comfortable with nuances and gray areas. However, just because those gray areas exist doesn’t mean distinctions are meaningless.
Break down assumptions. Ask why. Accept ambiguity.