In his personal blog, TGL member Praj asks if scientific thinking is like reading comprehension. He gives the example of a paragraph about American football. Being British and not a follower of the game, but nevertheless (I believe) fully literate in the English language, I can confirm that understanding the example is not merely a matter of general English comprehension. Some of the jargon terms such as “receiver”, “training camp”, “running back”, “season”, “backup” and “offensive line” may evoke some kind of sense to any reader of English, but one really has to know about football to fully understand them in this piece. Likewise, some of the slang terms of American reportage, such as “get off the ground”, “getting on track” or “banged up” have literal or conventional meanings in general English usage, but are used metaphorically here.
Praj worries about whether or not “scientific thinking” necessarily requires scientific knowledge, particularly in relation to “the issue” of global warming. I think you need to start by being clear about what you mean by the issue of global warming. I can see at least five distinct issues here:

1. the issue of how much reliance we can place on data that indicate global climate has changed rapidly in recent decades;
2. the issue of how much reliance we can place on climate models that predict the implications for future climate change;
3. the issue of how much confidence we can have in the efficacy of any policy designed to reverse or adapt to such predicted climate change;
4. the issue of how well we think we understand the economic and political consequences of such policies or their failure;
5. the issue of how people in whose name such policies are made value the presumed benefits of the policy as opposed to the presumed risks of any alternative.

I’d say that issue (1) is essentially scientific. To know what the measurements actually represent and the practical limitations of the measurement techniques used, requires specialist technical knowledge. When that is drawn from a shared pool of individual experiences of related technical knowledge, then you could call it “scientific thinking”.
Issue (5), on the other hand, isn’t scientific at all. Any individual or group of individuals is equally entitles to make a judgement against what it autonomously sees as its own interests.
Issues (2), (3) and (4) make a gradual transition between those two positions.
For the policy maker, the problem is to assess the need for a policy which takes into account (1) and (2), consider all technical possibilities for a technical response (2, 3 and 4) and then prioritize those for policy adoption (4 and 5).
Taking all those various (and even contradictory) interests into account to come up with a solution that is sufficiently acceptable to a sufficient number of parties to stand a chance of actually working, is the policy makers job, and I don’t envy them it.