The Power of Intuition

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Asexperia, Aug 15, 2012.

  1. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    THE POWER OF INTUITION

    The intuition is the ability to discover spontaneously the essence of things and relations between them.
    Various are the interpretations that have been given to intuition, from a mystical or divine power to a power of divination. It is also widely believed that intuition is a women's faculty.
    From a psychological perspective, intuition is an unconscious mental process of exaltation. Philosophically, intuition is defined as the ability to obtain new knowledge without the intervention of the senses or the reasoning. But these are two views to conceive the same process.
     
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  3. Dinosaur Rational Skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    Intuition tends to be overrated as some occult phenomenon.

    Often what seems to be intuition getting a right answer is really due to the application of special knowledge. for example: Experts at competitive card games like duplicate bridge sometimes go against the book odds because their vast experience picks up what poker players call Tells. An opponent gives information via subtle mannerisms not noticed by those with less experience.

    Evolution has conditioned humans (& perhaps other animals) to treat coincidences as evidence.


    Consider a group of prehistoric hunters who hear a strange noise immediately followed by some bad experience: A large cat or poisonous snake gets one of them or a tree falls & kills some body. If the noise is not evidence of the misfortune, no harm will come from checking for disaster next week when the same noise is heard. If the noise really was a harbinger, paying attention to it as a warning might save a life or prevent serious injury. Evolution favors paying attention to what might or might not be a coincidence.​

    People tend to exaggerate or misremember stories relating to their own experiences and the experiences of friends & family.
     
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  5. C C Consular Corps - "the backbone of diplomacy" Valued Senior Member

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    Reasoning, at least. Along the line of what Wilfrid Sellars decried as the "myth of the given". Having been inspired by Kant's thought that intuitions without conceptual processing are blind (interpretation, understanding, identification).

    Eric M. Rubenstein . . . "We don't know the world just by sensing it. We don't even know our own sensations just by having them. [...] to be aware of something, x, one must have a concept for x. But there is a flip side to this. If one has a concept of x, one can be aware of x's. With the concept of x in hand, that is, you can notice all sorts of things you didn't notice before you had that concept. For instance, a physicist looks at a puff of smoke in a cloud chamber and sees an electron discharged. She comes to have [...] knowledge of something we might not, as she has certain concepts we don't as laypeople, as well as an ability to apply them directly to her experience. In other words, perception is concept-laden, and depending on what concepts you have, you can perceive different things." (IEP entry, Sellars' Philosophy of Mind)
     
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  7. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    It's obvious that our intuitions depend on our experience and knowledge. The other aspect is that we should verify our conclusions with reality.
     
  8. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    THE INTUINICS

    The intuinics is the systematic method of exercising intuition. The Intuinics is aided by introspection to observe the process of intuition. The introspection is the examination of one's own thoughts or feelings.

    The Intuinics also aims to study the issues: levels of consciousness, intelligence, creativity and imagination.

    Some exercises that people can do are: A trip to Mercel, incomplete history, mating with imagination, quintesimal system and discover the essence. These exercises are only available in Spanish.
     
  9. Gregg Schaffter Registered Member

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    I think the main factor behind discovery is making connections. Though we seem to find new objects and new systems and models of the Universe, but we lack the ability to be able to connect them in any way, such as connecting quantum mechanics and general physics. The human mind seems to work off connections. This is why some drugs make people seem more sensible of the world because of the fact that their brain refuses to take in anymore information, allowing the person to make connections between ideas, which leads to inspiration. Like many say as a word of advice: The only way to discover is to pay attention to even the smallest piece of detail(At least I say this most of the time).
     
  10. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Intuition is just thought. Perhaps sub-conscious thought, but still thought.
     
  11. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Actually. in the intuition we establish a new connection between neurons in the brain without reasoning.

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  12. scheherazade Northern Horse Whisperer Valued Senior Member

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    My hypothesis for intuition is that the brain does indeed reason, but it does so without in-depth analysis or conscious rationalizing. The subconscious runs a 'program of previously experienced pieces and patterns' and extrapolates the best fit or possibility from that data. The speed with which our brain is able to do this is not perceivable at the time and so we credit 'intuition'.

    Those who pay attention to details are frequently also quite intuitive, in my observation.
     
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  13. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    The color blue (sea) represents the existing knowledge.
    The chord represents the surface of the sea.
    The central circle (brown) represents the float, stay on the surface. It is the intuition.
    The yellow color represents the knowledge that has not been discovered.
    The star represents the light that illuminates the knowledge.
     
  14. lalalandscape Registered Senior Member

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    I actually agree with scheherazade. I was just thinking to myself "uh wait- intuition isn't based on ANY form of reasoning?"
    Like he said, I do not think it is a part of our working memory's reasoning, but a more subconscious area. Indeed, it is a form of pattern-connection that may process faster than one can consciously understand as processing. I believe that the subconscious strings together relevant information in it's experienced, stored memory and recognizes an abstracted theme which connects the experiences.
     
  15. LaurieAG Registered Senior Member

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    It's a bit like the process that occurs when your subconscious realises that you are within a dream. Hmm, can short term memory become long term memory irrespective of your state of consciousness?
     
  16. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    I don't think so. If we don't remember something is that we don't pay attention.
     
  17. lalalandscape Registered Senior Member

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    I think the short term memory effects the long term. There are ways that short term memory processes new information (mainly sensory stimulation) which makes its way into long term, reversing the long-term retrieval of information into the short term. I am not sure if this is what you were asking though.
     
  18. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

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    How does intuition work exactly?

    Well, obviously, no one really knows...

    Still, as I see it, intuition works from a database of notions that the brain has previously integrated. The database is essentially what you've learnt through your life since birth. However, it's not knowledge as such. Rather, it's what you've learnt, which may well be bullshit.

    When you're interested in a problem, the key point to let your intuition come into play, is to give your brain the time to integrate the new data. So, a good idea is to work for example two hours a day on this problem, so that your brain takes in the stuff and has the time to "integrate" the new information.

    Another key point, is to diversify the points of view, the kind of data relative to the problem, because brains are really champions to establish correlations between apparently unrelated sets of data.

    A third key point, is to articulate whatever ideas you've got so far. Your brain will also work on that, given the time to do it.

    Intuition is probably the only intelligence we have. When we think, we toy with bits and ends literally without knowing what we're doing. It's only our intuition that will come into play to tell us that this bit and that end have to do with each other.

    Thus, our unconscious brain is probably more intelligent than our conscious mind. It's clear for example that when you're trying to solve a problem, your brain may find the solution perhaps several days before you. And it will give you the solution through intuition, i.e. you're thinking about a problem and there it is, you suddenly have the intuition something you're thinking is the answer. Sometimes the brain may have the solution, or part of the solution, years before you finally get round to it, if you ever do.

    A last point perhaps... Intuition is not just some idea that pops up in your mind as most people seem to believe. Intuition is really your brain insisting on telling you that something is the case or is true or is the solution. It tells you you should really pay attention to this one. If you feel that both A and not A are both possibilities, then neither is an intuition.

    Still, remember your intuition works on whatever you've learnt, and this may actually be complete bullshit. So, perhaps another key point is to keep an open mind and resist dogmatism. Whatever pet theory you're working on, remember it may well be trash. It's still best to stand your ground as most people do, but that shouldn't prevent you from considering the possible value of the arguments other people put forward. Let your brain sort out which is true. This is the only fountain of truth you can trust you will ever have. You just need to give it the time to work its magic and to consider and learn the possibly relevant facts.
    EB
     
    Last edited: Apr 4, 2019
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  19. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

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    Artificial intelligence may currently be pre-disposed in attempting to replicate the nature of human creative free thinking.
    this may be termed "intuitive thought".

    do you define a difference between intuitive thought and creative thought ?
     
  20. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Intuitive thought does not necessarily have to be new. It can be a way to learn existing knowledge. When the person has a lot of knowledge about a particular topic, then he can intuit new ideas.
    To create requires the domain of an area of knowledge or art.
     
    Last edited: Apr 6, 2019
  21. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Intuition is the form of the subconscious thought. It is free of the conscious logic. Intuition is an innate ability that can be developed.
     
  22. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

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    algorithmic probabilistic sequencing ...
    yes i am aware of this already

    you call this intuition(?) i do not.

    the statistical frequency of random workable sequences being formed is a statistical formula of a known range of formula equations inside a known function of set rules.

    you answer is very nicely steered well away from this point. please elaborate on what you deem to be a difference to define intuition apart from set frequencies of effective formula combinations.

    so would you define it as subconscious thought ? subconscious thought that is simply statistical variance of known workable formula of a set known range of probabilistic laws ?
     
  23. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    I just wonder at what treshold does chemical reactivity become a stored memory?
    Apparently there are several types of "intelligent reactive behavior", already beginning at nano-scale, and can be observed in single celled organisms such as the paramecium, which can sense obstacles, retreat, change course, and continue in a different direction from its original course. That's rudimentary decision making ,IMO.

    Why is it that one H plus two O = H2O, but only if the temperature is just right?
    Why is it that H2O be comes Ice or a Steam only when the temperature is just right ?

    When the right conditions exist one H plus two O atoms always respond instantaneous in concert.

    I believe the chemical/bacterial scientists call this phenomenon "quorum sensing".

    It may sound trite but under certain circumstances bacterial interactions appear to adopt a form of hive-mind and switch from an individiual state into cooperative mass reaction, such as switching from a benign state into a virulent state, all at the "same time", when a quorum (critical threshold) has been reached.

    Is that a rudimentary intuitive intelligence?

    IMO, the secret lies in retaining a memory (physical ability) which later becomes instrumental in identifying and responding to external information.

    Will an AI be able to do this? You bet. We don't identify their ability to draw from memory and reach a conclusion as Artificial Intelligence for nothing. They are intelligent, no doubt.

    Not being able to attach an emotion to reasoning does not disqualify the subject from being intelligent.
     
    Last edited: Apr 6, 2019

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