Intuition and judgement: A critical analysis
Intuition plays a role, big or small, in many of the decisions made by humans in their day to day life. Intuition is on the subconscious end of reasoning and is thus inexplicable in normal logical terms many a times. The very definition of the term ‘intuition’ says that it is the “knowledge acquired from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning”. This is why intuition is regarded an activity of the right side of the brain and is said to play a good part in developing aesthetic nature in man. It is thus, easy to see, how intuition plays a role in many of our decisions, as we carry them out according to our taste or aesthetic sense. On the other hand, there are the split second decisions or uninformed, ‘gut feeling’ based decisions which are also regarded to intuition. These decisions will lead to actions whose outcome may defer to the intuitive knowledge gained at a particular instance. For example, when you are at a crossroads trying to decide which road to take, your intuition might say left but, the gps which is used hundred metres into left, might say otherwise. The reason you took the left in the first place is because intuition has this characteristic of presenting itself as logical, only the reasoning behind the logic remains conveniently elusive as you concentrate on the task at hand. Interestingly, the reason you decided to look up the gps after all also falls under the realm of intuition. In the first place, if you recognised that it is intuition and not logic why you took the left, it is reasonable that you should doubt this knowledge before it is too late and double check. But if you haven’t recognised the role of intuition in taking the left, but relied on the knowledge as one coming from memory or some other kind of logic, believing it completely, why would you check the gps again? That’s intuition too!
Knowledge creation. Intuitive knowledge cannot always be right, but so is the case with conceptual knowledge or any other. Knowledge acquisition takes place within the human brain through language, sense and perception, reason or emotion. But the problem with intuition is kicks in at the knick of the moment and may lead to actions that cannot be righted. Like if the left that you took intuitively turns out to be a one-way. Or when your gut says the timing is 5:30 when it’s actually 4:00 and you miss your sister’s wedding. Normal reasoning happens through inference and perception of the outside objects, events, etc. but the exact workings of intuition cannot be deduced with certainty. But for all reasoning to be conscious, human beings will need to put in a lot more effort than they usually do at understanding things. This is why even the great thinkers, philosophers and scientists believed in the role of intuition, the unconscious reasoning, in manifesting itself at times when answers are most needed. Kant, for instance, in his theory of perception suggested that intuition is an objective cognitive function that is independent of any sensation occurring through perception (Janaik, 2009). For Kant, intuition occurs in the mind and is not relevant to the outside objects, but rather the concepts that have already formulated themselves inside the mind. Considering his view, one can assume that while not all conscious thinking might relate to reasoning or knowledge acquisition, all unconscious thought process might result in intuition. But only the intuitions that are the result of (or could be related to) conscious concepts could have good results in a real time situation. As Kant would say, ‘thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.’
Fig 1: Kant’s understanding of representation
Unless and until a conceptual base cannot be regarded for knowledge acquired through intuition, it is better to regard it as a separate entity. For example, a man might meet many women, date a few, but he could fall in love with only woman at a time (in most cases anyway). Sometimes this woman a man falls in love with (or vice versa) is so far off his loop, so radically different in stature—physical or social, intellectual opinions, age, profession, etc. that it doesn’t make any sense for him to fall for her. In such cases, it is usually, the intuitive knowledge that goads him to carry on in the pursuit of love. The good part is, the man would know to differentiate this knowledge from knowledge acquired through conceptualisation and conscious reasoning. All intuitive knowledge must be regarded separately in the conscious mind, until it can be supported through concept or experience. For example, last summer, I felt the incredible urge to go to India when our family was trying to decide where to vacation in. Taj Mahal and colourful Rajasthan were what were on my mind really, but I could not understand why I needed to be there so bad. So I regarded the information separately, only suggesting to the family that it could be one of the destinations. A few days later, I bumped into an album on Facebook belonging to a backpacker friend of mine. And intuitively, I navigated to his India tour album and through memory, reached the photo of a man dressed in Indian version of cowboy—jodhpurs, open vest, no shirt, a ribbon around his forehead, etc. sporting twenty three colours in that single outfit. And he was seated on a donkey. It was some kind of a street spectacle and I remember laughing at the picture so hard I had tears in my eyes last time. But then I also realised that the last time I saw that picture, I also felt strangely connected to the girl backpacker featured in that picture, Emily. Incidentally, I got to meet her once after that through mutual friends in a party. That was seven months before vacation planning with the family when the little tidbit of information in my passive memory came to life in the form of intuition. It says, Emily is supposed to go back to India this summer as she missed the Taj Mahal in her last trip, only in the words, “India is the one and only destination for you this summer.”
Intuitive explanations are not free from bias, in fact, sometimes they can get biased as the south pole, but one should treat this as self-knowledge and work towards improvising on conscious reasoning that can change the quality and concept-base of the intuition we receive. Also, intuitive knowledge once manifested into action will create ‘experience’ which is of course, the ultimate form of learning. Intuitive knowledge is not something to depend on, but to try and experiment with. Like Henri Poincare would say, “It is through science that we prove, but through intuition that we discover.” The more there is a foundation of reason and logic, the broader the spectrum of knowledge acquired is, and the more emphasis there is on conscious evaluation of the source of a shred of knowledge, the more chance there is that the intuitive knowledge received can be trusted and that it is unbiased. At the same time, there could be some instances where intuition naturally goes against everything you ever knew, like the atheist who has a spiritual epiphany. It might even make you change course and follow through against all reason, like I, who went after the girl to India—alone. Might even lead to disastrous circumstances, like aplastic anaemia, the condition Madame Curie suffered due to years of exposure to radiation. But the point is in giving value, a fair chance to that knowledge, taking that chance and following through with that action and well, even if you had to suffer horribly at the end, you’ll do so bouncing on the cushion of two Nobel Prizes!
Intuition is the link that connects us to the realm of unknown, where there isn’t enough light to take even a few steps. Ethical justifications are some of those dark areas where intuition helps a person take the leap. Take for example, a referee, who has to decide whether or not to break up the fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in their iconic fight, Rumble in the Jungle. Ali used the Rope-a-dope technique (named after he introduced it) which involved laying on the ropes and taking rigorous beating from the opponent in an attempt to tire him out. In the days when champion fighters were dying in the ring, and it looked to everyone that Ali was going to as well, intuitive knowledge helped the referee to let the fighters go on in the way that they are going. It wasn’t the case with the referee who actually did not stop the fight between Ray Mancini and Duk Koo Kim in a 1982 lightweight title fight. He committed suicide a few months later. The reason speculated was, of course, guilt of not having to courage to act on his intuition.
Intuition doesn’t always give you enough dough to take it seriously. But discarding intuitive knowledge should not be an automatic process and neither should acceptance. The conceptual ground behind intuition should be deduced before this knowledge is put to use. And the knowledge should definitely be discarded if the basis for it is bias or unethical affiliations of the self.
References
Janiak, A. Zalta, E.N (ed.). (2009). Kant's Views on Space and Time. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2009 Edition) Retrieved November 11, 2011 http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2009/entries/kant-spacetime/
George Foreman vs. Muhammad Ali. (2011). Retrieved November 11, 2011 from http://boxrec.com/media/index.php/George_Foreman_vs._Muhammad_Ali.
