INTUITION - What happens beyond the discursive use of the mind?
An adult tells from the perspective of that time: One day at the age of about ten he is visited by a school friend. The parents are not at home, mother runs errands, father is at work. The boy comes up with the idea of showing his father's weapons to his friend. The narrator stresses that he usually not showed himself to be irresponsible as a child and that even then he knew that one was not allowed to mess with the guns and, above all, that he should stay away to insert the ammunition. The two boys are looking at the latest purchase when suddenly the phone rings. It is the mother who sounds very worried and even uses a pay phone to call home. What she had never done before. She warns urgently not to do anything dangerous and, above all, to stay away from the gun cabinet.
The narrator investigates the matter. Despite his young age back then, he knows cameras and microphones well, as he says, and can't find any hidden installations, however much he hopes to find evidence to justify his mother's call. Even as an adult he still wonders about this episode and says, although he is a scientist, he can't explain what moved his mother (who herself thinks a lot of intuition) to her action and who he later asked about it.
Do you know similar phenomena which occur in your life and to which you do not pay much attention, but which nevertheless let something sound that makes you remember these events?
I speak of intuition.
Intuition is viewed and valued very differently. Some people ridicule, others glorify it. And others just find it normal.
But nobody can deny the existence of intuition.
Intuition is slippery and cannot really be grasped or described solidly. Especially if you have an intuition and then think about it further, the security slips away, whether it's still there or already gone.
Next of a gut feeling, I would also describe intuition as a head feeling (note, that we already include parts of our body in our expressions of it). Something somewhat far back, tries to report something about a particular meaning. It is like the delicate stroke of a feather, which I only notice when I am attentive to it and not distracted by too many stimuli.
Intuition roots from bodily and mind related practice and abstract knowledge connected to experiences.
There is an empractic self-knowledge which represents a trinity of bodily, felt (tuned) and informed self-knowledge. Successful empractise is based on the ability of an original, non-reflected ability to open up the respective situation. In its functional lust, the empirical appears as a concept-less flow.
So the body knows more about our possibilities and impossibilities, about our goals and intentions than we know. It understands more about us than we can explain to ourselves. In its sensuality it gives meaning, which all too often appears to us as nonsense.
Empractically, we feel life in its self-preserving and self-enhancing self-perspectivation and in this sense we all too often use terms like soul or spirit to express the tendency that carries our life.
But this bodily-mental knowledge is knowledge of what we want. But wanting is a body mood and a will without will. It is will without should, will against will, want against will. In the empirical the will of itself is certain of itself and through this we are certain of ourselves.
People aren't arrows
We sense that there is something not quite right about all this goal-setting, straightforward thinking and determination. Once you made the experience that a straightforward attitude towards another one left you frustrated and caused a conflict you maybe have thought about your behavior as not very wise in retrospect.
As we today talk massively about "awareness" and "consciousness" we also sense that this is a new age phenomena and people may understand "being aware" as a controlling device as to make ourselves awake to our standpoints or goal related desires. In particular, to "achieve" things. But intuition - and also what the dogma of, for example, Buddhist teachings is not about - is self-consciousness in the above sense. Indeed, self-consciousness can be experienced as a discomfort, a great uneasiness towards life.
Intuition could be described as the opposite of self-consciousness while at the same time it is probably the most conscious way of experiencing a lively moment - without pressing determination. I found the term "Empractise" to describe this phenomena.
"The term Empractise is a gracized neologism with the basic meaning "bodily integrated action, execution knowledge".
source/German Wiki
Strictly speaking, empractic action cannot be attributed to a self-conscious person, but to a selfgoverning person. Therefore, empractic action is behaviour in which something happens to us that goes beyond self-confident action. Empractic action is also goal-oriented, but the goal is neither single directed nor ambiguous.
Have you ever tried to do a little guessing test?
I sat together with my man once and because we are real card players, I told him to take half of the stack and I would want to guess if he held a black or red suit in his hand.
What did I notice? The more my excitement increased and the stronger I wanted to be right, the more difficult it became. But if I stayed relaxed, I got better. That can of course be a great self-delusion. From the result I was perhaps a little bit over the chance. But what was really interesting to observe with me? That intuition is really very fleeting.
So you can't say that intuition never deceives. Even though I would say that when it comes to true intuition, it never deceives. And the deception to which I succumbed cannot have been real intuition. Now, of course, I have a duty to explain what true intuition is when I make such a bold assertion.
Indeed. This can probably only be explained and felt with the help of examples that really happened.
How to define a term or an experience you are always allowed to follow your own trail of explanation. You can use the given definition. But that does not mean that you take it for granted on a total. You can as well add your own definition of intuition and attribute to the great realm of human experience. As everything is just a process of changing matter.
When I talk about intuition I do mean:
- The realm of thinking (mind)
- The realm of doing (body)
- The space in between 1 and 2 as a "route" for information travel
Unfortunately, I must divide this not separate ones but for a better understanding I did it.
... there is a kinetic intelligence that cannot be separated from emotional and operative intelligence. The unity of these three forms of intelligence could be called empractual intelligence. All three forms of intelligence are essentially mediated by mimesis, which creates a we-intelligence in a successful game: I know what you want, because I want what you want.
Personally, I can give you two examples where I found my intuition worked to the point.
Thirteen years ago I had the clear impression that I was pregnant. For the very first time in my life I had the conviction: I am pregnant! (never became pregnant before) Where did this thought come from? Of course, there is a story before hand. It was, that my former husband and I decided on having a baby. After that I was becoming more conscious towards my bodily appearances in a way. Not, that I did anything related like measuring the temperature or any of this forms of observing myself. But the day I was feeling that I could be pregnant, I decided to do a pregnancy test.
I went to the drugstore, bought the device and went to the bathroom. The result was disturbing. It was negative!
I was kind of insulted by the result and thought: "Nah ... that cannot be. I don't want it to be negative and the reason why its not a positive result may be for the very simple fact that it was too early for the device, hence, it was not precise enough. The chemicals in my blood hat not shown up in a significant amount to reach the urine."
Some days later I repeated the test and it was positive.
Knowing physics without being a physicist
My second example is related to an activity.
When my son was younger we sometimes went to the playground near by. There, a hanging basket gave me a chance to throw balls. I remembered Sigourney Weaver in this grandiose scene in Alien 4, where she played basketball with the crew of the spaceship "Betty". She threw a ball from the distance backwards and it went straight into the curb! I was so impressed by this elegant action that I wanted to try it myself. I was never good at ball games and actually was afraid as a kid to play with my classmates who hit me hard. Even from standing right underneath the basket I missed it.
But I thought to give it a try and do it anyway to see what might happen. Childhood long had passed.
I placed myself a few yards away from the basket, turned my back to it and threw the ball! Flipped my hand wrist in a relaxed but somehow determined way.
Interestingly, the lesser I cared about the result the better the first try came out. Mostly, I hit the basket! I knew in the very back of my mind that I should not impart the attitude of clenched teeth but to remain relaxed and somehow not "interested" in the result.
The body analysis connected with it takes into account the fact that all our knowledge, thinking and acting is bodily mediated, that the human being is a living being, a Trinitarian being, which is determined by body, mood and brain. All our thinking and acting is based on the unquestioned ground of the body and all knowledge points back to it and receives its meaning from there.
My intuition on that proved me right. Always, when I went to the playground to throw some balls the first or second ball came out perfect. But when I started to repeat hitting I got bad results. I know you might not think of this as intuition but maybe just a matter of self trust. That is also correct. Because intuition is related to self trust, in my opinion.
How on earth can an unskilled player like me make the calculation?
How could I make it that would lead to the ball taking the right trajectory and finding the narrow passage of the basket? How high and how far and with how much force did I have to throw to hit? Actually, I was always thinking of myself to be bad at maths and would a teacher have asked me to write down the calculations I would have greatly failed. So, an inherent mathematician lives inside of me, right?
This process was not calculated coolly but intuitively by me, and it simply happened. Behind it stood naturally also a will, this may happen in such a way. But not too much, because otherwise the will would turn against me.
In the empirical we experience that it is possible not to think of something and to realize the desired precisely through this. In this way we experience an original experience of skill that opposes modern hyper-reflection and the compulsiveness of the desire to succeed that is associated with it, which often leads to the failure of a desired action because one wants it. The demand to deliberately do what one should is precisely the guarantor of the failure of the intention.
Now, in order to hit the basket every time, I of course would have to practice way more. But as I was not interested in becoming a skilled player I left it at that. The sheer experience and the joy it created for me was good enough.
So, what else was intuitive about this action? It was the very Hintergedanke, that what I once had seen having been done from another human being that I might be able to do that, too. But it's more than just that. Somehow I knew for sure that this was going to work, despite my bad experiences with balls and the negative conviction "I am bad with balls, maths and physics". My so far experiences with ball games in general let me do my estimation.
Other intuitive measurements in physical laws would cause me to fail as I am having not enough (Em)practice in sports like Billard or archery.
The (psychological) desire to want to experience something about oneself and one's personality or to see it confirmed, what we intuitively know, is already an indication of inherent knowledge within us.
Testing who you are
Unfortunately, self insecurity gets in the way and some of us tend to take personality tests too seriously and even acknowledge them as "set" when a person of authority advises us to do so. As soon as I no longer have self-government, I leave my safe shore and start rowing insecurely. "Who am I then?" One asks oneself. And how do I have to be so that I am no longer the one who is shown to me in this psychological test? With this you move away from your intuition. Others reject such tests a priori or do not take their results seriously.
Personality tests such as this one are not very reliable, they clearly cause or make it very likely to manipulate the answers - though the tests could be seen as some exercise and also to get involved with the questions asked. But to give honest (intuitive) answers can be difficult insofar as wish and actual feeling and acting can contradict each other.
But is it possible to make intuition visible?
Can one get honest answers? If you want to find out how people really tick and can't completely trust their consciously made statements, how can you then approach their unconscious and intuitively understood answers? And why should one want this?
George Kelly, an American psychologist, already tested this at the end of the fifties in a procedure he called Repertory Grid. This method for capturing intuitive beliefs and assumptions has since been further developed.
The Repertory Grid is an interviewing technique which uses nonparametric factor analysis to determine an idiographic measure of personality. It was devised by Kelly in around 1955 and is based on his personal construct theory of personality.
By Source (WP:NFCC#4), Fair use, wikipedia
Before you rely on it and think that you have actually found a tool that works almost error-free, I would like to emphasize that you should carefully enjoy any set knowledge that is connected with humanity and its embedding in the world.
Though I found this method to be flawless. While the method itself is almost appearing perfect the circumstances under which it could be used (like forced upon people) can be not. The outcomes and their usage are another topic. It also can be seen as an attempt to overcome uncertainty.
Uncertainty is probably the most disturbing thing for humans.
In order to transform an uncertain thing into a certain one, one could think that all knowledge of the whole world now could be stored in a huge data-base and, as a result, there would be no uncertainty any longer.
But let's dive a little deeper into the method of RepGrid:
How to avoid determinism
Based on the psychology of personal constructs, George A. Kelly developed the Role Construct Repertory Grid (also called Kelly Grid in Germany). The term Repertory Grid is often used as a short form. Role Construct Repertory Grid procedures work with a repertoire ("repertory") of significant elements from a person's experience, such as roles (e.g. colleagues), groups (e.g. departments), but also situations (e.g. rituals), objects (e.g. products) and abstracts (e.g. brands). With the help of dichotomous descriptive dimensions, the so-called constructs (e.g. good vs. evil or innovative vs. traditional), these elements are individually assigned properties by the respondent. In addition, a quantitative evaluation, mostly Likert-scaled, takes place, so that at the end a grid (German: Gitter, Matrix) with numerical values is created. Once all elements have been evaluated on the basis of a construct pair, new elements are compared with each other to form another construct pair. This process is repeated until the interviewee no longer thinks of any new distinguishing dimensions, i.e. his repertoire of constructs for the given elements is exhausted.
Due to the systematic comparison and the complexity arising in the course of the interview, it is practically impossible to exert any purposeful, deliberate influence on the result. The RepGrid serves to determine and evaluate subjective associations of meaning. In Kelly's sense, it is intended to provide an insight into the construct system of the individual. The human being describes his reality with conceptual abstractions (constructs), which were formed by his individual experiences. He scales them in a given matrix with regard to suitable elements that represent the framework of the investigation. The interviewee thus depicts his individual, semantic and psychological space in the form of a grid filled with numbers. The Repertory Grid is thus a method with the support of which qualitative interviews with the corresponding advantages can be conducted to investigate subjective perceptions and cognitive processes and thus enables a better understanding of the subjective meanings of the interviewee.
source: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repertory_Grid - translated from German to English
The things we consciously deal with are only a small fraction of what we really (intuitively) think and experience about the world and ourselves. Pure determinism is therefore basically a guarantee that we not only deceive ourselves but also have little peace with the world around us. Strong determinism is essentially insulting in that we intuitively know how little it is suited to reaching consensus.
We remember experiences where we wanted another one to be convinced of a particular standpoint and failed greatly as we were way too determined to "make one understand". Even the wish this person should obey to what we just have said. Politics and Religion are in particular a realm where the debates get quite heated. So having a closer look about how systems do behave might be a servant to distract oneself from juicy media headlines.
Overcoming uncertainty (correct predictions) and reacting times
In this interview Peter Kruse, honorary professor of organizational psychology at the University of Bremen and professional consultant for collective intelligence, states:
"The fact that its more and more impossible to predict developments in business and society is due to the high degree of connectvity in the global markets. The worldwide networks are at any time ready for resonance effects. We are confronted with an enormous compexity and speed of change. Therefore, desicion making under conditions of uncertainty is no longer exceptional but simply normal. In situations like this the only way people have a chance is by acting more and more intuitively. Decisions are made on the basis of unconscious criteria based in the limbic system of the brain. These cirteria are the result of the lifelong learning process of a person."
Kruses company netxpractise, using computer science, developed a method based on making it possible to reveal and measure peoples value systems; allowing the participants to use their own language (expressions). Kruse stated that "a questionnaire is only as intelligent as the one who created it." He called his method for example "Qualitative interviewing".
You can download a little presentation from their website. Here is an excerpt of it:
When individual intuition is no longer sufficient and the usual linear methods of surveying large groups of people reach their limits – this is where the nextexpertizer computer-assisted interview technique can overcome the restrictions and boundaries of traditional market research tools and open up totally new dimensions. Through analyses of market and social studies, as well as corporate and management culture, nextexpertizer reveals those forms of emotional resonance which make people act the way they do. The interplay of cultural forces brought to light by the nextexpertizer makes it possible to gain a clearer understanding of contexts and interdependencies and concentrate on what is truly essential.
We could say that we intuit the right things but act in times upon wrongly chosen decisions out of wrongly applied methods (of science or interview techniques/marketing researches).
I often thought about whether I trust the human race and people and see their good qualities or if I should be critical about the ability of humanity on the total to do the right things. I think the more I carry distrust in myself and others the more I pay into the pessimistic notion of the human realm in total and feed distrust. But when I decide to take up a more optimistic and trustworthy notion the better I feed the circulation of notions altogether. But I would like to add that changing things is limited and not everything can be influenced on which I wish it should be.
But of course, its good advise to see the necessities in order to react appropriate to an upcoming event and even have some reaction time in advance (think of a company or governments and their unprepared state in a major crisis as not having seen it coming). It also would be unwise to ignore that there are always destructive forces in the game next to the constructive ones.
Computer Intelligence
RepGrid reminded me on what new kids appear on the block. The tau intelligence, a computer program which is under development right now, designed by Ohad Asor - as attractive it might be to assume that intelligent methods in the appearance of computer code and a human-to-machine-to-human communication basis can catch what it is intuitively known by us people - I still ask myself what is hoped to be achieved through an AI like this.
Is the intention of the builder the same as with that of Peter Kruse? To understand and react on societal and economical (rapid) influence and their applications onto the human existence?
I feel that people refer to an artificial intelligence like tau as some godlike entity or oracle which will help us to find consensus - some companies seem to associate their names to the desired outcome like the Oracle Corporation.
There is a focus on making things "faster". I haven't made up my mind though and will probably read and research a lot more to find my position in that.
The discovery of slowness
As much advantages speed has, it also has downsides and is causing the problems we currently face. Some people address that reducing the technological pace would be a good idea as well. Right now it seems that we deliberatly put ourselves to the speed of the machines we created and that the human serves the machines in order to hold the pace. Also, it doesn't seem to correspond what we also found out about intuition: the very connection to the bodily existence and the vast incomprehensible space of embodied knowledge. Are there examples of episodes where human intelligence prevented major damages to a suddenly occurring event which can be taken as best practices? This must be postponed to another article. Though I would like getting examples.
Can a machine indeed interpret human intuition without being an organically grown entity itself?
How long must an artificial intelligence learn in order to grow out of it's infancy to a fully mature adult intelligence?
Ten, twenty, or hundred or a hundred thousand years? When does the process come to an end, when will be the final state of maturation reached? And is it wise to use it meanwhile as a decideability-tool?
This is a matter of investigation.
After all, is humanity on a total not already an intelligence itself which operates alright, only, that one cannot grasp it from an individual perspective and is too attached to economy and the related fears of losing what one is used to use? Haven't we already understood Einsteins Equation of timespace and our place in it?
Does instinct equal intuition?
Some scientific papers declare that "instinct" should not be mixed with "intuition". Is an instinct not already an intuition?
Our sensations grow out of our incorporated experiences and inherent knowledge like sensing danger and decide for leaving a scene estimated as not safe before the real danger actually appeared. People serving the army or protecting others from assaults train their instincts and learn to trust their "spider-signals" to sniff out dangerous moments. This relates also to the phenomena to be stared at from behind - a commonly shared experience.
An instinct is considered a "not learned" reaction. I have noticed that I sometimes confused these two terms and assigned an instinct where it was already an intuition.
Intuition is often confused with two other words that also start with the prefix “in-”—specifically, instinct and insight. An instinct is a reaction that is innate, for example, shutting one’s eyelid automatically in response to a puff of cold air. It is important to distinguishthe two concepts by the fact that, contrary to instincts, intuitions represent learned behavior. Indeed, ... , learning and intuition are inseparable. Describing intuitive reactions of behavior as “instinctive” then should only be considered metaphorically (e.g., as in a tennis champion’s “instinctive reactions” in a game)
[5]
On the website detectivetraining.com I found this text:
What Are “Gut Feelings”?
Ever wonder how some investigators solve cases with little proof or evidence? They seem to know the truth about a person or situation that isn’t apparent to others? It’s called “gut feelings” or intuition. So what are gut feelings?
A gut feeling is merely a judgment that has come to the surface with spontaneity. It can also be called a cognitive experience, an educated guess, speculation, inference, conjecture, extrasensory perception, etc. Frequently, it is a vague, hazy sense of direction. This does not make it necessarily less valuable, only more difficult to evaluate.
Gut feelings do not have a logical sequence; they leap across chasms of missing information, make sideways detours, and bring together unusual, even illogical combinations. Gut feelings have no restrictions; they are a product of the mind’s capacity to do many things at once without being aware of them.
But gut feelings have their shortcomings, too. They suggest a conclusion without total evaluation of all variable factors. And, if a situation is not within the limits of previous experiences, then a gut feeling can be risky in some situations.
Read this short paper from Interviews with Criminal Investigators from KRIPOS, the national Norwegian unit for fighting organised and other serious crime. There, intuition also takes on a significant role.
Bottom line
Intuition is an ordinary human ability.
We must not be heroic about it. There is no heroism in intuition. It comes silent, humble and doesn't show up as a grand self praising figure. There is no such thing than "supernatural", only "natural".
Intuition needs space and not so much distractions or a stuffed mind and schedule. Though, when one is skilled in reducing stress, to still his mind even within aroused times and standing in the midst of a crowd, he created his own intuitive space. It's a "listening" quality, where resonance can be detected.
Intuition is already scientifically investigated and for some scientists it actually was the essential supportive "agent" in their findings.
What makes intuition vulnerable is exaggeration and the over-use of the term itself as well as a naive form of believing in a human "super-power" or "paranormal forces". There are forces we might not understand and the reason we might be so excited about intuition - I think - is, that we unlearned to trust this intelligence in others and we forget to keep notes about those moments of our own intuition which have some significance to us (without praising them over the top).
I would like you, dear reader, to use the comment section as space to tell an episode of intuition to contribute more examples. Personal narration has power.
Some quotes on intuition
“When you reach the end of what you should know, you will be at the beginning of what you should sense.”
― Kahlil Gibrán, Sand and Foam
“intuition is always right in at least two important ways;
It is always in response to something.
it always has your best interest at heart”
― Gavin De Becker, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence
“Insight is not a lightbulb that goes off inside our heads. It is a flickering candle that can easily be snuffed out.”
― Malcolm Gladwell, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
“Come from the heart, the true heart, not the head. When in doubt, choose the heart. This does not mean to deny your own experiences and that which you have empirically learned through the years. It means to trust your self to integrate intuition and experience. There is a balance, a harmony to be nurtured, between the head and the heart. When the intuition rings clear and true, loving impulses are favored.”
― Brian Weiss, Messages from the Masters: Tapping Into the Power of Love
By John William Waterhouse - Unknown, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=190449
[1] [2] [3] [4] German philosopher Volker Caysa
"The two basic forms of empractic physical activity"](http://www.empraxis.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/VC_zwei_grundformen_em_kh_web.pdf)
[5] (PDF) Intuition: A Challenge for Psychological Research on Decision Making. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233482816_Intuition_A_Challenge_for_Psychological_Research_on_Decision_Making [accessed Sep 19 2018].
George Kelly:
Construct Theory: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Gabriele_Chiari2/publication/317064022_George_A_Kelly_and_His_Personal_Construct_Theory_iBook/links/5923eceda6fdcc4443fa3cf4/George-A-Kelly-and-His-Personal-Construct-Theory-iBook.pdf
RepGrid:
https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/dspace-jspui/bitstream/2134/1526/3/sirajblatchford95.pdf
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/293347445_George_Kelly_and_repertory_grids_in_psychotherapy_research_An_introduction_to_repertory_grid_theory_and_technique
Intuitive theories
Tobias Gerstenberg1 & Joshua B. Tenenbaum MIT: http://web.mit.edu/tger/www/papers/Intuitive%20Theories,%20Gerstenberg,%20Tenenbaum,%202017.pdf
https://www.rd.com/health/wellness/how-to-tap-into-your-intuition/
https://civicscience.com/gut-instincts-come-age-experience/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17129192
https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucekasanoff/2017/02/21/intuition-is-the-highest-form-of-intelligence/#205f2a003860
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/brianna-wiest/8-struggles-highly-intuitive-people-experience_b_8024314.html?guccounter=1
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2588722/Why-SHOULD-gut-Instinct-better-detecting-lies-conscious-mind.html
Training intuition:
https://www.sheldrake.org/participate/joint-attention-test
https://www.sheldrake.org/participate/online-staring-experiment
Do you have other Websites you can recommend in testing your intuition? Please, forward them.
Picture sources:
Archery: https://pixabay.com/de/mädchen-sport-bogen-pfeil-übung-1909006/
Embryo: https://pixabay.com/de/embryo-menschliche-kleinkind-159691/
Basketball: https://pixabay.com/de/himmel-park-sport-kugel-spiel-1284256/
Grid: https://pixabay.com/de/hintergrundtextur-sechskant-gitter-1382002/
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Thanks, @anevolvedmonkey and "collective intelligence"-ia - first time I hear of you.
What really sums up the more significant aspects of the question of intuition is this part-
"Intuition could be described as the opposite of self-consciousness while at the same time it is probably the most conscious way of experiencing a lively moment..."
I sometimes think It's a way of tapping into greater consciousness not individual consciousness.
Talking about the guessing the cards, it's so difficult. I've done similar experiments and the moment one becomes invested in desiring a certain outcome , one looses the ability to do so. I think this is what sucks gamblers in, and keeps people playing the lottery. They can feel something is there, some power but the very 'need' to win always obscures the power. I did some research into the circumstances surrounding lottery winners, trying to find some pattern or a common thread and the one thing I did notice was the situation surrounding many winners: Whether the y were regular players or random or one time triers, there was often a forgetfulness'. They forgot they bought a ticket or forgot to check or forgot their usual numbers and went for a quick pick until a nagging sensation kind of hinted at them to check, so they found they were winners. I tried to do this, but it's hard to remember to forget ;-)
I can relate with the story of ball playing. The time I played my finest golf was when me and a friend just walked casually around a course carrying only one or two clubs. Usually I would play with my father and brother where there would be some pressure and a lot of advice. Just casually swing the club and not expecting to much (in terms of distance and accuracy) resulted in much straighter even shots. Maybe not as far but never off into the bushes...
I think part of the reason sports professionals (especially in things like billiards or darts) are able to cross that tipping point between being an able amateur and a 'talented' player is because they enjoy it and so end up playing it so often that they can afford to be 'casual' about it 70% of the time and thus develop that intuitive sense in a relaxed atmosphere. People who only get to play 'occasionally' will pressure themselves. Pros have time to just 'jam'. How they generally do not make use of the full potential is to keep this sense limited to their particular field without realizing it can be universally applied to improve quality of life and performance in all spheres including 'emotional intelligence'
The 'stared at from behind' phenomena has fascinated me since a child. It's so real and I've 'proven' it so many times. It must be universal to human experience yet is almost completely ignored by society in general. the implications are immense. On one level I understand why people don't want to think about the whys and hows concerning it. It's too mind boggling. Nice to know Sheldrake is looking into it. It's a bit like the placebo effect that science just refuses to investigate - what it means is we heal ourselves with positive thinking- yet there is no research as to how to practically harness the power. What could we do if we fully understood that we could sense attention without use of our '5 senses'. It hints at so much possibility not only about sense it but about giving it.
The differentiation with 'instinct' is an important one. People who don't like to think about these things like to just lump them together. Such a great read, you deal with the subject matter so comprehensively.
Your conclusion I think conveys an important message of remaining grounded, empirical, calm and pragmatic when investigating or working with subtle senses. To become overly imaginative think fantastically about them actually betrays an underlying lack of faith in a greater reality.
Thank you so much.
Your answer gives the text an interesting twist. I was hoping for this.
The examples of gambling I never would have thought of myself, so I like to being carried to that realm of investigation. Made me smile, that's exactly what intuition is about, too: to forget and not to forget simultaneously.
I myself must be careful to not fall into this "awesomeness". Guess that has to to with how we moderns treat skills in general. They "suck" or they are "adorable". While it still remains true, that they can suck and be adorable.
Your golf playing experience actually triggered a memory with a friend of mine, too. We are total losers in Billard but the one evening when we were playing against two males (not so much interested in the game at all, more in the men) we actually won. While the man were obviously more tensed and cared for the game. Thank you, it was a nice evening and brings back good (very old) memories.
To have the luxury of jamming one has to work all those hours of discipline. Music and dance show that, too. I listened to street art musicians and watched the acrobats doing their things ... those times in summer I always look forward to. If you are interested, I give you the link of two little recordings from the last festival here in Hamburg.
With this you raise an interesting aspect:
I asked that myself, as well.
Sheldrake is a real pearl. Do you listen to his talks? So much humor, this guy has. And this British cool attitude without being cold hearted, I find appealing. I think he deserves more than he actually gets (as a scientist, which he truly is). He transports a playful attitude towards science.
Sometimes I am kind of disappointed at myself, that I turned towards words and writing instead of an art more physically attached. Even, using so many of them.
"Sometimes I am kind of disappointed at myself, that I turned towards words and writing instead of an art more physically attached. Even, using so many of them."
Ha, me too, I even tried to give words up. Run away...
. ..But it seems they chose me: I can go with it or go nowhere, apparently.
I wanted to write my own article about intuition after it came up, but you covered it so well I thought I'd just send some of my ideas in a long reply...for now..
There's a great book/audiobook/movie about utilizing acrobatics as a path to inner development "The Way of the Peaceful Warrior" by Dan Millman. It was quite influential for me at a time and sparked that idea of universalizing expertise.
I bookmarked Sheldrakes website but haven't had a chance to seriously explore yet. Steemit is somewhat time consuming!
I love music of all kinds and street musicians always offer a level of originality and rawness, so yes, please send the links..
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Good to have something in common.
I do appreciate long replies a lot. For me, they are the fruits of the many trees. Some time they exhaust me but mostly I enjoy having a good conversation, even debates and arguments.
I think I am just an ordinary person who had adapted to what I was observing the world was putting value on: talking and writing skills. That is actually a good strategy and I see it today in my son, who is doing all this computer gaming and learning how to handle soft- and hardware. I do insist though that he attends Boy Scouts as a counterpart of experiencing life also.
My disappointment sets in when I do not get enough resonance on my writings. But only here in this realm. Before I wrote mostly for my hard drive and nobody got to read the texts. It's funny how one can get used to be spoiled.
Peaceful Warrior, wasn't that also a film in which Nick Nolte took a role? I found it a real good one! Before the movie with Philip Petite (the walk) came out I watched the youtube documentary about him and was fascinated so much by it.
Thanks for the recommendations. Here is my recording from the festival:
https://steemit.com/art/@erh.germany/street-art-festival-come-on-in-and-enjoy-the-show
Yep, Nick Nolte was in it. Obviously the movie leaves out quite a bit but the audiobook is really good.
I've never heard of Philip Petite though, I will check that out too.
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@goastrighter, I agree entirely with your comment that intuition is about tapping into the greater consciousness!
You ask, "Can a machine indeed interpret human intuition without being an organically grown entity itself?"
Of course I am no expert when it comes to computers, but my answer would be no, without human input the machine is still apt to fail at this task.
Yes, I do believe the ability to store huge amounts of data relating to particular cases and frequently chosen courses of action via human beings can be detected by the computer and after some time, the machine may start to have a higher probability of matching typical human reactions, but intuition (as shown by your research) lies outside of the typical.
Perhaps, we could say the computer could be replicating and producing "a gut hunch," minus having any guts ;)
I agree that intuition comes from learning and that the ability to intuit can definitely be dwarfed or grown depending on the care, environment and importance we place on it. In my opinion, that learning is not just about situations, but bodily sensations and emotions (as you've highlighted above) and how could these be trained into AI?
At the same time, if society grabs onto AI as being the final and greater word, the mass population will grow to doubt their own abilities with a greater zest--especially, if punishments for outside thinking begins to dominate society. Actually, I think this is already happening and many people do doubt themselves and one another and they badger those around them who might begin their own questioning as to what is actual truth. This creates a socialized policing system and much pointing at one another rather than taking a macro view (as well as an inner-wisdom view) as to what the problem is.
I believe that my dreaming practices have greatly increased my intuition and not just in listening to, identifying and honoring my own inner voice when it comes to nighttime working through problems, but in the waking reality too. I am more apt to pay attention to what my emotions and/or body are saying and then to the responses and happenings around me. And, whether the crow starts cawing, "no," like crazy when I ask myself whether I should do something, I don't have to wonder if I'm crazy or if the world around me is really interacting with me in such a deep way or if these are mere coincidences, because that really doesn't matter. If I hear the crow saying, no, then that is what my own experience is leaning towards. A friend on the phone later might list all of the ways in which I might be wrong, but my initial interaction with the world was different than I am learning to lean more into that answer. Notice the IN in INitial and INtuitive, INteraction.
Thanks for an INteresting read :)
Kimberly
"And, whether the crow starts cawing, "no," like crazy when I ask myself whether I should do something, I don't have to wonder if I'm crazy or if the world around me is really interacting with me in such a deep way or if these are mere coincidences, because that really doesn't matter."
That's such a difficult thing to properly make use of. You're right that it doesn't help to wonder about the how's and why's.. From a subjective point if view, with honest introspection I think anyone can feel the reality behind such moments.
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Yes, doesn't help, but sometimes I still do look too closely at the how's and why's, second guess my own best magic.
Dear Kimberly,
you have wisely spoken. I have not much to add and mostly come from the same standpoint.
Only I would say that you (and I) probably still think of it as a "problem", to which a policing and itself distrusting system overgrows this insight. I would say, it's maybe not the people but more the loudness of distributed messages.
When you look at an ordinary day you find it almost occupied with normality. Maybe a little percentage is drama in its physical appearance. A dog barking and the owner commanding him full of rage to quit. Or a baby crying itself sore and nobody around to sooth it. An impatient customer in the row mocking the cashier. But the rest of us doing their business, providing for food and shelter, doing the dishes, working the desk, buying birthday presents or greeting some strangers eyes. One dies, another one is born. We do what we can and we help where we were asked to help. And sometimes we are the road ragers and the uncaring ones who are observed by others. We say "no" but mean "yes".
We people are in our heads though really busy to identify problems and there, the ratio might be vice versa.
Your way of contributing to intuitive things, to let your associations flow freely and profit from them as your personal guiding system I appreciate a lot. Our human to human differences are a fortune, aren't they?
To doubt the inherent qualities and abilities I observe, too as a phenomena connected to the technological conveniences. Take a navigation system in a car. Before we had this luxury we had to rely on maps and also on our inner compass to navigate. We had to consider the movements in the physical world even more so when we walked by foot and had to orientate ourselves. Now, when there is no necessity to use those qualities people just neglect them and get the habit to always use the device. Did you mean this also?
To become an outsider by a rigid policy it really takes much. As long as you find people who do have things in common with you, I don't see a threat (in the sense of losing my life or going to prison). But even then: it would be good to know that one can stick to his ethical principles, no matter what.
Oh, that is true. You don't have to take an either-or position when the crow starts to cawing:) listening to your highest authority can be such a relief as it neither produces hatred nor ambiguity. I find this moments in my work much easier than within my private relations. I want to develop this quality and train my mind to be of more peace. ... Still a way to go:)
Now, my answer became long, lol :)
You write, I would say, it's maybe not the people but more the loudness of distributed messages. and I completely agree with this sentiment.
Yes, I did mean we lose our capabilities when we depend on someone or something else to do it for us, but would also go further by adding that those systems which would like to profit off of others being blind consumers and workers benefit and encourage our losing touch with our own divine wisdom. And, those doing "right," by these systems will attack their neighbor for challenging their own by-in. It's great to be able to discuss, in complexity, different values and beliefs and realize we're all in this together, informing one another. But sadly, in my opinion, this kind of free and considerate debating is being stomped out in politics, in education and even in one to one relationships.
Yes, most difficult exercising in private relationships and I too, will continue working this quality and daring in action.
Thank you for your thoughtful response.
Interesting post, with some really fascinating knowledge you are sharing here! Had to laugh, when I read about your "relationship" with ball games... was the same for me and I still hate them today. Never even watched a soccer game.. ever 🤓
Wonder if your experience as a basket ball player has anything to do with what we call "Anfängerglück"... when you start with no expectation, since you are a total rookie, and you do surprisingly well.
I'm always happy for my intuition when I'm out on my motorcycle. Call it my "radar"... I can't count the times, when I felt like slowing down a bit, and sure enough, a moment later some idiot comes my way on my lane.. or something like that.
In aikido the mechanisms you describe often work against me. Still a bloody beginner, I try hard to get things right and fail, the more I try. OK... will test a different approach today for sure!
Of course the thing with the Computer fascinates me. We had a big opening last weekend with a show by our international artists group "Libellule". One Czech colleague also has a little side job as a cardiac surgeon and if I understood things right, he just got promoted to chief physician. He always has some good stories and as we were talking about AI, he told me, that until recently, no computer had been able to beat a master in GO. Its the other way round today... the fascinating thing is, the first time a computer won, he (it?) made a move, that was totally unexpected. Kind of "not logical" and sort of genius in a non calculable way! Explain that one 😲
So... can a machine develop intuition? The Question, if a computer powerful and complex enough might develop a conscious has long been asked.. so, it would only be a logical (😜) consequence....
Thank you, Reinhard.
You gave some very interesting examples of your own, especially what I was looking for when it comes to different life experiences as well as professions. ... Actually, first I was thinking of making a collection and give SBDs or STEEM to all participants :))
Yes, you could name it "Anfängerglück" (beginners luck) and it reflects the easiness of a beginner who doesn't expect much from himself as he finds himself not very skilled. This low expectation makes him easy going and not wanting to "win" a task at all costs. May it be winning against the self or against others.
Your driving experience I find really cool! That also shows your expertise in handling a motorbike and be aware of possible dangers. It must have happened to you that you got into a "Schrecksekunde" and you were relieved afterwards that nothing worse had happened other than to have been shocked for a second. But the reaction time I would also contribute to the survival instinct. Reacting without thinking.
Sensing the danger before it actually appears is quite fascinating:) and life saving, as I see.
You do aikido? Wow! The martial arts! Yes. I have heard of an exam where the disciple has to kneel on the floor and must sense the sword coming from behind which his master swings without any sound and move. The disciple passes the test when he bows right in the second the master attacks from behind.
I wish you luck in not being interested in becoming a master. LOL! Maybe it's going to help to relax your jaw. HeHe.
I have heard of "go" and the computer beating the human. For this, I would say, there is not much intuition involved :) as the machine clearly has an advantage in making numerous calculations within nano-seconds for which the human mind has its limits. Even though it's really impressing of how much humans are capable of. Took a long time for computers to finally beat the best humans. My man though, would also attribute some weird kind of intuition "being alive" into the computer.
Sometimes I watch the series "Grey's anatomy" and what the surgeons approach on their patients are. The script certainly used also real experiences the author did research on. To find the tiniest rupture in the hearts environment by intuition could be something, one could investigate in the realm of medicine.
I will give you a link from a German "Computer-Philosopher" who states some things about what machines are capable of and what they will never reach from his perspective. I found it during my research but did not mention it as the article was already long enough.
Check out Rupert Sheldrakes research and maybe you also would like to do some intuition training:) (the very last links I provided at the bottom of this article).
Wow! It is so much work to do to assemble this article in the way you did it! I often wonder how you manage to write your article and to dive so deep into the subject, looking from so many angles. :)
As I told you, I don't listen to my intuition. I am never sure whether it is a "gut feeling" or just my fears or hope talking?
Still, I am going to share a memory. I was quite sure that I met the "one" a few days after I met my husband. My rationality told me that we are not a good match, but something else deep inside me was whispering that it is going to work somehow. Usually, I doubt any feeling I have, so I decided to check if I am right. I wrote down my hypothesis about us staying together in a case that later I forget about it and waited to see whether I was right :D I was right (for now :D)
I often have (as many other people do) these experiences when I am thinking about a friend and a minute later he or she is calling on the phone.
D. Kahneman describes intuitive thinking as a semi-conscious thinking which automatically examines the environmental factors and jumps to a conclusion. He says that in this way experienced firemen, for example, leave a burning building just before it collapses. Their mind automatically evaluates the sounds, the smell, the light, ext. in the buiding and sets an alarm.
Thank you so much Valeria! You are right, it's a hell lot of work to find different sources and not always the ones I am in favor of, but also those I do not have so much in common with. Like criminal investigation :)
I really do like your firemen example! It fits nicely in here, as this was not mentioned before. Readers can contribute so much flesh to a topic, I find. And to engage with one another widens the spectrum even more.
But you do listen to your intuition. And you also used a check up on it! Which does not hurt the intuition from my perspective. This is note keeping about a voice of your own. It is so much fun to find the records after years, isn't it? Finding the right person to be together with certainly one can also count into the realm of intuition. As we get to know many people throughout our lives we get experienced in sniff out with whom we may want to have a match and with whom not.
I find your example in particular good. I would revers the whole scene: You may have questioned what influences from outside do to us also: we get manipulated through media and advertisement. For example: To fall in love first sight could be a real thing. But what I also heard and experienced myself was that the first sight of my man did not turn me on, rather I got to know him as a friend (loved to stay in his company but without any sexual Hintergedanke) and only later on found him attractive and the right one for me. He did not match the beauty ideal we see from the screens and ads but he matched in the kind of thinking pattern and habit to my concept of life in general.
I will look up Dr. Kahnemann. Thank you again for your engaging with the topic!
P.S. I think you will find more examples from your motherhood as well. Mothers often report that they are aware that their babies need something even they are not in their presence.
You are right. There are particular "odd" things that happen. For example, most of the times since he was born I wake up exactly 10 or 15 seconds before he does at night. Somehow my body senses that he is going to wake up.
I return to you after a long nap. It's one of the best times to let intuition breathe, I think, the space between sleeping and waking.
You perform a clear analysis of intuition. You capture the heart of the issue when you say because
we don't trust it in ourselves.
We live in a scientific age, when everything needs to be "objectively" proven. How do you do that with intuition? Personal narratives don't do it for "science".
Personally, I have had experiences in which intuition played a significant role. There also have been people who claim I'm intuitive because I can sense the way they feel. But this has no objective value. It may just mean that I pay attention.
The most intriguing part of your essay for me was the discussion about uncertainty. The interconnectedness described by Peter Kruse has made the world less predictable because of unforeseen consequences. It's ironic, because our ancestors lived in a bubble of uncertainty. They didn't understand weather, or an eclipse, or an earthquake. They turned to the supernatural for explanations. Today, our science, with all its certainty, has brought us also to an uncertain universe.
Quite a bit of work went into this. I think you explored ideas that are personal to you and yet you placed them in a systematic framework so these ideas would have value for us. I know they did for me.
Nice, so you also have a lazy Friday.
Oh ... very interesting ... you draw a great circle from prehistoric ancestors to ultra-modern citizens and both face the same thing "uncertainty" where the circle closes again ... That is indeed a very surprising thought!
Hm .. I lately started to think that we might underestimate our prehistoric ancestors. I do not think of them as frightened creatures all superstitious in a naive way ... Scared over the top by earthquakes and weather phenomena, certainly cautious. I don't know why, maybe because of the influence of some really good books I read and also because of some other stuff I saw documented which opened up my readiness for letting in other stuff than pure science. Even though science itself has to do with it, too. The cave findings of paintings do radiate some really impressing energy, even just looking at them through the screen from the far. Don't know if you heard of them. Anthropologists put a lot of interest in them.
There was a pre-scientific era of people, how was it perceived?
For no objective reason I started to believe that our ancestors were dealing with death a lot better than modern people. Their abilities on an intuitive level must have been much higher than ours when it came to finding water and prey. I believe in things like the symbolic language in the Jungian sense and also find other sources interesting which speak from a collective "memory". For me, it is also logical, that what happened to my former generations (family related) does survive through unconscious convictions some generations (getting weaker over time).
I don't think that all findings of what humans do have interest for must be scientifically proven to count as true for people. I would dislike a world like this. Intuition actually, was for me a nice topic as it's not scientifically rejected when it comes to physical events. Mr. Sheldrake, for example, is interested in the fact that there is still room for a lot of research and that it is possible to empirically and correctly investigate this resonance phenomena. I find him fascinating because he tries to pursue his science in such a playful way. One might think what one wants of him, but I think he is courageous and opens up completely new fields.
Personal narratives don't do it for "science", that's true, but they are the inspiration generators to open up new fields of research.
Not so much lazy as recovering from a cold. My energy level has been greatly reduced since last weekend--although there is nothing wrong with being 'lazy'. Some of my best thoughts come from lazy times.
I'm very familiar with cave art. Wrote a couple of (small) books--on history and on art-- for students in which I featured it, briefly. Amazing that it can be found in different parts of the world.
Although intuition is hard to prove to a skeptic, I believe it is real. But it is so easy for the skill to be claimed by charlatans that it undermines true experiences. And undermines serious efforts to validate it.
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PS--Not sure if you know this steemian, but really enjoyed this article he/she wrote two weeks ago (I just found today) titled: A Simple Map to Freedom. There is mention of listening to the small voice. I grew up with a mother who assigned intuition to the Holy Ghost and that if one listened to these promptings they would never be sorry. Now, there's another topic all together, but perhaps again recognition of the same phenomenon with different labeling. I think in all, self trust, self love and the ability to see that we are just as worthy as any to know and act upon our own truths is of utmost importance.
https://steemit.com/freedom/@naturalxmission/simple-map-to-freedom
I'll answer you tomorrow morning, probably. Thank you for commenting, my dear friend.
Ok, thanks. I think I got it right now.
you replied to me instead to Kimberly. Maybe you should delete your answer and then make your reply to her. This happens quite some times to you :) I find it funny. It shows me how much "experts" we already are ... not always a good thing.