In reference to my comment on the normal role of intuition (e.g.,
Einstein)
in science, Ian writes:
>What's the difference between intuition and guess? <
and explains:
>It may matter somewhat if we are to discern not only the cognitive
processes of scientists as they try to report to others how they go about working through various problems, but, further, as a way to get a handle on the anti-science backlash borne of the 60's and 70's, when intuition was somewhat romanticized, to borrow a phrase.
>Given that there is still a lot of anti-science attitudes in US culture
which completely evades the issue of how science has been totally
subordinated to capitalism for the past 350 years, it would seem to
behoove those of us who wish to see science serve different social agendas along with concomitant transformations of the psychology of scientists and anti-scientists alike, t oget a somewhat better handle on how scientists and philosophers and artists etc. have thought about the distinction. I broached the question because it was raised in a very serious manner by Bas Van Fraasen back in the 80's in a symposium dealing with some controversial issues in the philosophy of science, one of which was the vaunted problem of induction, the inference to best explanation and their justifications as methods of organizing scientific data.<
well put!
he asked:
>What's the difference between intuition and analysis? When does the one
process leave off and theother begin in the dynamics of cognition and emotion?<
I answered:>there seems to be a dialectical "interpenetration of opposites," in which emotions and cognition condition each other, determining each others'character (within the social context, of course). The same can be said about intuition and analysis. But that doesn't say that all of these are one big mush, so we can jettison logical/empirical analysis, give up trying to separate cognition and analysis from emotion and intuition, and sit back & smoke some weed. We should try to be in touch with our emotions (as we say here in California), but we want our actions and views to be as rational as possible.<
Ian:>I 'see' them as complements rather than opposites; because if we each
harbor multiple intelligences then we're dealing with issues of pluralism and coherence as the notions of Self we've gotten from Luther, Descartes,
Locke and Kant as well as many others lose their tennuous grip on Western
Culture. In a related issue, we might still, following Wordsworth, wonder, after we've separated those processes from 'one another,' what motivates us to engage in such distinctions as well as what 'ends' they serve. <
this makes sense: it's true that one can't be (humanly) rational without emotions or (humanly) emotional without reason.
> From which of the contrasting and possibly complementary
terms/processes do we make the distinction[s]? And are these differences connected in any way to our individual and group abilities to perceive/conceive randomness and patterns within our bodies, societies and space-time?<
I wrote:>I don't understand the above very well. I'd bet that it's easier to deal with such issues if they were stated in concrete terms (with examples) rather than dwelling in abstraction.<
Ian:>Fair enough; how does the distinction between intuition and guess help us with the mathematics of induction and the role of randomness in
statistics, probability theory and information theory as well as the choices we make in applying them to understanding social phenomena? If intuition is not reducible to analysis and is not the same as guessing, 'what' is 'it'? <
I haven't thought much about intuition. But in the small piece of abnormal psychology that I'm familiar with, it plays a role in a specific way. People with autism or Asperger's syndrome (borderline autism) lack an "intuitive" sense of the seamless web of social relationships (societal norms, etc.) Instead, they figure it out intellectually or logically. This means (1) that they take a long time figuring out how to fit in (or deal) with society, even their local society, or that it takes a large amount of energy to do so; and (2) they are usually rigid in their social relationships, insisting on specific rules (rather than the ambiguity which most people are willing to put up with). So why is it that people on the autistic spectrum face the social world in this non-intuitive way? They lack the ability seen in neurotypical folks to see and understand the subtle cues of social life, such as facial expression and body language. They have a hard time feeling empathy because they can't "read others' minds" to figure out what emotions other people have [see Simon Baron-Cohen's book on "Mindblindness"]. (There's no lack of the potential to feel empathy.) Those on the spectrum also usually focus on concrete specifics rather than seeing the interconnections and rather than generalizing from the specifics.
By analogy, intuition in social-scientific or scientific work would involve the seeing of the subtle details that may not make explicit sense, the ability to see possible connections between individual pieces of evidence, and to generalize from specifics.
This kind of intuition is absolutely necessary to scientific creativity and "progress." It is discouraged by over-specialization and bureaucracy. But some sort of scientific discipline is also needed, to weed out the flights of fancy or at least to identify them as such. Again, scientific intuition and scientific discipline are complementary, as part of a dynamic process.
Jim
