INTUITION & PREDICTION

September 9, 2019 Darren 205 Comments

I have 2 questions for you:
1. Do you believe that our intuition on issues of threat, safety, risk, and violence can be wrong?
2. Do you believe that violence, in the form of sudden human violent behavior, can be predicted?

Here’s my take on this, for anybody interested, so take with a grain-of-salt. Intuition can absolutely be wrong and consistently shows as much. Not all intuition is “good” intuition. It has an element of evolution, yes, where we’re wary of snake-bites, being burned, sensing predatory danger/being hunted, etc. It’s hard-wired. But the daily intuition in modern context that we refer to is developed over time and intricately personal…soft-wired. Important? Well, I think it’s important for people to understand that it’s prone to various types of personal biases and that it’s not a magical mystical thing always designed to protect us. Like adrenaline, the more knowledge one has, the more one understands, the more chance of calm(er) response to it and what it means. How is it developed? By experience, exposure, knowledge, training, nature, nurture, environment, culture and, when those change, so too does intuition over time. (also meaning that feedback from your past ‘can’ be very helpful if those personal biases don’t cloud things and you’re aware of them – thus, the paranoia) It can be very right or very wrong so simply “trust your intuition” or “go with your gut” or “I had a feeling” are only partially-true and shouldn’t be the fallback many instructors tell you. It’s not some magical 6th-sense that most claim….it is grounded in elements very tangible.

Resultado de imagen para intuition images"

We are prone to errors but higher-stakes pattern-recognition (and let’s face it, intuition is a big part pattern-recognition) comes from a place of prior data/stimuli/experiences, which is greatly diverse from person-to-person. My intuition on night-club interview violence simply won’t be as honed as a bouncer’s due to his past. (which doesn’t mean I won’t have alarm-bells go off from my own experience/experiences) His/hers for particular Central-American issues won’t be as honed as mine for the same reasons. (Ditto on the alarm-bells for him/her) So, that being said, “thinking it first” has every bit the chance of success on many occasions as “feeling it first” if the perceptual filters listed above are present and there’s time. Thinking doesn’t make one paranoid, it just means it’s a situation where there’s greater time to assess and make an educated decision – whether right or wrong, like intuition, is another thing entirely. Generalizations.

One question on prediction. Can violence be predicted ahead of time to the point it can be stopped before happening? When we see “PINs” or “ritual signs of violence” or “body language/intent”….it’s at our doorstep and about to happen. It’s too late for mitigation, prevention, or prediction. It’s here and we need to deal with it…OR we simply don’t see or acknowledge these things and bad things happen. But can it be predicted prior and stopped? If there’s a lead-up or high-stakes predictions (long-term planning, manifestós, social media info, loved-one concern from signs, diaries, prior like-behavior), I’d say a far greater chance. If not, I’d say very difficult. Risk-analysis, threat-assessment, safety-precautions to mitigate threat….absolutely. To predict outright? I’d say pretty damn difficult. Trends, environments, statistics, signs all help to mitigate and risk-downsize….but it’s super-, super-difficult to predict individual human behavior what with urges, irrational behavior, impulse, momentary need, states, moods, etc. Maybe with the new brain/neuro technology that’s being developed but the risk of this (privacy-loss/mind-invasiveness/corporation-government misuse) is pretty damn horrifying. Lowering the odds is definitely achievable, however, to be certain.

Regarding definitions, I’d say (for me, from my perspective) “intuition” would be something on the short-end of time….something momentary, in-the-moment, situational, soon-to-happen..or not. “Prediction” longer-term, with a lead-up. Can we “predict” what will happen on the stock-market? How someone will handle traumatic bad news? What the future will hold? I’ll leave a few of very good, easy-to-read, and very up-to-date articles on intuition below for curiosity.