Toward an Understanding of Intuition and its Importance in Scientific Endeavor

TOWARD AN UNDERSTANDING OF INTUITION AND ITS IMPORTANCE IN SCIENTIFIC ENDEAVOR LOIS D. ISENMAN* When I asked a number of my scientific colleagues their view of the role of intuition in science, their answers ranged from "intuition is for poets, not for scientists" to "it's all intuition." Intuition can thus be viewed as something entirely apart from scientific inquiry, or as one of its most essential components. At least in part the problem is what we mean by the word intuition. The word is applied to a range of different events or processes, some of which call forth conflicting connotations. What is intuition? In order to begin to answer this question, we will explore the range of meanings the word intuition has accrued. We will then look beyond the specific usages to the common threads and from these craft a definition. Using this definition we will then examine the roles intuition plays in inquiry in general and in scientific endeavor in particular. Multiple Usages of the Word Intuition When physicists, for example, say that something is intuitively evident, they mean it is self-evident, clear by inspection, and not requiring further proof. In common speech as well, intuitive can be used to imply that something is clear and obvious, or easily accessible, that the argument is straightforward and unchallenging. In a similar vein, the word intuitive is often used in reference to habituated thought or action. Occasionally it is even used interchangeably with the word instinctive. The word intuition also is often used synonymously with the word hunch. In answer to a question, it is common to say, "My intuition is such and such," meaning that such and such comes to mind with only cursory reflecThe author wishes to thank Andreas Koehler, J. Fred Dice, Paul Isenman, and Kate Elgin for critical review of the manuscript, and to Leslie Brody, John Katz, and Ted Kauffman for helpful discussion. Thanks also to Florence Ladd and the 1994-1995 Bunting Fellows for support and encouragement. *Department of Physiology, Tufts University School of Medicine, 36 Byfield Road, Newton, MA 021683.© 1997 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. 0031-5982/97/4003-1013$01.00 Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 40, 3 ¦ Spring 1997 395 tion. The speaker may have no idea why such and such came to mind. Other hunches are backed by partial data or analysis. The word intuition used in this way implies that either all or certain of the pertinent information is unavailable or shrouded. Thus, intuition signifying hunch connotes something antithetical to the the use of the word, meaning clear and completely independent of further analysis. We also use the word intuition (or intuitive) to imply that a pattern, logical sequence, or understanding appears to the mind as a whole, that the whole is seen in a single instant. For example, when Linus Pauling, who had studied the hemoglobin molecule extensively, first heard about the behavior of red blood cells in sickle cell anemia, he immediately predicted that the disease resulted from a simple genetic mutation that caused hemoglobin to aggregate at low oxygen tension in a manner so as to both distort and rigidity the red cell membrane [I]. Intuition as a sense of the whole contrasts with the idea of intuition as a hunch, in which parts of the argument (or data) are shrouded or unavailable. Intuition as a sense of the whole is closer to the more trivial use of the word, in that the perception is clear and complete, a package deal as it were. However, except that such intuitions just seem to appear in awareness , there is generally little that is self-evident, obvious, or even consensual about these insights. Quite to the contrary, as the above example illustrates, they are often completely novel and involve multiple levels of interrelated understanding. Indeed, what is often so surprising about such insights is that such complexity can spring forth so well formed from the mind. Sometimes the phrase "an intuitive leap" is used to imply that a conclusion a number of steps beyond where the issue stood appears in awareness, but the intervening steps are inaccessible. One knows the conclusion, but doesn't...