Q&A: Experience and Intuition
Experience and Intuition
Question
Hello Rabbi, and happy holiday,
I had a conversation with my father over the holiday in connection with intuition. My father is a clinical psychologist, and when I told him about the validity of intuition, he answered that in his opinion intuition is a product of experience—that is to say, I feel that something is right because I experienced it in the past, but that is not a measure of truth. I also feel there is some truth in that—I sense something familiar, so I accept it in light of past experience.
When I thought about it, I couldn’t find any intuition that is detached from experience—1+1, parallel lines—everything I see / experience. Even the Rabbi’s proof in his book Stable and Unstable Truth about solving a math exercise quickly without thinking seemingly doesn’t put my mind at ease, because in my opinion the simple explanation there is that we sometimes think “in fast gear,” and not that there is some new creation of a synthesis between awareness and thought.
I would be happy to hear what you think.
Ariel
Answer
That is the accepted approach, but it is mistaken. You can’t learn anything from experience without an a priori infrastructure. Hume showed this, for example, regarding causality and induction. Therefore, even what we learn from experience is based on a priori principles that precede experience.
Discussion on Answer
I don’t recall anything special, beyond my aforementioned book. He didn’t show that there is no certainty, but that it is meaningless. There is no basis whatsoever for the assumption of causality (not merely that it isn’t certain).
That sounds puzzling to me. Everything we see and experience points to a connection between actions—true, that doesn’t mean causality, but Ockham’s razor would strengthen the fact that there is causality and not an angel or an imp or some other connection between the actions…. To say that it is meaningless sounds to me like too far-reaching a step…. Don’t you think so?
And even if you’re convinced Hume is right and it’s meaningless—these a priori assumptions that we are born with, what is their source? Brain structure? A divine spark?
If it seems puzzling to you, go out and see. Study the arguments and you’ll see. Connection is not causality. I just recently devoted a series of columns to this. You raise the possibility of an angel or an imp, but all of those are causal connections. The very fact that there is a connection is itself an a priori assumption of reason. The imps or forces are already an abductive move of reason.
It would be meaningless if they had no source. I explained at length in several places that in my opinion the Holy One, blessed be He, implanted in us an ability to grasp such insights (intuition).
Rabbi, thank you. With your permission, a few clarifications:
A. “That is the accepted approach, but it is mistaken. You can’t learn anything from experience without an a priori infrastructure. Hume showed this, for example, regarding causality and induction. Therefore, even what we learn from experience is based on a priori principles that precede experience.” — Beyond what you told me about causality, which I understand precedes experience, are there other things you could say are “a priori principles that precede experience”? (As for induction, I don’t understand why it precedes experience. It’s basic logic, unless you are claiming that all logic as a whole is one of those principles.)
B. In all the lectures I’ve heard from you, you always try not to answer in a God-of-the-gaps way—so isn’t the assumption that intuition is from God exactly that?
C. Where does logic really come from? What is its source?
D. Why does it seem more reasonable to you to assume that morality is intuition rather than environmental education?
E. I’d be happy to learn more about Hume—do you have references to recommended books / articles?
Thank you for the time you devote to these important clarifications.
Happy holiday
A. There is no connection between induction and logic, unless you define logic differently. It is an a priori assumption that has no logical or other basis whatsoever. Causality and induction are Hume’s two examples of a priori insights. Ockham’s razor is also an example (or actually a collection of examples).
B. I have explained more than once that it is not. First, because this is an essential gap (one that is not supposed to be closed by scientific research, since science itself is also subject to it). Beyond that, this is a reasonable explanation (if there is something that works, then apparently something created it), and therefore this is not God of the gaps at all.
C. Logic doesn’t come from anywhere. It simply is what it is. I have explained more than once that the laws of logic are not laws in the same sense as the laws of nature or the laws of the state. The laws of the state or of nature could have been different. Therefore a legislator is required to give them force. The laws of logic are not laws; they follow from the things themselves. The fact that a proposition is equivalent to itself, or that it is impossible for two contradictory propositions to both be true (the law of non-contradiction), are not laws. They are simply a description of the things themselves, with nothing added. That is why the Holy One, blessed be He, Himself is also subject to them. You can search the site for the laws of logic and the laws of nature.
D. Because that is my intuition (and yours too). See the spinach test in column 456.
E. I don’t remember. Search online.
Rabbi, is there somewhere you elaborate on this issue? It’s not completely clear to me—why does what Hume showed indicate that there must be an a priori infrastructure (I understand a priori = prior to experience)? He only showed that there isn’t 100% certainty there, but from experience we see that there is causality and that induction works.