# Mysticism of Intuition



## PaladinX (Feb 20, 2013)

Can someone please tell me where the idea of Jung describing Intuition as a mystical force comes from? Please cite a source. I may also need you to explain the significance of this idea to me. I consider myself to be someone that primarily works in essences of information and if this idea was communicated somewhere, it seems that it is an insignificant detail in the essence of Intuition. It is frustrating that so many (examples below) are hung up on this distinction. I feel as if this one word is being used to somehow inappropriately judge other information about Jung's interpretation of intuition. Like it gives a carte blanche to re-interpret his meaning in whatever way another might see fit.

Can someone please help to me to understand?

Thanks!



arkigos said:


> Let's be up front. Jung was wrong about the *mysticism *of Intuition. The best he can hope for here is that there is data (of a sort) that is being perceived that allows for this without the need for *mystic *forces or perceptions.





Shadow Logic said:


> If cognitive functions are ingrained into reality then they are not *mystical*. To further explain, anything that exists or could be is not *mystical *because it is a property of reality. Jung was intrigued by intuition because he couldnt fully grasp it, hence the *mystical *nature he perceived. Those who claim something is *mystical *are only claiming their lack of understanding. Good thing Jung understood that there was more to be learned about intuition that he himself couldnt even touch.



* *






reckful said:


> The *mystical *flavor of many N (and especially Ni) descriptions certainly goes all the way back to Jung, who mostly considered the abstract/concrete component of N/S a component of I/E instead, and — as shown by the stuff in your OP (which is essentially consistent with Jung's descriptions in Psychological Types) — conceptualized intuition primarily in terms of a special ability to perceive the contents of the unconscious and to envision, as Jung put it, "possibilities as to whence [something] came and whither it is going." Jung's Ni-dom portrait has a pretty strong _*mystical *visionary_ aspect that I don't think a typical INTJ is very likely to identify with.
> 
> Myers largely shifted abstract/concrete from I/E to N/S — and downplayed the unconscious stuff — with the result that the N/S items on the official MBTI are pretty much free of the *mystical *taint. But both Myers and Berens/Nardi talk about _both_ (1) the aspect of Ni that can potentially have visions of "what will be" (or at least could be) _in the future_, and (2) the aspect of Ni that uses the essential pattern-spotting nature of N to simply come to _present understandings_ (whether of the "aha!" variety or otherwise) of _the way things are_, or _the way things work_, or _what something means_, etc. And it's not uncommon for MBTI tests — both dichotomy tests and functions tests — to include one or more N questions (or Ni or Ne questions) that I suspect an NF or NP is more likely to choose the N response to than an NTJ. I'd say NTJs are the most _grounded_ of the N's in a number of ways, with the result that the N responses are sometimes too *mystical*/flaky/whatever to appeal to an NTJ. As one example, the original version of Keirsey's test asked if you find "visionaries" fascinating or annoying. Because (I assume) too many NTs (like me) were choosing the "annoying" response — because we associate the word "visionary" more with evidence-free New Agey *mystical *folks — Keirsey adjusted the wording, and the revised version asks if you find "visionaries _and theorists_" fascinating or annoying.
> 
> ...






EDIT: I am not trying to pick on anyone. Only trying to understand where this perspective is coming from.


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## sarek (May 20, 2010)

The way i see it there are several possible answers:

1. Intuition is indeed mystical in nature. That means we will never be able to describe it accurately from within our physical/logical frame of reference.

2. Intuition is an emergent property of other functions of the brain (intelligence? compassion? you name it). That means it can be theorised about but is not subject to real time computation.

3. intuition is a quantum mechanical effect. Which may or may not tie back into option one.


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## Deus Absconditus (Feb 27, 2011)

Things that exist can be explained no matter how hard it is for certain people. If its part of nature (nature being all of existence) then its not mystical but instead a fabric of reality and can be explained and understood. When someone cant fully grasp a concept, they call it mystical but do not assume because it seems mystical to one person, that its mystical to everyone else. The word mystical is derived from "I conceal". The whole concept surrounds itself by a notion that we cant know existence but thats flawed since all of existence is perceptible and subject to analysis. Some may not understand but that doesnt imply *all* will not understand. 

Since intuition isnt concealed and isnt being concealed, since we hold the possibility that intuition is ingrained into reality, then that means intuition is not some mystical force but instead a concept thats not fully understand. Not knowing now=/=never knowing ever.


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## Octavian (Nov 24, 2013)

> Can someone please tell me where the idea of Jung describing Intuition as a mystical force comes from? Please cite a source.


By mystical force what definition are you adhering to?



> belief that union with or absorption into the Deity or the absolute, or the spiritual apprehension of knowledge inaccessible to the intellect, may be attained through contemplation and self-surrender.


That sounds like Ni more than Ne. In fact I've never seen Ne described as mystical in any source or any of his writings. And so far as I know he never directly stated that Intuition _is_ a mystical force, only loosely likened it to one via the quote:



> Had this type not existed, there would have been no prophets in Israel [...] Its prophetic foresight is explained by its relation to the archetypes, which represent the laws governing the course of all experienceable things.


_p.400-401, Psychological Types, Princeton-Bollingen._



> I may also need you to explain the significance of this idea to me. I consider myself to be someone that primarily works in essences of information and if this idea was communicated somewhere, *it seems that it is an insignificant detail in the essence of Intuition.*


Imagery, metaphor, and the like are all unnecessary to the overall essence of a literary work, the purpose they serve is to convey specific meanings, in a specific fashion to the reader. So while they are unnecessary "details" in that they often do not propel the story forward, they still ultimately aid in deepening the readers understanding. 

I am doubtfully that Jung ever meant "Intuitives are literally prophetic and mystical." What he does convey is something else, the labor that must go into expressing such intuitions in understandable terms, the likelihood of such intuitions being completely misunderstood, images of witches and alchemists being burned alive on charges of heresy or a single man being followed around the desert as he splits bodies of water in half. 



> I feel as if this one word is being used to somehow inappropriately judge other information about Jung's interpretation of intuition. Like it gives a carte blanche to re-interpret his meaning in whatever way another might see fit.


That's been happening with every cognitive function since the day Jung released his work. I certainly do not think that [introverted] intuition is mystical in any way, but I don't have a problem with it being described as such, since I tend to automatically process that as being the equivalent to literary imagery / metaphor.



> Let's be up front. Jung was wrong about the mysticism of Intuition. The best he can hope for here is that there is data (of a sort) that is being perceived that allows for this without the need for mystic forces or perceptions.


This is what I mean by Jung not meaning it literally.



> Although his intuition may be *stimulated by external objects*, it does not concern itself with external possibilities but with what the external object has released within him.


p.399 - same book.

Of course information is being gathered through the auxiliary or inferior, Te/Fe and Se. It isn't coming out of nowhere, it isn't coming from a supernatural force, it just appears to be doing so.

If we know that by "archetypes" Jung meant the collective unconscious, which is understood as organized experience expressed through varying forms of humanity, the significance of his linking of Ni to the archetyes is amplified. The collective unconscious, the archetypes, are internalized within the Intuitive Introvert, as they are within every human being. All collective experiences, histories, inclinations, and etc. are stored within us as archaic, archetypal images according to Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious I think (I don't have that one on hand.) The Intuitive Introvert is simply more in touch with it. Views it more directly, more readily, exists in that perpetual state. 

Once again, the startling insight and prophetic foresight are not supernatural in the least (which I think is what you're all getting at when you say "mystical.") Jung would probably ascribe all prophetic abilities TO the collective unconscious. So just to clarify:

Ni orients by archetypal images, the archetypal images are rooted in the collective unconscious which is effectively a storehouse of all experiences, across all of time, across all of land and sea. I cannot help but interpret that as meaning the intuitive introvert taps into the collective unconscious to pull insight and form foresight accounting for the accuracy (the shit has already happened and has already been experienced, even if it has not.)

When you make an entire thread focusing on one word, narrowness will of course follow as a consequence.


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## Psychopomp (Oct 3, 2012)

@PaladinX - I was referring to that lecture in which he rhetorically states such:



> The last-defined function, intuition, seems to be very mysterious, and you know I am 'very mystical' as people say. This then is one of my pieces of mysticism! Intuition is a function by which you see round corners, which you really cannot do; yet the fellow will do it for you and you trust him. It is a function which normally you do not use if you live a regular life within four walls and do regular routine work. But if you are on the Stock Exchange or in Central Africa, you will use your hunches like anything. You cannot, for instance, calculate whether when you turn round a corner in the bush you will meet a rhinoceros or a tiger - but you get a hunch, and it will perhaps save your life. So you see that people who live exposed to natural conditions use intuition a great deal, and people who risk something in an unknown field, who are pioneers of some sort, will use intuition. Inventors will use it and judges will use it. Whenever you have to deal with strange conditions where you have no established values or established concepts, you will depend upon that faculty of intuition.


But, it doesn't matter. I think that Jung just commented on how people saw some of his views as 'mystical' and quipped on how they might see this also as mystical. Thus, he didn't necessarily explicitly state that it was. 

However, above and beyond this, I am quite at odds with how Jung portrays intuition here, as being actually predictive of things one cannot know. To me, this is actual mysticism. Rather, it implies something supernatural. Inasmuch as Jung thought this as he appears to have stated it, I disagree.


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## reckful (Jun 19, 2012)

PaladinX said:


> Can someone please tell me where the idea of Jung describing Intuition as a mystical force comes from?


That latest post of mine (that you quoted) was prompted in part by the Tavistock Lecture excerpt that Abraxas posted, and here's part of it:



Jung said:


> Things have a past and they have a future. They come from somewhere, they go somewhere, and you cannot see where they came from and you cannot know where they go to, but you get what the Americans call a hunch. For instance, if you are a dealer in art or in old furniture you get a hunch that a certain object is by a very good master of 1720, you get a hunch that it is a good work. Or you do not know what shares will do after a while, but you still get the hunch that they will rise. *That is what is called intuition, a sort of divination, a sort of miraculous faculty.* ...
> 
> *The last-defined function, intuition, seems to be very mysterious, and you know I am 'very mystical' as people say. This then is one of my pieces of mysticism! Intuition is a function by which you see round corners, which you really cannot do; yet the fellow will do it for you and you trust him.* It is a function which normally you do not use if you live a regular life within four walls and do regular routine work. But if you are on the Stock Exchange or in Central Africa, you will use your hunches like anything. You cannot, for instance, calculate whether when you turn round a corner in the bush you will meet a rhinoceros or a tiger - but you get a hunch, and it will perhaps save your life. So you see that people who live exposed to natural conditions use intuition a great deal, and people who risk something in an unknown field, who are pioneers of some sort, will use intuition. Inventors will use it and judges will use it. Whenever you have to deal with strange conditions where you have no established values or established concepts, you will depend upon that faculty of intuition.
> 
> I have tried to describe that function as well as I can, but perhaps it is not very good. I say that intuition is a sort of perception which does not go exactly by the senses, but it goes via the unconscious, and at that I leave it and say 'I don't know how it works'. *I do not know what is happening when a man knows something he definitely should not know.* I do not know how he has come by it, but he has it all right and he can act on it. For instance, *anticipatory dreams, telepathic phenomena, and all that kind of thing are intuitions. I have seen plenty of them, and I am convinced that they do exist.*


It's true that Jung didn't associate intuition _only_ with the kind of things that are commonly viewed as mystical. Far from it. But he was a believer in mystical phenonemena, and also a believer that intuition was what you might call the gateway function that caused N-types to be more in touch with (and receptive to) mystical stuff than S-types.

Describing Ni-doms in Chapter X of Psychological Types, Jung explains: "The peculiar nature of introverted intuition, if it gains the ascendency, produces a peculiar type of man: the *mystical dreamer and seer* on the one hand, the artist and the crank on the other."

Here's a bit from Jung's autobiography:



Jung said:


> No science will ever replace myth, and a myth cannot be made out of any science. ... It is not we who invent myth, rather it speaks to us as a Word of God. The Word of God comes to us, and we have no way of distinguishing whether and to what extent it is different from God. There is nothing about this Word that could not be considered known and human, except for the manner in which it confronts us spontaneously and places obligations upon us. It is not affected by the abitrary operation of our will. We cannot explain an inspiration. Our chief feeling about it is that it is not the result of our own ratiocinations, but that it came to us from elsewhere. ...
> 
> As a child I felt myself to be alone, and I am still, because I know things and must hint at things which others apparently know nothing of, and for the most part do not want to know. Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible. ...
> 
> It is important to have a secret, a premonition of things unknown. If fills life with something impersonal, a _numinosum_. A man who has never experienced that has missed something important. He must sense that he lives in a world which in some respects is mysterious; that things happen and can be experienced which remain inexplicable; that not everything which happens can be anticipated. The unexpected and the incredible belong in this world. Only then is life whole.


I don't think there's any question that the function that Jung viewed as most responsible for causing certain people (himself included) to be more in touch with their unconscious — the source, as he viewed it, of fantasies (in a positive sense), myths, prophecies, etc. ("the unexpected and the incredible") — was his intuition.


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## tangosthenes (Oct 29, 2011)

PaladinX said:


> Can someone please tell me where the idea of Jung describing Intuition as a mystical force comes from? Please cite a source. I may also need you to explain the significance of this idea to me. I consider myself to be someone that primarily works in essences of information and if this idea was communicated somewhere, it seems that it is an insignificant detail in the essence of Intuition. It is frustrating that so many (examples below) are hung up on this distinction. I feel as if this one word is being used to somehow inappropriately judge other information about Jung's interpretation of intuition. Like it gives a carte blanche to re-interpret his meaning in whatever way another might see fit.
> 
> Can someone please help to me to understand?
> 
> ...


"The peculiar nature of introverted intuition, when given the priority, also produces a peculiar type of man, viz. the mystical dreamer and seer on the one hand, or the fantastical crank and artist on the other. The latter might be regarded as the normal case, since there is a general tendency of this type to confine himself to the perceptive character of intuition. As a rule, the intuitive stops at perception; perception is his principal problem, and -- in the case of a productive artist-the shaping of perception. But the crank contents himself with the intuition by which he himself is shaped and determined. Intensification of intuition naturally often results in an extraordinary aloofness of the individual from tangible reality; he may even become a complete enigma to his own immediate circle. [p. 509] "

http://personalitycafe.com/infj-art...on-introverted-intuitve-type-ni-dominant.html

He describes every introverted function as mystical, and the unconscious of extraverts as mystical, as well.


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## FearAndTrembling (Jun 5, 2013)

It depends on what you believe in. But Jung was a true believer in mysticism. Arkigos doesn't believe in it. I actually saw this same argument in the difference between Spinoza (supposed INFJ) and Kant (supposed INTP). 










How Spinoza thinks intuition can reveal things beyond sensory experience, but Kant thinks it can only be reduced to sensory experience. Spinoza did believe intuition could do almost magical things. Which guys like Arkigos, and Kant, wouldn't agree with. It is simply a difference in philosophy.


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## Entropic (Jun 15, 2012)

arkigos said:


> @PaladinX - I was referring to that lecture in which he rhetorically states such:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Difference between Ne and Ni? Ni does have a prophetic quality to it, I won't deny that. PaladinX used such a quote recently to exemplify between Intuition, Thinking and Feeling and how they all saw and understood a burning house. Only intuition saw it as already being burnt down aka seeing into the future before something has happened. I think this is why socionics also associates Ni with time though I still think it's a shoddy and shallow understanding of the actual nature of Ni.

As an anecdotal example, I was sitting on a tram in my city many years ago, and I see this old man with a rollator getting on it. I just knew the man was going to fall even though he was still standing. I could already see him falling/lying on the ground. I also knew that the train was going to begin to move again before the man had reached the handicap seat even though in this very present moment, none of these things were true. Sure, some of this probably just essentially human that you can for example tell that an apple that is falling from the tree is going to hit the ground.

What I understood from PaladinX's quote is that Intuition or at least Ni, foresees events before they have happened as if they are concrete/literal. When I see my cat pushing something off the table I already see it on the ground/falling down to the ground even though it is not falling yet or lying on the ground yet. It feels very real and visceral to me. I can literally see it. 

It's the same thing with cognition too, in that I can literally see people's cognition as I wrote in the Frozen thread. I can see someone's Te for example, like it's something I can literally touch with my physical hands though I realize it's not of a physical property. That's what Jung means too with the ability to see what lies beyond the corner even though you just see the actual corner in itself. To me, the entire world is this way. I see things almost more literally or viscerally that do not tangibly exist compared to what actually exists. So if I see this computer of mine, standing here on the floor, even though all I see is the outer black case it's also something more than that. A machine that works and it's like I see its inner workings even if it's actually turned off. Not so much about what a computer is in how it's defined or what it means, but what it represents. Similarly, people's minds or brains, their personalities, it's like I could reach out and touch them. Turn a screw here and there, see how it that changes their reality of things. I can clad all this in fancy imagery when I describe other people, that's what Jung did too, though it's a mere simplification of what I actually experience because some of these things can't be put into words no matter how I try.

One of these things is the sensation I have whenever I see a flock of birds taking off the sky. It's what Jung would call a body or physical enervation because I feel it but it is not a feeling tone of pleasant, nice, good etc; it's something else. Something that can't be put into words because there is no word in the English language to describe it. The stronger my intuitive impression of something is, the stronger that feeling also becomes.


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## LibertyPrime (Dec 17, 2010)

o.o I'm a Ne dom.

*lets define intuition:* the power or faculty of attaining to direct knowledge or cognition without evident rational thought and inference.

Now let me explain how my intuition works. There is nothing magical about it and it has to do more with not being consciously aware of how one pulls the information from the situation one finds themselves in. For example I have a 2 minute chat with someone and I just know this guy is gay without him telling me or being obvious about it, because I just know. I am not fully aware how I do, but if I think about it and have time to properly analyze the "why" it will become evident that I just put the clues or details together subconsciously and came up with the answer. It was in his body language, what he said, how he said it, the voice, the eyes the tiny muskies in his face..everything together as a whole built a pattern that I somehow recognized.

Intuitives just tend to put 2 and 2 together and they aren't aware that they are naturally inclined to always do that. We see beyond the obvious because we think in terms of patterns and connections, so we can make forecasts and seemingly come up with answers out of the blue.

*To the outside world it may seem magical, but its just another way of perception.*


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## Psychopomp (Oct 3, 2012)

ephemereality said:


> Difference between Ne and Ni? Ni does have a prophetic quality to it, I won't deny that. PaladinX used such a quote recently to exemplify between Intuition, Thinking and Feeling and how they all saw and understood a burning house. Only intuition saw it as already being burnt down aka seeing into the future before something has happened. I think this is why socionics also associates Ni with time though I still think it's a shoddy and shallow understanding of the actual nature of Ni.
> 
> As an anecdotal example, I was sitting on a tram in my city many years ago, and I see this old man with a rollator getting on it. I just knew the man was going to fall even though he was still standing. I could already see him falling/lying on the ground. I also knew that the train was going to begin to move again before the man had reached the handicap seat even though in this very present moment, none of these things were true. Sure, some of this probably just essentially human that you can for example tell that an apple that is falling from the tree is going to hit the ground.
> 
> ...


I realize that prediction as we tend to think about it, is actually quite a Rational process. This could even extend to prescience. 

I was once chatting with an ISTP and discussing his rather peculiar ideas about God... and we began to discuss how such a thing as God might come about. It occurred to me the idea that if one were to have a complete algorithmic comprehension of all events in the universe simultaneously, that one would be able to unerringly predict the next iteration of those algorithms. Prediction, in this sense, is actually best oriented to Ti. It would make sense, then, that INFJs would be the Ni type most inclined to claim and orient to predictive powers. However, how could Ni bring this about? Wouldn't Si offer a better help here... offering a holistic sense of what was... which Ti can extrapolate into what will be? The notable dichotomy is that we are discussing predictions of what will take place in actuals, not in intangibles. It would make sense, then, that the best 'readers' in terms of psychics would be SFJs. I think there is actually a lot of evidence for this, as it appears to me that some of the most famous of these are indeed SFJs. Of course, I don't think they are 'readers' at all, but charlatans who are nevertheless good at extrapolating patterns from a dataset... and offering the most algorithmically likely prediction. 

It would then make sense that low order Ti types would be inclined to make crappy predictions based on and subjected to a dominating Pi? Certainly, we see this in, say, SFJs. I don't think I have seen this so much in STJs, due to the lack of Ti, but Si/Te might still predict, in it's way. More bluntly and 'writing on the wall' in a sense, less intensely or impressionistically. Certainly, you won't get so much of the 'psychic' from this group, though I know exceptions to exist. 

Comparing this to Ni types, I will tell you I have not ONCE seen such a thing from them. Maybe from an INFJ, because of the Ni/Ti coupling, but even then it still orients to more of a 'zeitgeist' than your more typical 'psychic' prediction of events and outcomes. Ni types, pressed, seem to very much shy away from predictions at all in specifics, but instead talk more about the 'way the world goes along'. More concerned with the nature of entities than then the details of their 'fate' in actuals. When Ni types I know talk about the future of, say, the USA, they talk about it's abstract nature... in Te or Fe terms, but all oriented around the 'zeitgeist' of the thing. The archetype of the thing. 

So, yes, prediction is Thinking. Of course it is. Fed, understandably, and predictably!, by Pi. 

I've spent tons of time with Ni types, and they seem to rarely predict things (at least they seem to rarely verbalize such to me) and when they do, I have never seen anything notable in terms of it coming true. I realize now that I predict things all the time, every day, but it is not something I ever thought to call prediction. It was just the most logical outcome given the data on hand. 

I'd really like to see examples of Ni types predicting things accurately, outside of subjective recollection. I mean actual prediction. That is, someone said something was going to happen and then it happened after they predicted it. Recollections specifically doesn't count unless you can show some meaningful reason why it should.

The only example I personally know of is when Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, who actually didn't make a lot of predictions of this nature... predicted the US Civil War, its cause, and the state it would start in (South Carolina), 29 years before it happened. He also predicted a lot of things about it that didn't happen, including mass slave revolts and it swelling out into a global conflict. I know quite a lot about the fellow, and he is rather easily typed an ESTP. 

I know an Einstein (clearly an INTP) made a lot of predictions... and once commented thusly:



> *I believe in intuitions and inspirations. I sometimes feel that I am right. I do not know that I am.* When two expeditions of scientists, financed by the Royal Academy, went forth to test my theory of relativity, I was convinced that their conclusions would tally with my hypothesis. I was not surprised when the eclipse of May 29, 1919, confirmed my intuitions. I would have been surprised if I had been wrong.


Interesting. In his case, was Ne a necessary factor? How so? I am sure it was, but it feels like Ti was at least as responsible, and likely a great deal more so.


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## FearAndTrembling (Jun 5, 2013)

Jung thought his dreams/premonitions saw WW1 or WW2, and stuff like that. He was really out there. He even got weirder later on. He was like that kid from Dune, who could see into the "flow". Everything that could be. He had a dream that haunted him through life: a large penis on a throne, a "maneater". He had seen ghosts and other type shit, since he was a little kid. He always believed in that stuff. That penis dream is one of the most defining moments in his life. 

I personally roll my eyes at INFJ who think they are psychics, or anything like that. I am very non psychic. 

"The irrational is a factor of existence which may certainly be pushed back indefinitely by an increasingly elaborate and complicated rational explanation, but in so doing the explanation finally becomes so extravagant and overdone that it passes comprehension, thus reaching the limits of rational thought long before it can ever span the whole world with the laws of reason. A completely rational explanation of an actually existing object (not one that is merely postulated) is a Utopian ideal. Only an object that has been postulated can also be completely explained on rational grounds, since it has never contained anything beyond what was postulated by rational thinking. Empirical science also postulates rationally limited objects, since its deliberate exclusion of the accidental allows no consideration of the real object as a whole ; hence empirical observation is always limited to that same portion of the object which has been selected for rational consideration.

When these functions are concerned not with a rationally determined choice of objects, or with the qualities and relations of objects, but with the incidental perceptions which the real object never lacks, they at once lose the quality of direction, and therewith something of their rational character, 

Although the irrational, as such, can never become the object of a science, nevertheless for a practical psychology it is of the greatest importance that the irrational factor should be correctly appraised. For practical psychology stirs up many problems that altogether elude the rational solution and can be settled only irrationally, i.e. they can be solved only in a way that has no correspondence with the laws of reason. An exclusive presumption or expectation that for every conflict there must also exist a possibility of rational adjustment may well prove an in-surmountable obstacle to a real solution of an irrational character."

This was kind of the theme of Jung's work, we don't allow nature to "answer in her fullness". We impose conditions, and ignore anything "irrational", or try to make it fit reason. 

Intuition is "given", like sensation. That is why it has such certainty. You don't create it, like thought or feeling. It is delivered. You touch something, that is as real as it gets. You didn't create that object you touched, and it greeting you, proves it. 

"Its contents, like those of sensation, have the character of being given, in contrast to the ‘derived or ‘deduced* character of feeling and thinking contents. Intuition has this quality in common with sensation, whose physical foundation is the ground and origin of its certitude. In the same way, the certainty of intuition depends upon a definite psychic matter of fact, of whose origin and state of readiness, however, the subject was quite unconscious."


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## SweetPickles (Mar 19, 2012)

It feels like instinct, sorry only way I can describe it. It's probably just different brain chemistry...or God speaking through us...whatevs.


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## Abraxas (May 28, 2011)

@ephemereality,

There was a thread posted recently in which someone put up a picture of a crashed helicopter and asked everyone to interpret it or something like that.

Your response in particular struck me.

When you said that you didn't really even notice the details, and all you saw was "war".

That is very much Ni, my intuition works the same way, although it might also just be intuition in general.

My take on this is that what we are "seeing" with intuition is Jung's "archetypes" - the "primordial images" of things. Instead of seeing the details, we see the symbolism of things.

I don't believe this is a mystical process at all, or supernatural in any way. It is not "divination" or really "predicting the future" or something, although it is very possible that I might make a prediction - that would come from my judgment more than my intuition I believe.

Like sensation which shows us merely that something exists, but not _what_ it is (the "what" or "definition" of things comes from judgment), intuition also merely shows us that something exists. But with intuition, the thing that exists is the _archetype_ of the object in sensation.

So, for example, I look at an object, and my senses tell me something is there. Then, my judgment tells me what is there - oh, it's an apple. And my feelings tell me what the apple is worth to me (or to others, if they are extraverted). But my intuition tells me something _primordial_ about the apple. It tells me something primitive about it, stored deep in my unconscious - particularly, in the so-called "collective unconscious".

It shows me the apple that exists in the part of my mind that does not belong to me. The part of my psyche where individuality does not exist. The part where, all that is left is everything that all conscious beings have in common. The _a priori foundation_ of all ordinary human consciousness _devoid_ of the contents of my specific life and my specific consciousness.

In that part of the mind, there is only the most basic, most _abstract_ and mythological, _timeless_ properties of objects and ideas. All introverted functions stem from that part of the mind. Only, intuition and sensation are both perceiving functions, thus, the are irrational. The information comes simply as an immediate awareness of "something" - but the image lacks a definition. It isn't defined, only _observed._ You don't yet know what it is you are observing until you use your judgment to "make sense" of it, and turn it into something rational.

At least, that's my take on it.


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## Entropic (Jun 15, 2012)

Abraxas said:


> @<span class="highlight"><i><a href="http://personalitycafe.com/member.php?u=39512" target="_blank">ephemereality</a></i></span>,
> 
> There was a thread posted recently in which someone put up a picture of a crashed helicopter and asked everyone to interpret it or something like that.
> 
> ...


You are right, I think so too. This is actual Jungian intuition, assuming I can find something to express the image properly too which is not always the case either. In those situations I just get that weird profound feeling. I see/experience something but wtf it is I don't know. I just know that something is there. 



> I don't believe this is a mystical process at all, or supernatural in any way. It is not "divination" or really "predicting the future" or something, although it is very possible that I might make a prediction - that would come from my judgment more than my intuition I believe.


Yes, I agree. I also think intuition is more likely to seem mystical to someone whose intuition is of inferior character because they do not understand how someone can see what they do not, being sensors. I have also noticed that Si types in particular often being dismissive of my intuition as well, usually referring to it as "over-thinking" or "seeing things not there". 

And I'll respond to this too in response to what @arkigos wrote:

I see what you are saying about drawing deductive (?) conclusions about future events being related to thinking. Is this something you do a lot? In the case of what you were expressing though, it's not so much saying what's going to happen or draw preliminary predictions as much as it is an ability to see what is going to happen before it happens because that's just what it is. It's not a conscious awareness. I'm actually quite shit at making proper predictions as in X will happen because of Y. It's one of my biggest problems when I play strategy games. As much as I love strategy, I have a hard time staking out a strategy independent of my opponent and their actions. I must observe it first before I decide how I am going to act myself. I think that's also an important distinction between P vs J dominance. 

For a comparison why I think you over-attribute this to Ti also:






Lelouch is commonly typed as an INTJ or ILI-Te in socionics, because he's definitely a Jungian ambivert because too much Te focus. While I agree with that he's ability to predict and manipulate outcomes relates to his developed Thinking, he's definitely doing it through Te so I can't agree with you that it's limited to Ti. Another character that comes to mind is Light Yagami. At least you got a live action film there if you are seeking for non-anime lol. 



> Like sensation which shows us merely that something exists, but not _what_ it is (the "what" or "definition" of things comes from judgment), intuition also merely shows us that something exists. But with intuition, the thing that exists is the _archetype_ of the object in sensation.
> 
> So, for example, I look at an object, and my senses tell me something is there. Then, my judgment tells me what is there - oh, it's an apple. And my feelings tell me what the apple is worth to me (or to others, if they are extraverted). But my intuition tells me something _primordial_ about the apple. It tells me something primitive about it, stored deep in my unconscious - particularly, in the so-called "collective unconscious".
> 
> ...


No, I perfectly understand what you mean. Expressing that though, that's a different matter. I find that I often fail in this area to be quite honest. It's not the first time Thinking dominant types have accused me of using terminology soup, sounding too stream-of-consciousness-like and whatnot. I am very sure it's because of the difference between P-dom and J-dom. Less focus on definition, more focus on conveying images. Sure, to communicate at all one needs some kind of judgement at least in order to make these images fit apropos language because as I outlined in a previous post the act of language in itself is the expression of judgement, but I find that a big difference between rational and irrational types is that rational types spend a lot of time trying to outline what something is or what it means. They constantly define and redefine. 

Once you get accustomed to observing it, it is quite noticeable in how people use language to structure their thoughts. Rationality to me at least, tends to come across as overly rigid where too much focus is spent not so much on understanding the "idea" or as you called it, primordial image behind something, as much as they are interested in making sense of this image. I find that it's rather frustrating and is definitely a big contributor why I have a difficult time communicating with rational types.


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## Abraxas (May 28, 2011)

ephemereality said:


> No, I perfectly understand what you mean. Expressing that though, that's a different matter. I find that I often fail in this area to be quite honest. It's not the first time Thinking dominant types have accused me of using terminology soup, sounding too stream-of-consciousness-like and whatnot. I am very sure it's because of the difference between P-dom and J-dom. Less focus on definition, more focus on conveying images. Sure, to communicate at all one needs some kind of judgement at least in order to make these images fit apropos language because as I outlined in a previous post the act of language in itself is the expression of judgement, but I find that a big difference between rational and irrational types is that rational types spend a lot of time trying to outline what something is or what it means. They constantly define and redefine.
> 
> Once you get accustomed to observing it, it is quite noticeable in how people use language to structure their thoughts. Rationality to me at least, tends to come across as overly rigid where too much focus is spent not so much on understanding the "idea" or as you called it, primordial image behind something, as much as they are interested in making sense of this image. I find that it's rather frustrating and is definitely a big contributor why I have a difficult time communicating with rational types.


Yeah, I've noticed that as well.

Like, when judgment dominates, everything is a project and they bring their perception to bear on improving it only when they "hit the wall". They ignore perceptions that don't immediately seem to fit into their paradigm.

But the perceiving-dom is the other way around. We do want to express ourselves, and we do have our projects as well, but we're not as committed. If the work isn't "worth it", we just let it go and move on to something else.

Especially for introverts, I think. It's hard to feel like any of them matter enough to focus on just one, because introverted perception is so abstract, synthesizing everything together, that you fail to see the facts and details that distinguish things from each other and everything starts to look the same. So the feeling is like, "why bother with this, it doesn't matter anyway." And then I get detached after awhile and stop caring.


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## Eggsies (Feb 5, 2013)

PaladinX said:


> I feel as if this one word is being used to somehow inappropriately judge other information about Jung's interpretation of intuition. Like it gives a carte blanche to re-interpret his meaning in whatever way another might see fit.


Ugh, some magical special snowflake shit you get when you toss sparkly words at intuitives. Now if you'll excuse me I'm off to my sensory deprivation tank to astral project.


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