"Science is and must be exciting, since it relies on largely unspecifiable clues which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning.... This is the unaccountable element which enters into science at its source and vitally participates throughout, even in its final result. In science this element has been called intuition." --Michael Polanyi, Scientist and Philosopher
"Polanyi ... most adequately expressed this idea of "lower intuition," so to speak, being critical to the evolution of scientific understanding and therefore progress into the great unKnown. It's not so much that the "intuition" is lower, only that science applies (and arbitrarily limits it) to a lower order of reality, i.e., the material/horizontal world.
"But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material. "
".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition.
Perhaps this means something to you but I find it the kind of gobbledygook that Kant obfuscates with so well. This type of language is actually irresponsible, especially for a scientist/philosopher. To whit: largely unspecifiable clues. This is a term, a phrase, without any discernable meaning. What does “unspecifiable” mean? If they are “ unspecifiable” then how does he know they exist as “clues?” This is a blatant contradiction. Another violation of the Proving the Negative Fallacy and/or Assertion Without Proof that is so common in these discussions.
. . . which can be sensed, mobilized and integrated only by a passionate response to their hidden meaning.
This is nice poetry and all but it isn't serious philosophy. It is wrong though since information can only be “sensed, mobilized and integrated” by reason. (What does 'mobilized' in this context mean? Just words.)
This also backhandedly acknowledges the point I made (sensed, integrated) from the quote you used. But to call the process “intuition” is to Beg the Question or use the term in a manner in which it isn't traditionally meant.
"Polanyi ... most adequately expressed this idea of "lower intuition," so to speak, being critical to the evolution of scientific understanding and therefore progress into the great unKnown.
Evolution? Very funny. So now we have “lower intuition” which implies a 'higher intuition' without having proven the existence of intuition in the first place. Not very convincing.
But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.
Same errors is logic, over and over again. But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition . . . this statement cannot be proven. It is merely an Assertion Without Proof, since it is attempting to Prove a Negative “cannot be understood”.
Then the second half: is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.
Oh really. Then why do bullets kill people? Do people just 'intuit' that they are deadly? See this is where this stuff crosses the line into nonsense (in a very literal sense of the word). How can it be “an obvious fact” if there are no “facts” since the world isn't material? Do you see the contradiction here? Let me put this another way, taking out the obfuscation in between and parsing the whole phrase for logical validity we have:
But to point out that the material world cannot be understood in the absence of intuition is to simultaneously affirm the obvious fact that the world is not material.
Which gives us: the material world . . . is not material.
In other words: A is not A. (That groaning sound you hear is Aristotle turning in his grave.)
Thus it fails the most basic truth table.
Thus your final statement: ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition is a non sequitur since it follows from none of the above. If reality is nothing but an intuition there is no way to validate anything since nothing 'exists' except intuition, including the statement ".... reality itself is nothing but an intuition.”
Can you say “absurdity?”