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The Captain Kirk Principle
Scientific American ^
| December 2002
| Michael Shermer
Posted on 11/26/2002 7:25:35 PM PST by AndrewC
The Captain Kirk Principle
Intuition is the key to knowing without knowing how you know
By Michael Shermer
Stardate: 1672.1. Earthdate: October 6, 1966. Star Trek, Episode 5, "The Enemy Within." Captain James T. Kirk has just beamed up from planet Alpha 177, where magnetic anomalies have caused the transporter to malfunction, splitting Kirk into two beings. One is cool and rational. The other is impulsive and irrational. Rational Kirk must make a command decision to save the crew, but he is paralyzed with indecision, bemoaning to Dr. McCoy: "I can't survive without him. I don't want to take him back. He's like an animal-- a thoughtless, brutal animal. And yet it's me!"
This psychological battle between intellect and intuition was played out in almost every episode of Star Trek in the characters of the ultrarational Mr. Spock and the hyperemotional Dr. McCoy, with Captain Kirk as the near perfect synthesis of both. Thus, I call this balance the Captain Kirk Principle: intellect is driven by intuition, intuition is directed by intellect.
For most scientists, intuition is the bête noire of a rational life, the enemy within to beam away faster than a phaser on overload. Yet the Captain Kirk Principle is now finding support from a rich emerging field of scientific inquiry brilliantly summarized by Hope College psychologist David G. Myers in his book Intuition: Its Powers and Perils (Yale University Press, 2002). I confess to having been skeptical when I first picked up the book, but as Myers demonstrates through numerous well-replicated experiments, intuition-- "our capacity for direct knowledge, for immediate insight without observation or reason"-- is as much a component of our thinking as analytical logic.
Nalini Ambady and Robert Rosenthal of Harvard University, for example, discovered that evaluations of teachers by students who saw a mere 30-second video of the teacher were remarkably akin to those of students who had taken the course. Even three two-second video clips of the instructor yielded a striking 0.72 correlation with the course students' evaluations.
Research consistently shows how so-called unattended stimuli can subtly affect us. At the University of Southern California, Moshe Bar and Irving Biederman flashed emotionally positive images (kitten, romantic couple) or negative scenes (werewolf, corpse) for 47 milliseconds immediately before subjects viewed slides of people. Although subjects reported seeing only a flash of light for the initial emotionally charged pictures, they gave more positive ratings to people whose photographs had been associated with the positive ones-- so something registered. Intuition is not subliminal perception; it is subtle perception and learning-- knowing without knowing that you know. Chess masters often "know" the right move to make even if they cannot articulate how they know it. People who are highly skilled in identifying "micromomentary" facial expressions are also more accurate in judging lying. In testing college students, psychiatrists, polygraphists, court judges, police officers and Secret Service agents on their ability to detect lies, only the agents, trained to look for subtle cues, scored above chance.
The Captain Kirk Principle: intellect is driven by intuition, intuition is directed by intellect.
Most of us are not good at lie detection, because we rely too heavily on what people say rather than on what they do. Subjects with damage to the brain that renders them less attentive to speech are more accurate at detecting lies, such as aphasic stroke victims, who were able to identify liars 73 percent of the time when focusing on facial expressions. (Nonaphasic subjects did no better than chance.) We may even be hardwired for intuitive thinking: damage to parts of the frontal lobe and amygdala (the fear center) will prevent someone from understanding relationships or detecting cheating, particularly in social contracts, even if he or she is otherwise cognitively normal.
CONTINUED --- Click Here
(Excerpt) Read more at sciam.com ...
TOPICS: Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: captkirk; crevolist; drmccoy; inference; insight; intellect; intuition; psychology; science; shermer; skeptic; spock
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No one else has posted this that I can tell. My previous assessment of Mr. Shermer's ability to discern value must now be reappraised.
I also add, "Design, I know it when I see it."
1
posted on
11/26/2002 7:25:35 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: AndrewC
It's in the math!
2
posted on
11/26/2002 7:29:16 PM PST
by
Southack
To: AndrewC
Um, they've known this in the advertising business for HOW long?
3
posted on
11/26/2002 7:29:31 PM PST
by
tet68
To: scripter; Heartlander; f.Christian; gore3000; CalConservative; Alamo-Girl; jennyp; *crevo_list
Intuitive ping. To jennyp: I pinged you because Shermer was the author and I have berated him due to Hardison.
4
posted on
11/26/2002 7:31:57 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: Southack
You beat the invitation! You are now "formally" invited. ;^)
Don't you usually have a nice bovine logo?
5
posted on
11/26/2002 7:33:27 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: AndrewC
I would like the Scientific American to analyze the Star Trek episode where Spock has to have sex once every 7 years or he goes crazy.
6
posted on
11/26/2002 7:35:00 PM PST
by
PJ-Comix
To: tet68
Um, they've known this in the advertising business for HOW long? It isn't "real" to many people until you can measure it and it is published a some orthodox scientific publication.
7
posted on
11/26/2002 7:35:15 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: AndrewC
The Captain Kirk principle. Would that be "Loudly claim how very important the Prime Directive is, while violating it IN EVERY SINGLE EPISODE?"
Is THAT the Captain Kirk principle they speak of?
To: AndrewC
Intuition says a=in
9
posted on
11/26/2002 7:39:57 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: Billy_bob_bob
Is THAT the Captain Kirk principle they speak of? Are you asking my rational or intuitive mind? If it is the rational side -- I hesitate to answer but no. If it is the intuitive side -- I definitely feel that it is not.
10
posted on
11/26/2002 7:43:58 PM PST
by
AndrewC
To: AndrewC
I thought the Kirk principle was "If you can't have sex with it, blow the crap out of it!"
To: PJ-Comix
I would prefer every seven hours...
Spock was a loser.
To: Blood of Tyrants
I thought the Kirk Principle was, "Send in an expendable crew member first!"
13
posted on
11/26/2002 7:49:13 PM PST
by
ovrtaxt
To: AndrewC
Actually,the Captain Kirk principle is to always send out the red shirted guys first, and to feel bad when good ol' Ensign Whozits buys the farm.
To: AndrewC
I always like to compare the clinton administration to the "Kobiayashi Maru" test. clinton hates to lose.
If you can't make the numbers what you want, change how you count the numbers.
15
posted on
11/26/2002 7:52:18 PM PST
by
copycat
To: ovrtaxt
No, that is a Star Fleet standing order. It must be since the expendable crewman is ALWAYS the one to die.
To: PJ-Comix
I would like the Scientific American to analyze the Star Trek episode where Spock has to have sex once every 7 years or he goes crazy.Scientific American has been corrupted by liberals.
They'd probably try to link it to trouble with tribbles, thus proving that Spock was a poofter.
I don't think I could stomach that revelation.
To: AndrewC
intuition is baloney...
intuition is a biggie with feministas.
hyperemotive driven behaviors... are endocrine system driven.
"first impressions" that they use to try and nail down similarities between a teacher in 30 second review vs.in class, flow from INTELLECT based on past, factual experience. That's not "intuition" its template application based on an internal database of factual experiences, properly perceived.
ALL that is "good" about what they are calling "intuition" here, is acgally internal "ods making" Las Vegas style, based on experiences as we have perceived them. And that is why raw "intuitions" cannot EVER be trusted without intellectual cognition.
IE. If you see a girl that looks like your first lover, ods are you would find her attractive even if you did not know she was an epileptic (if that former lover had worked out for you on some level), or you might find a really wonderful person, repulsive (if the girls she reminded you gave you syph, or left you for your best friend, or your sister...).
The problem is, you may find another person repulsive at first, but later find that "john" was nothing like your psycho 11th grade football coach in high school. Hence, "don't judge a book by its cover."
Intuition can often become more useful as "experiences" form a database and templates for future growth and interaction. OR, it can become debilitating as one becomes hormonally addicted to the emotive aspects that are not productive.
I trust my parents "intuition" better known as "ods making skills", based on decades of personal experience than I do my adult children's. Mom and Dad have a much larger database of events and persons to consider and form their "impressions."
Perception based on experience is being blurred here with "intuition" which is usually a code word for liberal-feminists whose default setting is the hyper-emotive-state d'jour for ill advised decisions NOT based on intellect. Wise women know these for what they are more commonly recognised as: "irrational" choices and behaviors.
I don't think much of intution as a basis for anything, especially for the young..
To: PJ-Comix
I recall some comedian discussing that very phenomenon, in the context of how Spock's ears got that way...
19
posted on
11/26/2002 8:05:55 PM PST
by
OKSooner
To: AndrewC
I know how exactly how the alternative Kirk feels -- everytime I get out on the road then get cutoff by one more %&*#! pinhead!
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