Intuition & Reason
Whatever its stigma, “intuition” is a term that we simply cannot do without, because it denotes the most basic constituent of our faculty of understanding. While this is true in matters of ethics, it is no less true in science. When we can break our knowledge of a thing down no further, the irreducible leap that remains is intuitively taken. Thus, the traditional opposition between reason and intuition is a false one: reason is itself intuitive to the core, as any judgment that a proposition is “reasonable” or “logical” relies on intuition to find its feet.
The End of Faith by Sam Harris (p. 183)
Hang on…
Is Harris admitting that there are many important things we can know – in philosophy, in ethics, in science and in life – that we can’t grasp through our faculty of reason? Is he admitting that there is more to knowledge than bare empirical data?
William Wordsworth said, “Faith is a passionate intuition.” So obviously Harris agrees that “the traditional opposition between reason and intuition (including religious faith) is a false one”?
Steve
on September 17th, 2011
People who are surprised by this obviously don’t know as much about Harris’ thinking as they think they do. He is much subtler and wiser in his outlook than his detractors characterize him as being.