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Intuition: Role, Biases, Cognitive Basis, And A Hypothetical Synergistic Explanation Of Intuitive Brain Operations, Jens G. Pohl

Collaborative Agent Design (CAD) Research Center

This paper explores the characteristics of the intuitive responses that are generated by our brain continuously in an automatic and effortless manner. However, while intuition is a very powerful mechanism, it is also subject to many biasing influences. The author discusses the role of intuition, examines representative examples of biasing influences, compares cognitive theories of intuition advanced by Simon (2002), Klein (2003 and 1999), and Kahneman (2011), and then advances a hypothetical explanation of the neurological operations underlying intuition based on Hebbian rules (Hebb 1949) of plasticity in combination with synergetic principles.