Quotes about intuition (556 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“Controller is so intuitive, even your mom can play.”

Shigeru Miyamoto (1952) Japanese video game designer and producer

On Wii
Source: E3 2006

Moms

“Mathematical reasoning may be regarded rather schematically as the exercise of a combination of two facilities, which we may call intuition and ingenuity.”

Alan Turing Systems of Logic Based on Ordinals

"Systems of Logic Based on Ordinals," section 11: The purpose of ordinal logics (1938), published in Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, series 2, vol. 45 (1939)
In a footnote to the first sentence, Turing added: "We are leaving out of account that most important faculty which distinguishes topics of interest from others; in fact, we are regarding the function of the mathematician as simply to determine the truth or falsity of propositions."
Context: Mathematical reasoning may be regarded rather schematically as the exercise of a combination of two facilities, which we may call intuition and ingenuity. The activity of the intuition consists in making spontaneous judgements which are not the result of conscious trains of reasoning... The exercise of ingenuity in mathematics consists in aiding the intuition through suitable arrangements of propositions, and perhaps geometrical figures or drawings.

Exercises , Mathematics

“For me, the camera is a sketch book, an instrument of intuition and spontaneity.”

Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908–2004) French photographer

Books

“Reasoning draws a conclusion and makes us grant the conclusion, but does not make the conclusion certain, nor does it remove doubt so that the mind may rest on the intuition of truth, unless the mind discovers it by the path of experience.”

Roger Bacon book Opus Majus

Opus Majus, c. 1267
Source: Robert Belle Burke (2002) The Opus Majus of Roger Bacon Part 2. p. 583

Truth , Drawing

“Instinct reveals itself as self-concentrating, self-edifying it is limitation. Intuition produces self-denial, self-destruction； it is expansion. Culture can develop both. If it develops instinct, animal nature appears. Then culture destroys the intuitive capacity which men have even found in a primitive state.”

Piet Mondrian (1872–1944) Peintre Néerlandais

Source: 1940's, A New Realism', 1943-1945, p. 17

Men , Nature , Appearance , Animals

“Intuitive cognition is such that when some things are cognized, of which one inheres in the other, or one is spatially distant from the other, or exists in some relation to the other, immediately in virtue of that non-propositional cognition of those things, it is known if the thing inheres or does not inhere, if it is spatially distant or not, and the same for other true contingent propositions, unless that cognition is flawed or there is some impediment.”

William of Ockham (1285–1349) medieval philosopher and theologian

Opera Theologica (1986), edited by Gedeon Gal, Vol. I, p. 31.

Distant

“I make what it pleases me to make.... I have no ideas about what the paintings imply about the world. I don't think that's a painter's business. He just paints paintings without a conscious reason. I intuitively paint flags.”

Jasper Johns (1930) American artist

Quote of Jasper Johns, as cited in Trend to the Anti-Art: Targets and Flags, Newsweek 51 no. 13, March 1958, p. 96
1950s

World , Idea , Business , Thinking

“It appeared to me that, although Logic might be viewed with reference to the idea of quantity, it had also another and a deeper system of relations. If it was lawful to regard it from without, as connecting itself through the medium of Number with the intuitions of Space and Time, it was lawful also to regard it from within, as based upon facts of another order which have their abode in the constitution of the Mind.”

George Boole (1815–1864) English mathematician, philosopher and logician

Source: 1840s, The Mathematical Analysis of Logic, 1847, p. i: Lead paragraph of the Preface; cited in: R. H. Hutton, " Professor Boole http://books.google.com/books?id=pfMEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA157," (1866), p. 157
Context: In presenting this Work to public notice, I deem it not irrelevant to observe, that speculations similar to those which it records have, at different periods, occupied my thoughts. In the spring of the present year my attention was directed to the question then moved between Sir W. Hamilton and Professor De Morgan; and I was induced by the interest which it inspired, to resume the almost-forgotten thread of former inquiries. It appeared to me that, although Logic might be viewed with reference to the idea of quantity, it had also another and a deeper system of relations. If it was lawful to regard it from without, as connecting itself through the medium of Number with the intuitions of Space and Time, it was lawful also to regard it from within, as based upon facts of another order which have their abode in the constitution of the Mind. The results of this view, and of the inquiries which it suggested, are embodied in the following Treatise.

Law , Idea , Appearance , Time

“I am convinced that human continuance depends entirely upon: the intuitive wisdom of each and every individual”

Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist

From 1980s onwards, Critical Path (1981)
Context: I am convinced that human continuance depends entirely upon: the intuitive wisdom of each and every individual... the individual's integrity of speaking and acting only on the individual's own within-self-intuited and reasoned initiative... the individual's never joining action with others as motivated only by crowd-engendered-emotionalism, or a sense of the crowd's power to overwhelm, or in fear of holding to the course indicated by one's own intellectual convictions.

Wisdom , Dependency

“My ideas hang on me like outsize clothes into which I still have to grow. My mind lags behind my intuition.”

Etty Hillesum (1914–1943) Jewish diarist

Idea , Clothes

“Doutbless, revenge is not always sweet, once it is consummated we feel inferior to our victim, or else we are tangled in the subtleties of remorse; so vengeance too has its venom, though it comes closer to what we are, to what we feel, to the very law of the self; it is also healthier than magnanimity. The Furies were held to antedate the gods, Zeus included. Vengeance before Divinity! This is the Major intuition of ancient mythology.”

Emil M. Cioran book History and Utopia

p. 70. https://books.google.com/books?id=5DuCDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT70
History and Utopia (1960)

God , Law , Revenge , Self-confidence

“Trust intuition and feel, not what you hear.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1983

Feeling

“It is through science that we prove, but through intuition that we discover.”

Henri Poincaré (1854–1912) French mathematician, physicist, engineer, and philosopher of science

Science

“All of us are having conversations with God all the time. We’re simply calling them something else. We’re calling them moments of “inspiration.” Or “women’s intuition.” Or a “psychic hit.” Or a “bright idea.” Or a “deep insight.” Or an “epiphany.” We call the results of such encounters “serendipity” or “coincidence” or “chance.””

Neale Donald Walsch (1943) American writer

God , Idea , Chance , Time

“For a moment I had a strange intuition that just this, and in a real, profound sense, is life; and perhaps happiness even - love with a mixture of sadness, reverence, and silent knowledge.”

Erich Maria Remarque book Three Comrades

Source: Three Comrades

Love , Life , Sadness , Knowledge

“The especial genius of Woman I believe to be electrical in movement, intuitive in function, spiritual in tendency.”

Margaret Fuller book Woman in the Nineteenth Century

Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845)

“Intuition (is) perception via the unconscious”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

“I want the following word: splendor, splendor is fruit in all its succulence, fruit without sadness. I want vast distances. My savage intuition of myself.”

Clarice Lispector (1920–1977) Brazilian writer

Source: The Stream of Life

Sadness

“It is not what the man of science believes that distinguishes him, but how and why he believes it. His beliefs are tentative, not dogmatic; they are based on evidence, not on authority or intuition.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Science

“intuition is always right in at least two important ways;
It is always in response to something.
it always has your best interest at heart”

Gavin de Becker (1954) American engineer

Source: The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence

Way , Heart

“Bring the mind into sharp focus and make it alert so that it can immediately intuit truth, which is everywhere. The mind must be emancipated from old habits, prejudices, restrictive thought processes and even ordinary thought itself.”

Bruce Lee book Tao of Jeet Kune Do

Source: Tao of Jeet Kune Do

Truth

“Intuition does not denote something contrary to reason, but something outside of the province of reason.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

“The true basis of religion is not belief, but intuitive experience. Intuition is the soul’s power of knowing God. To know what religion is really all about, one must know God.”

Paramahansa Yogananda (1893–1952) Yogi, a guru of Kriya Yoga and founder of Self-Realization Fellowship

God , Religion , Soul

“Dull minds are never either intuitive or mathematical.”

Blaise Pascal Pensées

Source: Pensées

Mathematics

“intelligence is intuitive
you needn't learn to love
unless you've been taught
to fear and hate”

Saul Williams (1972) American singer, musician, poet, writer, and actor

Source: , said the shotgun to the head.

Love , Hate , Fear , Intelligence

“Intuition is unconscious accumulated experience informing judgement in real time.”

Alain de Botton (1969) Swiss writer

Time

“The premonition of madness is complicated by the fear of lucidity in madness, the fear of the moments of return and reunion, when the intuition of disaster is so painful that it almost provokes a greater madness […] One would welcome chaos if one were not afraid of lights in it.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

On the Heights of Despair (1934)

Pain , Fear , Light , Madness

“In such doubtful matters, where you have to work as a pioneer, you must be able to put some trust in your intuition and follow your feeling even at the risk of going wrong.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Feeling

“If experience is the soul of religion, expression is the body through which it fulfills its destiny. We have the spiritual facts and their interpretations by which they are communicated to others. It is the distinction between immediacy and thought. Intuitions abide, while interpretations change.”

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Variant: We have spiritual facts and their interpretations by which they are communicated to others, sruti or what is heard, and smṛti or what is remembered. Śaṅkara equates them with pratyakṣa or intuition and anumana or inference. It is the distinction between immediacy and thought. Intuitions abide, while interpretations change.

Religion , Soul , Communication , Change

“Children understand intuitively that the world they have been born into is not a blessed world.”

Hayao Miyazaki (1941) Japanese animator, film director, and mangaka

At the New York Film Festival http://www.slate.com/id/43805/

Children , World , Understanding

“He doesn't have to be the funniest guy in the room. Now, he's a guy who is much more secure. He's not afraid to look in the mirror anymore. Underneath all the (stuff) that used to get in his way was a heart of gold. He's really a super-compassionate human being. He's so smart. He's always got good advice. I've gotten free therapy from him for years. He's very intuitive.”

Matthew Perry (actor) (1969) American actor

Matt LeBlanc, interview in Donna Freydkin (April 1, 2004) "A brush with happiness", USA Today, Gannett Co., Inc., p. 01D.
About

Way , Guy , Heart

“Before I start carving the idea must be almost complete. I say 'almost' because the really important thing seems to be the sculptor's ability to let his intuition guide him over the gap between conception and realization without compromising the integrity of the original idea; the point being that the material has vitality – it resists and makes demands..”

Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975) English sculptor

Source: 1932 - 1946, The Studio 132:643', (1946), p. 279

Idea

“She had this feeling for what was happening biologically. She was an intuitive observer, and she saw that something was making these nerve connections grow and was determined to find out what it was.”

Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909–2012) Italian neurologist

Stanley Cohen, quoted in New York Times obituary http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/science/dr-rita-levi-montalcini-a-revolutionary-in-the-study-of-the-brain-dies-at-103.html?_r=0
About

Feeling

“The days of the 'intuitive' manager are numbered.”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

Source: 1930s- 1950s, The Practice of Management (1954), p. 93, cited in Henry Mintzberg (2005) Managers Not MBAs (2005). p. 10

“If you cannot teach knowledge, than you should teach your intuition.”

Hasan ibn Ali (624–669) Shia Imam

Majlisi, Bihārul Anwār, vol.78, p. 111
Regarding Knowledge

Knowledge

“The insight does not arise if we are not familiar with the facts of the case… The successful practice of intuition requires previous study and assimilation of a multitude of facts and laws. We may take it that great intuitions arise out of a matrix of rationality.”

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Law , Study , Success

“Well, I knew it was going to be important. That much I knew. In fact, I had thought about sealing it in a dated envelope with my predictions and then opening it 20-30 years later to see if my intuitions were right. I realized this paper marked a new direction. I used to think about it this way-that one day Fuzzy Logic would turn out to be one of the most important things to come out of our Electrical Engineering Computer Systems Division at Berkeley. I never dreamed it would become a worldwide phenomenon. My expectations were much more modest.”

Lotfi A. Zadeh (1921–2017) Electrical engineer and computer scientist

Answer to the question: "Back in 1965 when you published your initial paper on Fuzzy Logic, how did you think it would be accepted?"
1990s, Interview with Lotfi Zadeh, Creator of Fuzzy Logic (1994)

Dreams , Way , Thinking

“No matter how deep a study you make. What you really have to rely on is your own intuition and when it comes down to it, you really don't know what's going to happen until you do it.”

Matsushita Konosuke (1894–1989) Japanese businessman

Kōnosuke Matsushita in: Cherry blossoms and robotics, 1983; Cited in: John R. Schermerhorn (1993), Management for productivity, p. 170

Study

“Why is psychology the youngest of the empirical sciences? Why have we not long since discovered the unconscious and raised up its treasure-house of eternal images? Simply because we had a religious formula for everything psychic — and one that is far more beautiful and comprehensive than immediate experience. Though the Christian view of the world has paled for many people, the symbolic treasure-rooms of the East are still full of marvels that can nourish for a long time to come the passion for show and new clothes. What is more, these images — be they Christian or Buddhist or what you will — are lovely, mysterious, richly intuitive.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Source: The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (1934), p. 7-8

Love , People , World , Beauty

“Van Gaal has a good vision on football. But it's not mine. He wants to gel winning teams and has a militaristic way of working with his tactics. I don't. I want individuals to think for themselves and take the decision on the pitch that is best for the situation… I don't have anything against computers, but you judge football players intuitively and with your heart.”

Johan Cruyff (1947–2016) Dutch association football player

reported in Maarten Meijer (2014). Louis van Gaal: The Biography.

Way , Thinking , Decision , Heart

“The Church acknowledges the indispensable contribution which women make to society through the sensitivity, intuition and other distinctive skill sets which they, more than men, tend to possess. I think, for example, of the special concern which women show to others, which finds a particular, even if not exclusive, expression in motherhood. I readily acknowledge that many women share pastoral responsibilities with priests, helping to guide people, families and groups and offering new contributions to theological reflection. But we need to create still broader opportunities for a more incisive female presence in the Church. Because “the feminine genius is needed in all expressions in the life of society, the presence of women must also be guaranteed in the workplace”[72] and in the various other settings where important decisions are made, both in the Church and in social structures.”

Pope Francis (1936) 266th Pope of the Catholic Church

Section 103
2010s, 2013, Evangelii Gaudium · The Joy of the Gospel

Life , Women , Men , People

“I have always stressed that methodology is intuition reconstructed in tranquility.”

Paul Lazarsfeld (1901–1976) American sociologist

Paul Lazarsfeld (10/ 5/67), in: Ann K. Pasanella (1994), The Mind Traveller: A Guide to Paul F. Lazarsfeld's Communicating Research Papers. p. 22

“A woman knows by intuition, or instinct, what is best for herself.”

Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer

Attributed to Monroe in self-help books and on social media, this quotation is of unknown origin and date.
Misattributed

For women

“The rude, discursive Thinker is the Scholastic (Schoolman Logician). The true Scholastic is a mystical Subtlist; out of logical Atoms he builds his Universe; he annihilates all living Nature, to put an Artifice of Thoughts (Gedankenkunststuck, literally Conjuror's-trick of Thoughts) in its room. His aim is an infinite Automaton. Opposite to him is the rude, intuitive Poet: this is a mystical Macrologist: he hates rules and fixed form; a wild, violent life reigns instead of it in Nature; all is animate, no law; wilfulness and wonder everywhere. He is merely dynamical. Thus does the Philosophic Spirit arise at first, in altogether separate masses. In the second stage of culture these masses begin to come in contact, multifariously enough; and, as in the union of infinite Extremes, the Finite, the Limited arises, so here also arise "Eclectic Philosophers" without number; the time of misunderstanding begins. The most limited is, in this stage, the most important, the purest Philosopher of the second stage. This class occupies itself wholly with the actual, present world, in the strictest sense. The Philosophers of the first class look down with contempt on those of the second; say, they are a little of everything, and so nothing; hold their views as the results of weakness, as Inconsequentism. On the contrary, the second class, in their turn, pity the first; lay the blame on their visionary enthusiasm, which they say is absurd, even to insanity.”

Novalis (1772–1801) German poet and writer

Pupils at Sais (1799)

Life , Hate , World , Law

“A good traveler has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts
and keeps his mind open to what is. Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.
He is ready to use all situations
and doesn't waste anything.
This is called embodying the light.”

Laozi book Tao Te Ching

Variants:
A good traveller has no fixed plan and is not intent on arriving.
As quoted in In Search of King Solomon's Mines‎ (2003) by Tahir Shah, p. 217
A true traveller has no fixed plan, and is not intent on arriving.
Source: Tao Te Ching, Ch. 27, as interpreted by Stephen Mitchell (1992)

People , Travel , Light

“Philosophy leaps ahead on tiny toeholds; hope and intuition lend wings to its feet. Calculating reason lumbers heavily behind, looking for better footholds, for reason too wants to reach that alluring goal which its divine comrade has long since reached.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks

Source: Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks (posthumous), p. 40

Hope

“Most actors possess an intuitive side. Actually, the further away I am from the character, the less work I have to do. It takes so much more energy to detach yourself from your own life references that might cross wires with your character's. I think it's cheating for me to ever use my life references in conjunction with my characters. It's my reaction transferred to the character, which isn't good. What I have to do is erase those things and then find something else. I can't stand in front of a camera and let anything of myself come through or I'm betraying the character's complete trueness. There are some actors who just use themselves. They can wear their ego on their sleeve and it looks great. I can't do that.”

River Phoenix (1970–1993) American actor, musician, and activist

US Magazine (1991)

Life , Thinking , Cheating

“The square is not a subconscious form. It is the creation of intuitive reason. The face of the new art. The square is a living, regal infant. The first step of pure creation in art.”

Kazimir Malevich (1879–1935) Russian and Soviet artist of polish descent

Quote in 'From Cubism and Futurism to Suprematism: The New Realism in Painting', Kazimir Malevich, November 1916
1910 - 1920

Art

“Algebraic geometry has developed in waves, each with its own language and point of view. The late nineteenth century saw the function-theoretic approach of Riemann, the more geometric approach of Brill and Noether, and the purely algebraic approach of Kronecker, Dedekind, and Weber. The Italian school followed with Castelnuovo, Enriques, and Severi, culminating in the classification of algebraic surfaces. Then came the twentieth-century "American" school of Chow, Weil, and Zariski, which gave firm algebraic foundations to the Italian intuition. Most recently, Serre and Grothendieck initiated the French school, which has rewritten the foundations of algebraic geometry in terms of schemes and cohomology, and which has an impressive record of solving old problems with new techniques. Each of these schools has introduced new concepts and methods.”

Robin Hartshorne book Algebraic Geometry

Algebraic Geometry, Springer, (1977), p. xiii
Algebraic Geometry (1977)

School , Problem

“The assumption that the human psyche possesses layers that lie below consciousness is not likely to arouse serious opposition. But… there could just as well be layers lying above consciousness… The conscious mind can only claim a relatively central position and must put up with the fact that the unconscious psyche transcends and as it were surrounds it on all sides. Unconscious contents connect it backward with the physiological states on the one hand and archetypal data on the other. But it is extended forward by intuitions which are conditioned partly by archetypes and partly by subliminal perceptions depending on the relativity of time and space in the unconscious.”

C.G. Jung book Psychology and Alchemy

Source: Psychology and Alchemy (1952), p. 132

Lie , Lying , Time , Dependency

“There is no regular path which leads from these intuitions into the land of ghostly schemata, the land of abstractions. There exists no word for these intuitions; when man sees them he grows dumb, or else he speaks only in forbidden metaphors and in unheard — of combinations of concepts.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
Context: That immense framework and planking of concepts to which the needy man clings his whole life long in order to preserve himself is nothing but a scaffolding and toy for the most audacious feats of the liberated intellect. And when it smashes this framework to pieces, throws it into confusion, and puts it back together in an ironic fashion, pairing the most alien things and separating the closest, it is demonstrating that it has no need of these makeshifts of indigence and that it will now be guided by intuitions rather than by concepts. There is no regular path which leads from these intuitions into the land of ghostly schemata, the land of abstractions. There exists no word for these intuitions; when man sees them he grows dumb, or else he speaks only in forbidden metaphors and in unheard — of combinations of concepts. He does this so that by shattering and mocking the old conceptual barriers he may at least correspond creatively to the impression of the powerful present intuition.

“The truths of the ṛṣis are not evolved as the result of logical reasoning or systematic philosophy but are the products of spiritual intuition, dṛṣti or vision.”

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Context: The truths of the ṛṣis are not evolved as the result of logical reasoning or systematic philosophy but are the products of spiritual intuition, dṛṣti or vision. The ṛṣis are not so much the authors of the truths recorded in the Vedas as the seers who were able to discern the eternal truths by raising their life-spirit to the plane of universal spirit. They are the pioneer researchers in the realm of the spirit who saw more in the world than their followers. Their utterances are not based on transitory vision but on a continuous experience of resident life and power. When the Vedas are regarded as the highest authority, all that is meant is that the most exacting of all authorities is the authority of facts.

Truth

“As a "rational" being, he now places his behavior under the control of abstractions. He will no longer tolerate being carried away by sudden impressions, by intuitions.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
Context: The venerability, reliability, and utility of truth is something which a person demonstrates for himself from the contrast with the liar, whom no one trusts and everyone excludes. As a "rational" being, he now places his behavior under the control of abstractions. He will no longer tolerate being carried away by sudden impressions, by intuitions.

Behavior

“The man who is guided by concepts and abstractions only succeeds by such means in warding off misfortune, without ever gaining any happiness for himself from these abstractions. And while he aims for the greatest possible freedom from pain, the intuitive man, standing in the midst of a culture, already reaps from his intuition a harvest of continually inflowing illumination, cheer, and redemption — in addition to obtaining a defense against misfortune.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
Context: The man who is guided by concepts and abstractions only succeeds by such means in warding off misfortune, without ever gaining any happiness for himself from these abstractions. And while he aims for the greatest possible freedom from pain, the intuitive man, standing in the midst of a culture, already reaps from his intuition a harvest of continually inflowing illumination, cheer, and redemption — in addition to obtaining a defense against misfortune. To be sure, he suffers more intensely, when he suffers; he even suffers more frequently, since he does not understand how to learn from experience and keeps falling over and over again into the same ditch.

Pain , Freedom , Happiness

“Intuition is a distinct form of experience.”

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Context: Intuition is a distinct form of experience. Intuition is of a self-certifying character (svatassiddha). It is sufficient and complete. It is self-established (svatasiddha), self-evidencing (svāsaṃvedya), and self-luminous (svayam-prakāsa). Intuition entails pure comprehension, entire significance, complete validity. It is both truth-filled and truth-bearing Intuition is its own cause and its own explanation. It is sovereign. Intuition is a positive feeling of calm and confidence, joy and strength. Intuition is profoundly satisfying. It is peace, power and joy.

“Intuition is a positive feeling of calm and confidence, joy and strength. Intuition is profoundly satisfying . It is peace, power and joy.”

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Context: Intuition is a distinct form of experience. Intuition is of a self-certifying character (svatassiddha). It is sufficient and complete. It is self-established (svatasiddha), self-evidencing (svāsaṃvedya), and self-luminous (svayam-prakāsa). Intuition entails pure comprehension, entire significance, complete validity. It is both truth-filled and truth-bearing Intuition is its own cause and its own explanation. It is sovereign. Intuition is a positive feeling of calm and confidence, joy and strength. Intuition is profoundly satisfying. It is peace, power and joy.

Peace , Feeling , Confidence , Joy

“My suggestion is that at each state the proper order of operation of the mind requires an overall grasp of what is generally known, not only in formal logical, mathematical terms, but also intuitively, in images, feelings, poetic usage of language, etc.”

David Bohm book Wholeness and the Implicate Order

Wholeness and the Implicate Order (1980)
Context: My suggestion is that at each state the proper order of operation of the mind requires an overall grasp of what is generally known, not only in formal logical, mathematical terms, but also intuitively, in images, feelings, poetic usage of language, etc. (Perhaps we could say that this is what is involved in harmony between the 'left brain' and the 'right brain'). This kind of overall way of thinking is not only a fertile source of new theoretical ideas: it is needed for the human mind to function in a generally harmonious way, which could in turn help to make possible an orderly and stable society. <!-- p. xi

Feeling , Mathematics

“There are ages in which the rational man and the intuitive man stand side by side, the one in fear of intuition, the other with scorn for abstraction.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
Context: There are ages in which the rational man and the intuitive man stand side by side, the one in fear of intuition, the other with scorn for abstraction. The latter is just as irrational as the former is inartistic. They both desire to rule over life: the former, by knowing how to meet his principle needs by means of foresight, prudence, and regularity; the latter, by disregarding these needs and, as an "overjoyed hero," counting as real only that life which has been disguised as illusion and beauty.

Age , Fear

“The principles of quantum mechanics are so contrary to ordinary intuition that they can best be motivated by taking a look at their prehistory.”

Steven Weinberg (1933) American theoretical physicist

Source: Lectures on Quantum Mechanics (2012, 2nd ed. 2015), Ch. 1: Historical Introduction

Motivation

“The development of quantum mechanics in the 1920s was the greatest advance in physical science since the work of Isaac Newton. It was not easy; the ideas of quantum mechanics present a profound departure from ordinary human intuition. Quantum mechanics has won acceptance through its success. It is essential to modern atomic, molecular, nuclear, and elementary particle physics, and to a great deal of chemistry and condensed matter physics as well.”

Steven Weinberg (1933) American theoretical physicist

Preface
Lectures on Quantum Mechanics (2012, 2nd ed. 2015)

Idea , Science , Success , Departure

“I think it’s an organic process. I don’t plot. I don’t plan. I start writing and characters and geography emerges. I find that in telling stories, the best laid plans go poof when your characters do what they want to do because you don’t control them—they become real and live their own lives. I certainly am influenced by the people I meet and the places I go to when I create my characters but it’s an intuitive thing, I just know who this person is or that person is and I know their name and I just know. And what I don’t know, he or she tells me.”

Amulya Malladi (1974) Indian writer

On formulating characters in “An Interview with Amulya Malladi” http://jaggerylit.com/an-interview-with-amulya-malladi/ in Jaggery

Personality , Thinking , People

“In fact the opposition of instinct and reason is mainly illusory. Instinct, intuition, or insight is what first leads to the beliefs which subsequent reason confirms or confutes; but the confirmation, where it is possible, consists, in the last analysis, of agreement with other beliefs no less instinctive. Reason is a harmonising, controlling force rather than a creative one. Even in the most purely logical realms, it is insight that first arrives at what is new.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Source: 1910s, Our Knowledge of the External World (1914), p. 21

“If we have no intuition of ourselves as independent, unmediated beings in the world, then we cannot conceive ourselves surviving our liberation; for what our liberation will do is dissolve the structures and dismantle the mechanisms by which Woman is mediated by Man. If we cannot imagine ourselves surviving this, we certainly will not make it happen.”

Marilyn Frye book The Politics of Reality

Source: The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory (1983), p. 80

World , Imagination , Making love

“The power of intuitive understanding will protect you from harm until the end of your days.”

Laozi (-604) semi-legendary Chinese figure, attributed to the 6th century, regarded as the author of the Tao Te Ching and fou…

Understanding

“Intuition is the art, peculiar to the human mind, of working out the correct answer from data that is, in itself, incomplete or even, perhaps, misleading.”

Isaac Asimov book Forward the Foundation

Source: Forward the Foundation

Art

“… It was one of the great livery-stableman's most masterly intuitions to have discovered that Americans want to get away from amusement even more quickly than they want to get to it.”

Edith Wharton The Age of Innocence

Source: The Age of Innocence

“Intuition is like reading a word without having to spell it out. A child can't do that because it has had so little experience. A grown-up person knows the word because they've seen it often before.”

Agatha Christie Murder at the Vicarage

Source: Murder at the Vicarage

Reading , Personality

“When I look in the mirror, I see a woman with secrets. When we don’t listen to our intuition, we abandon our souls. And we abandon our souls because we are afraid if we don’t, others will abandon us.”

Terry Tempest Williams (1955) American writer

Source: When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations on Voice

Secret , Soul

“For in spite of language, in spite of intelligence and intuition and sympathy, one can never really communicate anything to anybody.”

Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English writer

"Sermons in Cats the musical"
Music at Night and Other Essays (1931)

Intelligence , Communication

“Marriage, each of them realized intuitively, was about compromise and forgiveness. It was about balance, where one person complemented the other.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Choice

Travis Parker, Chapter 16, p. 203
Variant: Relationship is about forgiveness and compromise. It is about balance where one person complements each other.
Source: 2000s, The Choice (2007)

Marriage , Forgiveness , Personality

“Nothing comes unannounced, but many can miss the announcement. So it's very important to actually listen to your own intuition rather than driving through it.”

Terence McKenna (1946–2000) American ethnobotanist

“You cannot love without intuition.”

Graham Greene book The Quiet American

Source: The Quiet American

Love

“The child intuitively comprehends that although these stories are, they are not…”

Bruno Bettelheim (1903–1990) child psychologist and writer

Source: The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales

“Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.”

Immanuel Kant book Critique of Pure Reason

A 51, B 75
Source: Critique of Pure Reason (1781; 1787)
Context: Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind. The understanding can intuit nothing, the senses can think nothing. Only through their unison can knowledge arise.

“I learnt another valuable lesson that night: listen to the quiet voice inside. Intuition is the noise of the mind.”

Bear Grylls (1974) Chief Scout, adventurer, author

Source: Mud, Sweat and Tears

Night

“The really valuable thing is intuition.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Although similar to many of Einstein's comments about the importance of intuition and imagination, no sources for this can be found prior to The Psychology of Consciousness by Robert Evan Ornstein (1973), p. 68 http://books.google.com/books?id=0Yh9AAAAMAAJ&q=%22really+valuable+thing+is+intuition%22#search_anchor, where there is no mention of where the quote was originally made. A number of early sources from the 1980s and 1990s attribute it to The Intuitive Edge by Philip Goldberg (1983), which also provides no original source.
Disputed

“All this time I'd thought we were strangers, and it turned out we knew each other intuitively, in our bones, in our blood. It was kind of romantic. Catastrophically romantic.”

Gillian Flynn book Gone Girl

Source: Gone Girl

Time

“This is the essence of intuitive heuristics: when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.”

Daniel Kahneman book Thinking, Fast and Slow

Source: Thinking, Fast and Slow

Question

“I never wanted to be away from the family. Intuitively, I knew how easily distances could harden and become permanent.”

Junot Díaz book Drown

Source: Drown

Family

“Don't try to comprehend with your mind. Your minds are very limited. Use your intuition.”

Madeleine L'Engle A Wind in the Door

Source: A Wind in the Door

“Our rational minds can never understand what has happened, but our hearts.. if we can keep them open to God, will find their own intuitive way.”

Ram Dass (1931–2019) American contemporary spiritual teacher and the author of the 1971 book Be Here Now

God , Way , Understanding , Heart

“Intuition is really a sudden immersion of the soul into the universal current of life.”

Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist

Source: The Alchemist

Life , Soul , Universe

“Intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.”

Jonathan Haidt (1963) American psychologist

Source: The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion

“Faith is a passionate intuition.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

Source: Garbled version of c. l 1295 of Despondency Corrected (Vol. 5 of W's Poetical Works on Gurenberg)

Faith , Passion

“Your intuition knows what to write, so get out of the way.”

Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) American writer

Way

“To become really good at anything, you have to practice and repeat, practice and repeat, until the technique becomes intuitive”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Source: Aleph (2011)
Context: Routine has nothing to do with repetition. To become really good at anything, you have to practice and repeat, practice and repeat, until the technique becomes intuitive.

“You are using your own moral intuitions to authenticate the wisdom of the Bible - and then, in the next moment, you assert that we human beings cannot possibly rely upon our own intuitions to rightly guide us in the world.”

Sam Harris Letter to a Christian Nation

Source: Letter to a Christian Nation

Wisdom , World

“We are all born with extraordinary powers of imagination, intelligence, feeling, intuition, spirituality, and of physical and sensory awareness. (p.9)”

Ken Robinson (1950) UK writer

Source: The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

Feeling , Imagination , Intelligence

“You must train your intuition - you must trust the small voice inside you which tells you exactly what to say, what to decide.”

Ingrid Bergman (1915–1982) Film actress from Sweden

Training

“I believe in intuition and inspiration.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Cosmic Religion : With Other Opinions and Aphorisms (1931) by Albert Einstein, p. 97; also in Transformation : Arts, Communication, Environment (1950) by Harry Holtzman, p. 138. This may be an edited version of some nearly identical quotes from the 1929 Viereck interview below.
1930s
Context: I believe in intuition and inspiration. … At times I feel certain I am right while not knowing the reason. When the eclipse of 1919 confirmed my intuition, I was not in the least surprised. In fact I would have been astonished had it turned out otherwise. Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution. It is, strictly speaking, a real factor in scientific research.