Ways Of Knowing Are A Check On Instinctive Judgements

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking is a book written by Malcolm Gladwell. This book introduces the concept of “thin slicing”. The concept refers to how in a split second or blink of an eye people can make an unconscious and accurate assessment of someone. Using the concept of thin slicing we can determine what is really important within the first few seconds when meeting someone. Malcolm Gladwell explained that first impressions or spontaneous decisions can be just as important as decisions that are made carefully and planned out. According to Gladwell, people make better decisions with quick judgments than they do with a lot of analysis. Gladwell believes that the power

In this reading by Gazzaniga: “Toward a Universal Ethics”, we are presented with The Trolley Dilemma. The dilemma in abstract moral reasoning studies most often presented by researchers is the trolley problem. This is an experiment in ethics and moral justice. A situation built on abstract moral reasoning. The question here is “Are morals something that is innate or are they something we learn?”

Some might say, our sense perception does lead us to justifiable instinctive judgments, because the knowledge we gain through it about others’ appearances does reflect their personality. This is only true to a certain extent. If our instinctive judgments can really be checked by sense perception or intuition, then why did some couples who claim to have experienced a “love at first sight” end up falling apart? Because their relationships lack to be “checked” by the most important factor – reason. How long would a relationship last really depends on knowledge gained by reasoning, such as how well the couple’s would view and value match each other’s; how their personalities are complementary, etc. A couple knows their first instinct is right when they decide they are indeed the right ones for each other by logically reasoning out their compatibility. Therefore, reason is ultimately the “check” on our instinctive judgments. To what extent can we rely on our emotion to make good choices at crisis instinctively? Ethical decisions are often to be made in situations where we don’t have enough time nor a clear, conscious mind to make the best judgments, and these decisions made without logical reasoning are intuitive judgments. The man who paid a heavy price for making an irresponsible ethical decision was the captain of the capsized South Korea ferry. He abandoned his passengers and prioritized his own life at the

In one experiment, involving various bad smells, it was noted that the participants that had been exposed to a mild-stink or strong-stink smell were more severe in their moral judgements than participants exposed to no bad smell. In all four experiments, the same results were obtained, participants that felt disgust were likely to be more severe in their judgments. This paper concludes that participants who believe in their intuitions were often tricked by outside forces, such as a bad smell. Noting this phenomenon, the paper suggests that self-awareness of these outside factors can help mitigate their effect. However, they also suggest it is not wise to completely remove somatic markers. In one study, the patients were not able to incorporate feelings and sensations into their decision making; as a result, the patients were unable to come to conclusions on any simple subject matter. The paper concludes that it is ok to rely on these intuitions even if they can be easily influenced, but it also says we must be aware of factors that can distort our intuitions. By following this methodology, one can mitigate making biased decisions due to his or her

Blink is a book that analyzes the way people make decisions. According to the author, Malcolm Gladwell, people use one of two strategies to come to a decision. The first strategy is a conscious one. When using this strategy, people think about what they have learned and develop an answer. The second is an unconscious strategy in which a person's brain reaches a conclusion in a matter of seconds, often times without awareness. These conclusions are what we generally refer to as hunches or instincts and, it is the development and reliability of these types of conclusions that Gladwell focuses on in this book. In doing so, Gladwell sets out to accomplish three tasks. The first is to prove that decisions made very quickly can be as

World renowned journalist and best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell, in his novel, Blink, discusses the step by step analysis of how the first few seconds impacts our decision making skills. Gladwell’s purpose is to explain how the initial reaction we face and how our brain responds to an event is far more intricate than we may think. By utilizing the information presented through his book via psychological tests,real life stories, and interactive puzzles, Malcolm Gladwell emphasizes how one can be able to control his snap judgements to become better decision makers in everyday life.

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell tells of many people and events that had disastrous or incredible outcomes because of the power of the subconscious to make decisions that the conscious mind is unaware of. Throughout Blink, Gladwell presents many ways to show that the mind and body give off hints to one’s true feelings in the “blink” of an eye. One of his many compelling arguments is the idea of “priming,” while one of his less compelling arguments is the idea of anyone having too much information to make a correct decision. Priming is such a compelling argument because it can account for such a large change in mindset. However, the idea of having too much information is misleading and confusing. Both arguments have the potential to change how one looks at their own

While the questions incorporated in Blink include whether it is best to listen to untrained intuition, expert advice from a source not oneself, or highly researched data, the book by Gladwell illuminates cognitive psychology, creating a curiosity regarding human behavior in which all can

While continuing to argue that although snap judgments are an important part of human nature and a powerful tool for understanding the world, still snap judgments can be prejudicial and objectively wrong or even can be horrifically wrong, which the author calls “The dark side of the snap judgments” . The author explain his arguments with the example of Warren Harding, one of the worst presidents in American history—an incompetent man who, Gladwell argues, only won the election because he had been considered as dazzle personality for presidency. The second example given by the author in the final chapter of Blink is about interpreting facial expressions—one of the most basic kind of snap judgments that we make. The author argues that Amadou Diallo’s death was the result of some bad snap judgments and mistaken interpretations of body

As illustrated in the text, the first task of Blink is to convince you of a simple fact: decisions made very quickly can be every bit as good as decisions made cautiously and deliberately. The second task of Blink is to answer when should we trust our instincts, and when should we be wary of them? The third and most important task of this book is to convince you that our

We have been taught to stop and carefully consider all the options/factors involved before making an important decision. But in Blink, Malcolm Gladwell finds that in complex situations, our initial two-second judgments, our blink moments, are often more accurate than judgments derived from lengthy, painstaking analysis. Although Gladwell is careful to explore situations where two-second judgments fail, the most interesting scenarios are where rapid cognition succeeds. It contradicts reason to think that a two-second judgment could be more accurate than a carefully made analysis, but in many cases it is.

‘Instinctive judgment’ is the motivation of an action in response to external stimuli based on either behaviour, innateness, or impulsion without involving reason (Encyclopædia Britannica, 2014). Although intuition is often associated instinct, they are separate concepts because instinct is inherent and intuition is acquired; instinct is the inherent inclination to react to a situation because of an inherited configuration of thought while intuition is the ability to acquire knowledge without thought. There are as many meanings to ‘check’ as there are for ‘instinctive judgment’, but in this essay the word means to verify as to correctness but also stops or restrains false judgments from becoming permanent. If the statement is interpreted with these

When an individual is proposed with a moral dilemma they will often seek the advice of others rather than acting solely upon their immediate cultural, familial, and cognitive predispositions; suggesting that judgments are also made about the moral judgments of others (Rest, Cooper, Coder, Masanz & Anderson, 1974).

An intuitive moral judgment is immediate judgment that requires no thinking or reflection. In other words, an intuitive moral judgment is simply a judgment we make with a minimum of thinking about it. An intuitive moral judgment is an automatic response to our understanding of a situation or an action. Many moral psychologists believe that moral intuitions are mainly based on our feelings rather than reasoning.

“Blink” by Malcolm Gladwell is a book about how we think without thinking, about choices that seem to be made in an instant – in the blink of an eye – that actually aren’t as simple as they seem. The book deals with the smallest components of our everyday lives—the content and origin of those instantaneous impressions and conclusions that spontaneously arise whenever we meet a new person or confront a complex situation or have to make a decision under conditions of stress.