Instinct vs. Reason

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This topic is an extension of a thread in Whatnots that brought up the issue of acceptable or expected behavior during an earthquake (give into the instinct to run or follow Emergency Management's "stay inside" approach).

The whole thing got me thinking....are we governed by our instincts, despite all the reasoning ability we have? Should we ignore our instincts in times of dire need? I know, for me, there are times when my instincts say one thing and reason says something else. Everyone has been in situations where, for some strange reason, you sense danger...red flags go up, you get goose bumps and maybe breathe a little harder-yet logically, everything seems to be in its place. For myself, I usually follow my instincts-if my gut tells me something-from experience, I've learned that it's usually correct.

So, how about you? Instinct or Reason? How important a role does instinct play in your life? Or should we all leave instinct to the animals and live by reason?

 

I think that what seperates mankind from other creatures is the ability to use reason. However, I also believe that too much reasoning can cause paralysis. We still are animals and have thousands of years of instinct bred into us. I try to use both.

 

In my opinion I like to think of the human mind/body as a scale, and the weights are instinct and reason. Instincts is the most basic part, the inner beast if you will, which forces us to react to certain things in a certain manner. It is also the instinct that is connected to the "fight or flee" situations. Reason, holds the instinct in check, allowing us to analyze and choose the best course of action available, so you are not to run in mindlessly. The instinct keeps the reason in check by allowing to act quickly, and spontaeneously, so you will not spend a long time standing there just deciding what to do.

 

I go for instinct having the upper hand over reason, no matter what I would like to think. Sure reason is what put us apart (or should do, as I sometimes think ), and we might be convinced that we are the ones in control. But what about all this in-/subconscious stuff ? Isn't that instinct ? It sure is not reason.
Now, I am no psychologist, but I know one thing: instinct kept a lot of other life-forms alive for quite a long time. You really think we would be doing so well without it ?

 

A surprising fact:

Psychologists believe that the only instinct humans have is to swallow.

I don't agree with them. Are we primarily instinctive creatures? Not from what I've seen. Then again, I haven't seen enough of the world to know what it's like in other parts.

Reason is certainly the most powerful tool that humans have (just think about how often you make a judgement call in the course of a single day). I'd have to go with the reason camp and say that humans tend to use rationality more often than not.

 

I agree with Rastor; reason is what we tend to steer by in day-to-day life.

Personally I believe that instinct will kick in in those "immediate reaction needed"-situations, when there's no time to think things through. In all other situations, provided there's at least a second or two available to consider the opportunities available and the consequences thereof, pretty much everyone would opt to use reason. Maybe not always good reason, but reason nonetheless.

 

Dictionary Definition

1 the innate capacity of an animal to respond to a given stimulus in a relatively fixed way

2 inborn intuitive power

3 a natural and apparently innate aptitude

I suppose earthquakes fall under the first definition, which doesn't exist as an either/or option where reason is concerned.

The second definition, intuition does though;

Reason allows people to make decisions based on the presented facts.

Instinct is a filter through which those presented facts are first passed. Good instincts will subconciously separate out the probable lies from the probable truths, allowing the right decision to be made in a fraction of the time.

People with good instincts spend more time answering the question 'How did you know...?' than they do making the decision in the first place.

Often the 'How did you know...?' question cannot be answered rationally, making people who trust their instincts appear to be irrational, and landing them in a lot of trouble when the decision turns out to be the wrong one, (or is made to appear to be the wrong decision by the people affected by the decision,eg. "I was just about to pay your boss, and then you decided to put me under pressure, so now I won't").

There is a peculiar effect that occurs when people are put in life threatening situations, time's passage appears to slow down. Actions that could only have taken a split second to occur appear to the 'victim' to last for several seconds. To the 'victim' it feels like they are moving and thinking at a normal pace, yet from the outside it looks like the 'victim' has unnaturally quick reactions. The instinct-reason partnership is still working, only at lightning speed. In such a situation people are said to be 'acting on instinct'. Movies try to portray this using slow motion shots.

The number of times that you have had difficulty answering the 'How did you know...?' question is a good indicataion of how much use you make of your instinct fact-filter.

[ September 13, 2003, 02:36: Message edited by: Bluin ]

 

Is reason not created by humans?

 

er.. and what exactly do you base this on to call it a fact? First of all I think that statement has a very precise definition of instinct, compared to what we percieve it as here. Else it seems very oneway minded to me.

As for the original question, how important a role it plays in my life? I dont know. Not a very great one I think. I prefer reason most of the time, however if we abandoned all instinct I'm afraid we'd be something very conservative. I consider instincts that which make us react spontaneously and without such, the world in my mind would become a very dull place to live in.

Reason is in my mind that which makes sense explainable by facts, and as such I wouldn't say humans invented it. It's a word for a process, isn't it?

 

There's quite a few instincts I override with reason. Or at least, have learned to...

 

Bluin wrote:

You have a good point here. However I think a better definition would have been: good instincts separate the probable from the improbable, allowing to make a decision that best fits the situation which is most likely to happen. That is what I think is happening.
Reason is applied only after this process has taken place and might overrule it when we "know better". After all, instincts have been developed and fine-tuned for survival, not for the kind of social life we lead.
In situations of great stress, however (fear, emotional distress, extreme pressure) our insticts show up their full scope.

As for the slow-motion part, what can I say ? I experienced it as well once or twice (biking is dangerous business sometimes...) and all I can say is that I remember it happening at a slower rate, but whether I actually experienced it in slow motion or not, in all sincerity, I cannot say.

 

I say reason over instinct, ergo, mind over matter.

Sometimes times instinct is needed, but not very much.

 

Both. That's why I'm so fascinating and captivating.

 

My psychology studies have all been within the context of Organisational Behaviour classes so very narrow in scope. I therefore may not fully understand the distinctions between "instinct" and "reason", which would be a fatal flaw in the theory I'm about to express. /disclaimer

There is a time and a place for each. Instinct makes poorer-quality, but faster decisions, whereas Reason produces much finer decisions if you have time to wait around for them.

Instinct allows you to reach out your hand to catch a ball as it sails past you. The degree to which your instincts are naturally good, and to which you've honed them through practice, will determine whether or not you will catch it.

Reason allows you to plot a graph describing the velocity and trajectory of the ball and use calculus to determine the end point at which it will land. The extent of your forebrain intelligence, or "IQ", and the degree to which you've honed your mathematical skills through study and practice, will determine whether or not you will be correct.

If you have a week to calculate a satellite's orbit, you definitely want to use reason instead of instinct to do the calculus in your forebrain. If it's the bottom of the ninth and have to catch the ball in the next few seconds to prevent the opposing team scoring the winning home run, you definitely want to use instinct. It's the same basic task, i.e. calculus, just done in different ways.

Time and a place for each type of skill. Which is why there aren't many astrophysicists in the Texas Rangers, and why Joe DiMaggio was not recruited to NASA.

[Edited for spelling]

[ September 13, 2003, 19:10: Message edited by: Sprite ]

 

I'm not calling a fact, I'm calling it a theory. One that I won't subscribe to. It's been in debate among the psychological society for a while.

I'll admit that my own psychological studies have been limited, so I'm not sure of the major details of this theory.

 

Instinct? What are you talking about? There is no instinct in human. You place a five human years old kid in forest, the kid will die for sure (unless you place a pair of twins and they were suckled by wolf, but that's another story). You place a 5 dog years old puppy in forest, the puppy will, has a large chance, survive. When you are sick, you stay hopelessly sick without doctor. When a monkey is sick, it will instictively find herbs to cure itself.

Culture is what we human have and depend on. Culture is the kit of survival, the knowledge passed down from one generation to another. To the extreme, without being taught how to use chopsticks, all Chinese kids would die of hunger even with food presented infront of them.

We are all shaped according to our past experiences. Why do you want to drink orange juice on Friday afternoon? Not because of any instinctive reason. It is a large combination of all your past experience that made you drink orange juice on Friday 1.23 p.m. If you haven't had orange juice in the past, you would know of this beverage. If you haven't influenced by your friends that drinking orange juice is "cool", you wouldn't drink it that time. If your first love wasn't a big orange juice fan, you wouldn't order a orange juice for good old time's sake.

With all that said, how can i make decision based on instinct when i don't actually have one?

 

instinct is not the same as being physically able to do something, like survive in the wilds alone.

Instinct is when you hear a crack from the darkness and all your senses are put in high alert mode, it's the part of the brain that dates back to that of a reptile.
It primarily controls stuff like reflexes, observation, readiness to act.

 

Of course there is, as Lokken and others already pointed out. And actually it dates back way before reptilian evolution. Just observe a fly avoiding being swatted.
As for:

This is such a ridiculously wrong argument that I shouldn't even bother answering to it, but anyway: a 5 year old kid is a juvenile of a species with a high degree of parental care. A five year old dog has not been a puppy for nearly four years. He probably already has plenty of granchildren. So, if you really want to compare (which is plain wrong, since we talk two totally different species), you should take a real puppy, i.e. few months old. Which does not have one fat chance of survival (and guess why ? Because at that stage of life he still is supposed to be cared for by his parents).

So now not only do you deny instinct, you also refuse to acknowledge learning behaviour.

Beside the Friday afternoon part (which is just a restriction that you impose on drinking juice) I drink orange juice because I instinctively know that orange is good. For the same reason I stay away from crap and rotting stuff. There is nothing intrinsically repulsing in them - in fact, a huge number of species are instinctively attracted by the same odours - but by instinct I am repelled by them. Why ? Because eating rotting stuff is bad for me and eating crap is a waste of time, since it is already-processed food.

With all that said, I do not deny the importance of culture in human beings, but do not forget that by instinct and through it life forms have evolved for hundreds of millions of years. We are but one product of this evolution.
If you want to be anthropocentric, be my guest, but to flat out deny instinct in humans is going way too far IMHO.

[Edit: corrected some spelling mistakes]

[ September 14, 2003, 16:12: Message edited by: Kralizek ]

 

Some human cultures - French and British both come to mind - do have a taste for the smells of decay, and almost anyone can acquire the taste. We just don't think of it is "rotted" if it's a food we like, such as a well-aged Black Angus steak (which is not eaten until you have to cut several inches of mould off, hence the high price). We are not instinctively repulsed by carrion; our digestive system is very like that of dogs or pigs.

I like well-aged steaks, game birds and hares that have been hung until putrid, and cheeses filled with mould (roquefort) and liquified from decay (camembert or brie). In Corsica there is a cheese that is not traditionally eaten until it is infested with maggots. That would be too much for me, but I do like Corsican donkey salami in which the hazelnuts have turned green and slimy.

A Margaret Visser article I read recently said that the only things instinctively considered unfit for food in all human cultures are hair and paper. And I'm not so sure about the "paper".

 

@ Sprite: you are most right. Point taken.

Now, it would be interesting to know if and which one of those two behaviours (the general unpleasantness we feel toward rotting material and the "exceptions" we make in the case of food) is innate and which one is learned. Well, I don't know for sure, but my feeling is that we learned to sometimes overcome our repulsion when in the past it turned out to be worth. If this would be the case, the reasoning in my previous post would still hold, bar some exceptions.

One more point I feel deserves discussion:

I am not trying to split hair (hope you excuse the pun here), but IMO there is an incoherence in using the terms "instinct" and "culture" in this sentence. I might have a too biological approach, but to me instinct is an innate property of human beings, whereas cultures are "learned" (sorry, I am at loss for a better word here, hope you get me). While it is interesting that no culture eats hair, the interesting "foods" are those enjoyed in some cultures but not in others. To me it sounds like members of the cultures where "special" food is present learned to eat something (duly prepared, no doubt) which was instinctively repulsing to them at the raw stage.

Guess I have been rambling for long enough already.