Discussion Forum > Role of Structure in Intuitive Systems
Aaron:
I think the first thing in answering your question is to establish what exactly intuition is.
As I've said many times in the past, intuition is not some magic voice from above telling you what to do. It is the result of your learning, experience and practice.
So for example a top-ranking tennis player can intuitively tell what their opponent is going to do, what their weak spots are, and so on. This is the result of long experience.
Another example is a fire chief arriving at a fire. They can intuitively tell what the fire is likely to do, what the dangers are and the best way to tackle the fire.
Similarly a pilot who has many flying hours under their belt and has also spent a lot of training in a flight simulator can intuitively react to an emergency situation.
One message to get from this is that your intuition varies from subject to subject. And every person will have their own individual "intuition set".
Another message is that structure is there to support intuition, not to get in its way. The top-ranking tennis player has a training schedule which is highly structured. The fire chief has a team which has been trained in fire-fighting drills until every action is automatic. The pilot has a check-list of actions to take in every situation.
I think the first thing in answering your question is to establish what exactly intuition is.
As I've said many times in the past, intuition is not some magic voice from above telling you what to do. It is the result of your learning, experience and practice.
So for example a top-ranking tennis player can intuitively tell what their opponent is going to do, what their weak spots are, and so on. This is the result of long experience.
Another example is a fire chief arriving at a fire. They can intuitively tell what the fire is likely to do, what the dangers are and the best way to tackle the fire.
Similarly a pilot who has many flying hours under their belt and has also spent a lot of training in a flight simulator can intuitively react to an emergency situation.
One message to get from this is that your intuition varies from subject to subject. And every person will have their own individual "intuition set".
Another message is that structure is there to support intuition, not to get in its way. The top-ranking tennis player has a training schedule which is highly structured. The fire chief has a team which has been trained in fire-fighting drills until every action is automatic. The pilot has a check-list of actions to take in every situation.
March 14, 2021 at 10:10 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
Thanks for the clarification. I posted another post elucidating some of the things I think were coming out here, particularly in that I think I've been intuitively manifesting something more akin to a checklist, and thus, paradoxically, my intuition has been pushing strongly for a structure that it has put together for itself.
March 15, 2021 at 4:43 |
Aaron Hsu
Aaron Hsu
When we build interfaces that fit within their unique set of contexts, experiences, habits, jargon, and understanding, then, and only then, will we create designs that are truly intuitive.
April 22, 2021 at 2:19 |
Stephanie Sy
Stephanie Sy
I concur with Mark. It's not the elimination of structure that is most effective, it's simplifying it to its most basic form. When the structure is complicated, you spend your mental energy trying to grasp and work within the complicated structure. When it's simple, you just know the structure and your intuition has free reign within the simple box. When it's absent, you are stuck trying to work effectively in a box of equal complexity to the chaos around you. That is much harder than operating effectively within a simple system, though it may be easier than operating effectively in a convoluted system.
April 22, 2021 at 14:32 |
Alan Baljeu
Alan Baljeu
I guess the lowest hanging fruit might be sleep. Why not just let sleep be something that you do intuitively rather than structure it at a regular bed time or the like? And beyond that, what else might fall into this? How do we decide what should be structured and what should not be?