The intuition of NTs

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Well sure there are different levels of inherent ability in different skills among people, due to numerous factors. The problem is that by just labeling it as "intuition" it treats it as this mystical quality that can never be taught to any degree. There are also different ways to teach and different ways to implement the functionally similar/same thing. My son's language is driven by written rather than spoken form, in a very real way he has read before he talked. It is likely that he'll always be like that. However keeping that and a few other things about in mind, instead of trying to teach him like a typ, has allowed him to learn a lot of things.

Same deal with mathematics really, only there is a very different set of people that have problems there. For me mathematics has always been near to breathing. It's actually where I first learned about how to hone my "instincts", to pull them apart, clean them out, tune them up, and retool them. From there I figured out some basics about how to deconstruct external algorithms and "program" them into my subconsciousness. I don't know everything about it, and I'm not sure how well I could teach someone with poor skill in doing so. But I'm only 1/2 way through life, so I've got some time. And I've got some "test subjects" at home here.

Interesting example, I might have actually pulled that off. The time would make it tight, sure. But I effectively self taught myself computers in my early teens, in near isolation from pretty much any source of technical information.

Talk about negative thinking. You are calling in the fix on our poor AS subject. Plus the phrase I highlighted? Nonsense. "Objective reality" hardly ever is. Even Quantum Mechanics at it's core says that reality at the subatomic level isn't entirely objective. You are always viewing reality through a subjective filter. As such social context is reality. Which is the real problem with the AS person in your example. Not looking big picture enough. (although it wouldn't be you, right, because you've learned to be careful around blood ties). And it is something that NTs do too, get focused in and don't look at the big picture. Or make assumptions that turn out to be incorrect. Like maybe the boss loathes his nephew and only has him on due to a family obligation. The Boss is happy for the excuse to fire his butt [even if the suspition about embezzling is incorrect] and our 'hapless', yet observant AS scores a feather in his hat. *shrug*

Actually there is no consensus agreement on what quantum mechanics tells us, only that it works. This is why Richard Feynman said "nobody understands quantum mechanics", as opposed to special relativity, which made sense to more or less everyone who understood the theory and accepted that certain classical assumptions were wrong. The most common interpretation of quantum mechanics is that the state of a particle is described by the wave function, which is probabilistic (as opposed to deterministic). Even if that is "the way things work", many things in physics above the quantum level - and in life in general - appear to behave in a deterministic fashion.

That's not to say I'm taking anyone's side here; I have to admit most of this debate doesn't make much sense to me.

These points of yours are all valid, but, as you point out (implicitly), the frame of reference is important in any social discussion. Obviously I mean "objective reality" when observed through a mammalian sensory system programmed with human thought functions common to walking, talking people who share enough neurological similarity to work in modern-day Western culture.

So leaving the quantum-mechanical frame of reference aside for a moment, the individual whose social context awareness is more adept (NT) than another's (AS), will likely have more "lucky" acts based on intuition, in the sense of professional advances and avoiding getting in trouble with acting on intuition (by not "suppressing" socially risky intuition). I think that picking an example where you tell the boss his relative might be an embezzler is pretty good. A lot of NTs probably would say nothing, choosing to not get involved at all, since surviving that situation would require the boss is neutral toward the nephew or wants to get rid of him.

Some time ago the clerk put my cheque inside her purse. The following week I was asked for the cheque by another clerk, and I pointed to the first clerk and said "she put it away in her purse!". They both laughed and brought the "purse" and took out my cheque. Turns out it's not a purse but a pens case they use in that office to put cheques for 3rd appointments in 1 same day (long story, this was at the hospital). Each time I see them we still laugh.

I guess NTs are better at the use of intuition for connecting, but not at the insight of what to do about the relationships they form out of those connections... If I could choose, I'd rather have my insight than their intuition.

That sounds like progress.

Magliabechi.

It certainly feels that way...

It probably would be tough to condition yourself to overcome some of the uncertainty. Although "instinct" certainly isn't inherently irrational, that's a common misunderstanding. In fact, because rational thought includes inference it shares a lot in common with instinct. The one difference is being able to consciously be aware of the full path and spell it out explicitly. Unfortunately that causes a lot of overhead as well as limits how much of your intellect you can bring to bear on the problem. So ultimately limiting yourself to conscious thought is crippling yourself.

EDIT: One way to put this, to highlight the irony, is that your instinct is to reject the uncertainty of instinct. Something ingrained deep in you feels uncomfortable in the face of any form of "loosening up". But this, given the reality of humans lacking omnipotence in any significant life scenario and the limitations of conscious thought, is in truth illogical (or pathological if you like, but not in the clinical sense ). You have got serious junk clogging up your instincts. One common (or is it universal?) aspect of early interventions with ASC children is to desensitize them to these feelings of dread of the unknown, and of surprises occurring, that drives the rigidity.

Missing my point I think. You are fixating on and defining things in a social setting, and only one aspect of it. You are letting it dominate and limit you. EDIT: You are also focusing on the false dichotomy, of objective reality and the social setting. You are mysticising (no, not a real word ) social setting, which is giving up on trying to figure out what is going on. Like instincts, it isn't magic.

Losing at the game? You've got a number of choices to change it. Change your level of abilities by learning some skills. Change the rules. Change the venue. Change the definition of a win. One or more of these something more in your favour.

Incidentally it is unlikely that I wouldn't get involved with your second example. I tend not to STFU where other people might. Perhaps to my determent at times, but that's where I go. And you don't even need the boss to be neutral, to start with. There are ways to proceed. I tend to "get lucky". I don't succeed every time but when I do it makes up for it because I risk the failure and make things happen.

I started life as an introvert. Truth is I have poor native social skills, or at least very uneven skills natively. Many, many years ago for my first summer job I moved to a distant city. Through the work baseball team I met and could have got laid by an fabulously hot young woman. But I didn't jump at it, I wasn't very proactive. I think there was one misunderstanding that cost me it, it was sort of weird tipping point. There was only a window of a couple weeks and then she met someone else and instead of me having a summer of hot all-nighters (she was military so in good shape ) with her it was him. I moved but I've never forgotten that, I'm forcefully dragged back every time I hear an INXS song. But I also decided that I wasn't going to miss opportunities like that any more, I was going to trust my "gut" ((EDIT: because I had already developed some understanding of how to use it for other uses )) and save myself the regret. And if I happened to screw up in some particular instance I would just use that as a learning experience and move on. Not an easy task since I've got a perfectionist streak to me (one I've long fought and continue to fight). So I picked myself up, forced myself to go out the door in a city I didn't know and expose myself to people and their weird ways, and spent a good deal of time reflecting on why they did what they did and why I did what I did.

Practice, the great equalizer.

P.S. I haven't read the Luck Factor [yet], I have heard of it and it was good to hear someone trying to test and quantify what I've "known" for years. It is an ancient idea that our habits, how we approach life, largely control our "luck". Sounds like a good, practical book on the subject.

Brief clarification on Wiseman's book. The word "intuition" as described in the book is merely the word used to describe hints from your subconscious. It's not in or out of context, it just "is" and sometimes it's accurate and other times it's not. What he points out in the book is that strong gut-feelings about a particular course of action are accurate more often than not. What it means is that you've had a series of similar experiences that indicate that a particular course of action will result in positive or negative consequences. The only difference is that you can't consciously recall the "training" that tells you why action x is likely to have the result you want. So there's nothing mystical at all in his description of "intuition" -- although you may be accustomed to people using the label in a mystical way.

Not taking into account the hidden interests and motivations of those involved in a certain situation, and therefore losing badly, is very typical of me. I wonder if some are born with a bigger general interest and others are born with a more "people" approach and therefore the latter have lots of social savvy much sooner, while we Aspies have more insight sooner..?

Everything goes so well for neurotypical people that they don't have the loads of personal mistakes to extract wisdom from that most autistic people do. In addition, because of their normal social skills, most neurotypical people do not spend the amount of time observing their peers that many autistic people do.

For these reasons, the NT mind is probably not as well trained to deal with the possiblity for error.

That's very true too, I think. I always say NTs get cleverer and Aspies get wiser.