Sensation vs Intuition

Sensation and intuition are the perception or irrational functions. They perceive stuff, and perception is more straightforward than judgment. Perception refers to the mere reception and identification of information. It gathers information, and merely experiences events, plain facts, and observes phenomena. Jung stated that for perception, “Elementary facts come into this category; the fact, for example, that the earth has a moon, that chlorine is an element ... etc.”

Sensation

Sensation is concerned with the concrete, realistic details. It is concerned with given information. That is, information that is specified and explicit. So overall, sensation is a focus on the concrete reality of things. In Michael Pierce’s words, sensation perceives the actual current nature of a thing.

Much like extroversion, sensation is quite straightforward, so all that can be said about it is quite clear and simple.

Intuition

Intuition is a bit more complex; at least how I see it. When someone learns, discovers, or knows something by intuition, they instinctively get the gist of that thing. They get a hunch of the general but relatively vague idea or notion of the situation. Therefore, intuition is concerned with general notions, concepts, and insights. Consequently, a lot of other fundamental elements are ascribed to intuition.

In order for intuition to understand something, it needs to form a general concept of the situation, as previously implied. A concept is not only a notion, but also a representation apprehended by the mind; i.e., a mental representation. Accordingly, intuition is also concerned with what a thing represents. When one asks what a thing represents, they are seeking to see what it is like. Therefore, another element of intuition is the fact that it seeks out connections and relations between things. Intuition can hence be described as a “network of insights,” so to speak.

Now, as said before, intuition is concerned with general notions. When something is notional, it exists hypothetically, speculatively, and imaginatively. This connects to my earlier point about intuition getting a hunch; it makes conjectures and hypotheses. Jung’s primary claims about intuition is that it deals with possibilities, and that it apprehends images from the unconscious. What does he mean by this?

My primary claim about the intuitive function is that it is concerned with concepts because concepts are concerned with everything that isn’t necessarily realistic; that is, possibilities, notions, images, representations, hypotheses and speculations. Hence, the process of intuition is to conceive things; the process of speculating and insightfully guessing on the possible nature or essence of a situation; it’s seeking to grasp the possible nature or general idea of something through guessing or hypothesizing. On its own, this process is quite immediate. People can usually just “get” things, but that mostly comes out of guesswork; aka, intuition.

The intuitive function is also known to insightfully predict or anticipate future events; another reason why Jung stated that it is concerned with possibilities. It vaguely envisions things, to put it shortly. It can do this through pattern-recognition; when it sees the big-picture, a pattern can start to emerge, and hence hypotheses, guesses, and insights on future possibilities are formed. As Jung stated, “intuition points to possibilities as to whence it came and wherever it is going in a given situation.” And when Jung states that intuition is a perception via the unconscious, he means that intuition apprehends what is hidden or implicit in a situation, which is why it’s considered insightful.

Summary

So, given all of what was just stated, intuition can be defined as the perception of the possible big picture of a situation, apprehending hypotheses. While sensation is the perception of the concrete reality of a situation. Or all in all, sensation prefers concrete, specific information, while intuition prefers abstract, notional information