Science Forums 2

[CraigD]

Originally Posted by Jay-qu

I dont know - I have heard many accounts of people that say they had instincts of things going wrong but they where able to prevent it in one way or another…

In this thread, I think it’s important to distinguish between the several different things to which the word “instinct” commonly refers.

Racoon defined it for this thread as

instinct: (n.) - an Inborn tendency to to act or respond in a particular way

Jay-qu is using it with a different meaning – its most common meaning, I think – roughly synonymous with “hunch” or “intuition”.

While these 2 definitions may overlap – we and other animals likely have inborn, “hardwired” aptitudes for forming and following hunches – in the context of this thread, they’re entirely different ideas.