Gut Vs. Brain: The Body’s Best Decision-Making Organ
March 28th, 2010
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Is it best to make rational decisions with your brain, or just go with your gut? Are people who insist on logic making the best use of all available information, or are they missing out on something far more powerful?
We always hear that sometimes you just have to listen to your gut. What exactly is the gut, anyway? Dictionary.com offers this definition:
“the alimentary canal, esp. between the pylorus and the anus, or some portion of it”
If I had to pick a body part other than the brain to listen to, I’m not sure this would have been my first choice. Why not the skin, heart, or solar plexus, or even the appendix? But anyway, I’m willing to consider that maybe we do underestimate the decision-making power of our intestines.
I asked about it on Twitter, and got a couple of responses. @Armen said:
“My gut has told me some very smart things that I have ignored and paid for, but I hear your point there [that the brain is more likely to be right]…It sure is overrated. On the other hand, it is underrated by folks who ignore it until problems show up…Some that come to mind here are gut telling to see dentist, or to come clean on lie, or to try a biz opportunity”
But even if the gut works in these cases, is it the best source of advice?
Regarding the dentist, you can listen to the calendar that says to go every six months, or to your nerves that say you have a toothache. Regarding the lie, you could listen to your conscience and not lie in the first place.
As for the business opportunity, this is where I can see the gut being helpful. Many business ideas that looked crazy on paper have become huge successes. In these cases, only a gut feeling could convince someone to follow through without a logical reason.
But gut feelings can also lead people astray, such as the gambler who “just knows” that his luck is about to change (only it doesn’t). How do you sort out the accurate gut feelings from all the rest?
Maybe the best idea is to use the gut not as a replacement for the brain, but as an idea generator to brainstorm (intestinestorm?) potential options before handing them over to the brain for evaluation.
Back to Twitter, @MiscBytes said:
“Gut” is just our brain using shortcuts it’s already figured out!
http://www.miscbytes.com/gut-feelings/
The linked post mentions a book that talks about the brain quickly using rules of thumb to make its best guess without analyzing all the data. This best guess is known as a “gut feeling.”
It’s not always right, of course. Gut feelings would tell you that a bowling ball falls faster than a grape, that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, that there are no irrational numbers in the Cantor set, and that it’s better to upgrade a Prius than a Suburban (see When Logic And Intuition Fail).
But while poring over all the data might be better in theory, a gut feeling often works well when facing a shortage of time. An excess of data can also overwhelm you, blinding you to the answer that your intuition can clearly see.
Right now, think of some either-or decision you have to make, something you haven’t thought out yet. Going to work tomorrow vs. taking a day off, having a healthy meal vs. junk food, buying this house vs. the other one, something like that.
I’m going to flip a coin to help you decide. Heads, you take the first option. Tails, you take the second. Ready?
The coin is in the air…I’ve caught it, and it’s…
But I don’t need to say what it is. You already know what you want it to be. This is your gut talking. Does it conflict with your brain? And which organ will win?
Photo by mikebaird
March 28th, 2010 at 9:54 pm
Hi Hunter.
You bring up a valid point here. The gut is not as reliable as concrete factors or pointers, like if a dentist in September told you to get your next cleaning in 4 months, and 7 months has passed. In that case, the gut might be informing that the time is coming, but the advice is also pointing to going to get a cleaning.
It took me a second to think about this, but you are right. The gut is okay as a backup, but it is certainly not as reliable as thought and based conclusions. It makes sense then that conclusions or facts would not be as relevant for potential future efforts with random variables, as you pointed out there. The gut then comes in handy for taking risks.
The point about the gut being the brain taking shortcuts sounds about right. I will keep that in mind for future reference.
March 28th, 2010 at 10:14 pm
Gut feeling can mean different things to different people. Some people receive intuitive messages as a sensory feeling, often in the gut area. The gut also has a brain of its own — enteric nervous system — which works like a small brain and independently from the brain. This is science, whether you learned it in high school or not.
How these two are related, I don’t know.
But I can tell you that, whenever I dismissed my gut feeling, I had to pay for it sooner or later. The brain is limited to verifiable data, the gut is not and therefore it’s wiser, I think.
March 28th, 2010 at 11:37 pm
I feel like the value of a following a gut feeling is in trusting your own wisdom. If you wait until you have all of the information to make a decision, the critical moment will have passed.
While the anatomic definition of “gut” is not necessarily the most appealing, I feel that when we are more present in our bodies and less wrapped up in the cyclical, often unhelpful repetition of the same thoughts, it is more helpful to just go with your gut.
Besides, any action is usually better than inaction. Go with your gut ;D Fix it if it doesn’t work.
March 28th, 2010 at 11:52 pm
I’m a fan of using different input for decision-making, including the gut. I think one of the simplest and most effective ways to leverage the mind, body, and emotions when making decisions is Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats.
Your gut can be a grate gateway to your intuition. There are different levels of intuition … one is the animal instinct, but the other is the expert. A doctor builds amazing intuition from thousands of triage sessions and can intuitively make snap judgments that satisfice for the situation. Animal instinct in this case would suck. Animal instinct helps when you’re communicating, because regardless of the words said, you can sense the bigger story.
March 29th, 2010 at 6:56 am
I’ve also made some huge mistakes in life by ignoring my gut – and of course I don’t mean a feeling about the next card in a game or anything.
Gut can be my true feelings trying to scream their way past all my rationalizations about something.
Cops can see someone come in a room and their “gut” knows that something is off about this person. They wouldn’t be able to name it immediately, but it’s just their brain using its years of experience to know that there’s a detail that doesn’t add up. Of course they can’t just come and arrest us for looking suspicious!
Gut vs. brain may be like thinking vs. feeling too – better to think first, but then apply that layer of gut to the problem. Ugh – “layer of gut..”
March 29th, 2010 at 10:23 am
The point is, Nature gave us two brains, the head brain and the gut brain. This implies we need both. Each functions differently and serves different purpose. For things like keeping dental appointment, use your head brain. For decision making that involves unknown factors, use your gut brain.
March 29th, 2010 at 10:24 pm
I suggest checking out “blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking.” It delves deeper into the “gut vs brain” debate, sharing some very interesting stuff.
March 30th, 2010 at 6:41 am
I do think it’s wise to use both, though maybe the gut brain has to be trained to be most effective (so that you can tell the difference between butterflies in the stomach and actual danger, for example).
Blink was already on my list of books to read, and it just moved up a bit.
April 8th, 2010 at 2:02 am
[...] a follow-up to the gut thinking discussion, @MiscBytes passed on a link to a relevant study. It turns out that Armed With [...]