This document discusses the role of intuition in obtaining historical knowledge. It defines intuition as a gut feeling or impression not based on reason or perception. Historical knowledge refers to knowledge about past events. The document provides examples of how intuition can spark investigations by raising suspicions about possible suspects in unsolved crimes. It also examines how intuition influenced the wrongful conviction of an African American man in 1983 based on racial biases prevalent at the time. Finally, the document notes intuition plays a bigger role in fields like arts and ethics than history, but it can still guide historians and lead to breakthroughs, though it also risks diverting people with biases.

1. What role does intuition play in
obtaining historical knowledge
 Defining intuition
“knowledge or belief obtained neither by reason nor by
perception, a gut-feeling or an impression as examples.”
 Defining Historical knowledge
“knowledge about things that have happened in the past”
An example of this could be a gut-feeling about who is a
possible suspect at a crime nobody witnessed, a spark
triggering an investigation based on e.g. previously
disregarded motives

2. The real-life situation linked with the KQ
The real life example
 An african-american male
convicted in 1983
 All-white jury
 No murder weapon
 One eyewitness, the
girlfriend of another
suspect in the case
 Lawyers who never tried
a murder case
Intuition linked
 Intuition was a vital part of
both his incarceration and
the reconsideration of the
case
 Racism was far more
prominent in the 1980’s
and could be argued to
have played a role in all of
the evidence being
believed

3. Intuition linked to historical
knowledge
 Historical knowledge is
largely based on
trustworthy sources of
information
 We as regular students
as examples decide if
we trust some of them
based on intuition
 This intuition is the
product of their public
image, their seeming
professionalism and
what we’ve been told
 Intuition works differently
in different AOK’s. e.g.
in arts and ethics it plays
a more prominent role
than in for example
natural sciences and
historical knowledge
 A hunch based on
intuition may lead to a
breakthrough or it might
be completely wrong

4. Examples of intuition relating to
historical knowledge
 History writers and bias: perspective of post-war history
writers on both the “winning” side and the “losing” side
 A fact universally recognized is that winners write history
 The winners intuitively write that they were heroic and did
the right thing without acknowledging the negative sides,
The losing might process the events more thoroughly
considering all sides of the story better than the winners.

5. To conclude
Summary
 Intuition in terms of
historical knowledge can
often be a “spark” that
leads to further
examination or it might
divert us from it
 We use intuition to help us
decide e.g. trustworthiness
 Intuition might divert us into
looking at things
subjectively since it “feels
right” resulting in bias
Conclusion
 When evidence is
presented, a quick
conclusion without further
processing can possibly be
drawn
 If a quick solution is
needed, e.g. at a crime
scene, intuition might spark
us to process what
happened and who did it