science

Medical intuitive

Medical intuitive is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Medical intuitive rather than just read about it. In short: A medical intuitive is an alternative medicine practitioner who is purported to be able to use their intuitive abilities to find the cause of a physical or emotional condition through the use of insight rather than modern medicine. Other terms for such a person include medical clairvoyant or medical psychic.

Key takeaways

Medical intuitive belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Medical intuitive to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Medical intuitive from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

A medical intuitive is an alternative medicine practitioner who is purported to be able to use their intuitive abilities to find the cause of a physical or emotional condition through the use of insight rather than modern medicine. Other terms for such a person include medical clairvoyant or medical psychic.

History The practice of claiming to use intuition or clairvoyance for medical information dates back to Phineas Parkhurst Quimby (1802–1866), whose intuitive healing practice began in 1854. Edgar Cayce (1877–1945) was known as one of the most well known medical clairvoyants. William M. Branham, the father of the Pentecostal Latter Rain Movement, was said by his followers to be able to discern the health condition of people that attended his services, and in many cases heal them of their affliction.

Reception Making a formal medical diagnosis is not a practice for many medical intuitives. In a few cases medical intuitives have been hired by hospitals, clinics and medical offices, particularly in California. Many medical professionals and psychologists attribute perceived anecdotal successes by medical intuitives to a combination of wishful thinking, confirmation bias, the placebo effect, and regression fallacy associated with self-limiting conditions. A few educational institutions offer graduate degrees that include "research-based training" and certifications for medical intuitives. Other medical intuitives may be licensed medical professionals and their ability to accurately diagnose diseases and heal may not be supported by scientific evidence. In 2009 Steven Novella, writing on Science Based Medicine, calls medical intuitive diagnosis as "purely magical thinking" and refers to a Huffington Post article about it as "a promotion of a dubious pseudoscientific medical claim".

See also Energy medicine Faith healing Psychic

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Medical intuitive

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Medical intuitive claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Medical intuitive before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Medical intuitive ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Medical intuitive

In research: Medical intuitive appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Medical intuitive in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Medical intuitive is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Alternative medical diagnostic methods, Parapsychology, Pseudoscience, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Medical intuitive outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Medical intuitive in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Medical intuitive means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Medical intuitive out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Medical intuitive in simple terms?

Why does Medical intuitive matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Medical intuitive?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Medical intuitive.