Common sense and its cultivation / by Hanbury Hankin ; with a foreword by Dr. C.S. Myers.
- Ernest Hanbury Hankin
- Date:
- 1926
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Common sense and its cultivation / by Hanbury Hankin ; with a foreword by Dr. C.S. Myers. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![CHAPTER III EXAMPLES OF SUBCONSCIOUS JUDGMENT The instinctive mental powers of statesmen and administrators —The jury system as an example of the use of subconscious judgment—Recently acquired knowledge bad for such judgment—The value of forgetting—Comparison of com¬ mittees and juries—Lord Mansfield’s advice never to give reasons—Cross examination—Rapid composition by journal¬ ists—Sherlock Holmes in practice. We will now consider other examples of subconscious judgment that appear to be of a higher order of com¬ plexity than those hitherto discussed. Their nature is such as to suggest that processes analogous to choice and formal reason may go on in the subconscious mind of a higher degree of efficiency than occur in the region of consciousness. An important instance is the instinctive power of rapid decision possessed by statesmen and administra¬ tors. Of Lord Kitchener it is recorded that “ he had a most extraordinary instinct in military matters. He never thought things out. He seemed to know them.” Here the power of rapid decision was not due to formal reason but to its replacement by work of the subcon¬ scious mind, the result of which alone came into his consciousness. Mr. J. M. Keynes thus describes Mr. Lloyd George’s activities at the Peace Conference :— “ What chance could such a man [President Wilson]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b31357945_0046.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
