Intuition versus Analysis

[Gonso]

The thing with intuition is that the definition tends to bend a lot when talking about poker. One definition defines it as, "the act or faculty of knowing or sensing without the use of rational processes", which is how I use it.

If someone is going to be at all successful at poker, they're just going to have to employ rational processes constantly, plain and simple. Some processes might be more accurate and/or complex than others, sure, but they're still rational processes.

Evaluating information -whether it's mathematical, psychological, or even physical information- is not intuition, it's analysis. Just because you don't have an exact hand range in your head doesn't mean you haven't done an analytical evaluation.

Intuition can come into play when your subconscious sees something that your analysis missed, and experience will help refine this as well.

But to answer the question, analysis is really what poker is all about, the game revolves around it. Intuition has it's place (and yes, some players do have an excellent "poker sense"), but you still need to have some rational method of processing the information you're getting. Even more than that, intuition can get you in trouble since there are so many strategic concerns that are counterintutive - something that might "seem" right can often be completely wrong.