Don’t Underestimate the Right — or Human Intuition in General

"On Intuition." Source: chatgpt.com.

The debate over gender-affirming care for minors has reached a fever pitch, with Tennessee’s law banning certain medical treatments for transgender youth now at the recently upheld ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Skrmetti (June 2025). Supporters of the law argue that it protects vulnerable children from irreversible decisions, while critics, including the ACLU and the American Academy of Pediatrics, call it discriminatory and ideologically driven. Beneath this clash lies a force often dismissed in progressive circles: human intuition. What if the conservative push to anchor identity in biology and tradition reflects not just dogma, but a deeper instinct about what it means to flourish as a human?

Cognitive science suggests this possibility should not be brushed aside. Gerd Gigerenzer, a psychologist at the Max Planck Institute, has long argued that heuristics—gut-feel rules of thumb shaped by millennia of human experience—guide decisions precisely where data is incomplete, contradictory, or rapidly changing. In his 2008 Scientific American article “Why Heuristics Work,” he defended intuition as an adaptive tool, not an outdated relic. Theoretical physicist Carlo Rovelli makes a similar point about science itself: great breakthroughs, from Kepler’s planetary models to Einstein’s relativity, often began as intuitive leaps before any rigorous proof could be offered. If intuition can guide the frontiers of science, might it also help us navigate social questions where evidence is still contested and human lives are at stake?

For many conservatives, the conviction that biology, family, and shared history provide stability is not merely nostalgic. It stems from a sense that humans are embodied, social creatures who thrive within enduring structures. This intuition has helped drive a wave of legislation—more than 20 states since 2020, including Tennessee and Florida—restricting or banning gender-affirming care for minors, such as puberty blockers or surgeries. Proponents frame these laws as protective measures, cautioning against irreversible interventions during adolescence. Critics counter that such bans reject medical consensus and worsen the suffering of transgender youth, who already face disproportionate rates of depression and suicide.

This tension is not merely about facts, though the facts matter. It is about competing visions of what it means to be human. For many on the right, identity rooted in biology or tradition prevents individuals from becoming unmoored. Public intellectuals like Jordan Peterson have argued that ignoring sex-based differences in the name of self-determination risks a broader unraveling of social cohesion. That argument is often caricatured as fear of novelty or religious dogma. But what if it is something subtler: a felt recognition that happiness is less likely when one cuts entirely against the grain of embodiment, family, and community?

Europe’s recent experience illustrates why this debate cannot be resolved by invoking “science” alone. In 2024, the long-awaited Cass Review in the United Kingdom, an independent evaluation of youth gender services commissioned by the National Health Service, concluded that evidence supporting puberty blockers and early medical transition for minors was “remarkably weak.” Dr. Hilary Cass, the pediatrician who led the review, recommended far greater caution, more comprehensive psychological support, and strict limits on prescribing. Sweden and Finland have already adopted similar policies, shifting away from routine medical interventions toward more restrictive, staged approaches. These decisions, made by health systems far less politicized than America’s, reflect an acknowledgment that scientific data remains uncertain and that clinical practice must balance evidence with prudence.

Critics are right to warn against intuition hardened into prejudice. History shows us how easily intuitive “truths” can be distorted: the sense that racial segregation was natural, that rigid gender roles were essential, that homosexuality was a pathology. Intuition is not infallible. But to dismiss it altogether is to impoverish our moral reasoning. Human intuition reflects not only bias but also accumulated wisdom—our tacit knowledge of what promotes resilience, stability, and belonging. To reject it outright in favor of what sometimes amounts to politicized scientism is not progress. It is another form of blindness.

The suffering of transgender individuals is real. Too often, it arises less from medical treatment than from social isolation, hostility, or lack of affirmation. Studies, including one published in JAMA Surgery in 2021, have found regret rates after gender-affirming surgery to be exceptionally low, between 1 and 2 percent—lower than regret rates for many elective procedures. Yet regret does occur, particularly among those who transitioned without robust counseling or adequate social support. These cases illustrate that neither uncritical affirmation nor blanket prohibition addresses the full reality. What is needed is a framework that respects both human freedom and human limits.

That framework might look like what some European countries are now attempting: age-based restrictions for irreversible interventions; comprehensive psychological assessment and support as a first resort; and robust informed consent processes involving families, mentors, and communities. Such measures recognize that adolescence is a time of profound identity formation, that some youths benefit from medical transition, but also that others may change course as they mature. A balanced policy neither forecloses options nor rushes them. It takes seriously both the empirical uncertainties and the intuitive sense that identity cannot be endlessly self-invented without cost.

We are living through a period of upheaval, with technology and identity pushing boundaries once thought immovable. Progressives emphasize self-determination, arguing that individuals must be free to shape their identities unconstrained by tradition or biology. Conservatives emphasize stability, warning that too much freedom without anchoring risks fragility and despair. Both are responding to real features of the human condition. But to assume that conservative caution is simply fear or ignorance is to underestimate the role intuition plays in human flourishing. It is to dismiss a voice that, while imperfect, has guided communities for generations when evidence was uncertain or absent.

Intuition does not have to dictate policy. But it does deserve to be engaged, tested, and refined rather than mocked or ignored. In the end, wisdom demands more than knowing what we can become. It requires cherishing what we already are: embodied beings, bound by flesh, relationships, and time, seeking meaning in a world where freedom and stability must coexist. If we fail to take that intuition seriously, we risk constructing policies that are technically precise yet humanly hollow.

The future of this debate will not be settled by one Supreme Court case or one medical study. It will be shaped by whether we have the humility to hold science and intuition in dialogue, not opposition. A humane future depends not only on innovation but on remembrance—on recognizing that progress without anchors can leave us adrift, while anchors without openness can leave us stuck. The challenge is to honor both.