Intuition Amplifiers 2

“Yes, experiments. You see, psychology is mostly based on all sorts of tests, and trials; it is an applied, experimental science at large. As a psychologist I use my observations of human behavioural patterns as my main research tool. Sometimes, I deliberately set certain conditions and see how people react to them and how their behavioural patterns change under those artificially created conditions. I call those set ups “experiments”. However, occasionally I come across some naturally developed conditions that present an opportunity for me to have my “experiments” without setting anything up. I think today is one of those lucky days,” professor said suddenly winking at Michael.
Boulez immediately felt awkward and took his eyes of the strange professor. He looked around trying to hide his uncomfortable feeling and saw that it was already evening. The water in the lake had turned black, and a light boat was now gliding on it. One could even hear the splash of oars and the excited voices of a couple of teenagers on it. The public appeared everywhere and the Boathouse’s staff was lighting up the candles on the dining tables all around its banquet halls. The sky over Manhattan seemed to lose its color, and the full moon could be seen quite distinctly high above the classical silhouette of San Remo. It was much easier to breathe, and the voices under the old maple trees now sounded much clearer.
“Although I have never studied psychology, I have to admit that it does sound intriguing”, McCarty said, “I am sure you have all the reasons to be fascinated by it, however, I have to beg your forgiveness for still having no idea what does it have to do with what Michael and I were discussing here.”
McCarty was about to add something else but suddenly another wave of strikingly sharp pain rushed through his chest stopping abruptly all the thoughts in his head. Green and red circles slowly immerged in front of his eyes and strange whistling noises along with the sounds of popping air balloons filled his consciousness. He dropped his briefcase, grasped his chest with both of his hands and started to slowly slide from the bench right onto the weathered wooden boards of the Boathouse’s deck.
“Jim!! …” Michael cried in anguish trying to catch the sagging body of the editor and prevent his head from hitting the deck.
“Jim! Jim!!! …” he was repeating in desperation not knowing what to do and not understanding what is happening to his mentor, “Help!!” He yelled at the strange professor, but the professor was already bending over McCarty’s chalk-white face, putting his briefcase under his head and making sure that the editor is lying comfortably on the wooden boards. Dr. Rouleau was calm and collected; he was checking McCarty’s pulse, quickly unbuttoning his shirt and making sure that he is still breathing. He confidently turned the editor on his side, bent his left leg and looked at Michael.
“Calm down, Michael,” he said in powerful and demanding voice, “run quickly to that bar and get me some cold, wet towels. Don’t panic, the ambulance will be here in a second.”
Without any thinking Michael ran to the bar as quickly as he could and when he was running back carrying two white towels and the pitcher of ice he heard the loud siren of the approaching ambulance.
In less than a minute McCarty was placed on the stretcher with the oxygen mask over his face. His bare chest, his hands and his arms were covered with hundreds of tangled wires connected to the ambulance’s heart monitoring equipment. His face regained its normal color, his eyes were open but it was obvious that he was still oblivious to what was going on around him. Two paramedics swiftly moved the stretcher inside of the ambulance and instantly connected the IV system to McCarty’s left arm. The third uniformed man with a small clip board in his hand walked towards Dr. Rouleau and Michael who was still trembling trying to overcome his initial shock.
“Gentlemen,” the ambulance officer addressed the pair with the confident and demanding tone, “do you know the patient?”
Michael nodded silently and looked at the professor who did not react to the question at all.
“What is the patient’s name? Are you his friend or a relative?” The official started the rapid fire of questions peering into Michael’s eyes, “Where you the one who called the ambulance?”
“No … Ah, mmm … We're not really friends per se. We are, well, colleagues … Mr. McCarty is my mentor. And …. Ah, I did not call the ambulance.” Michael said quietly looking back to the officer with a total confusion on his face.
“I did.” Dr. Rouleau stated confidently to Michael’s total astonishment, “I have just met, Mr. McCarty but I will be glad to be of any assistance to you.”
“In this case, would you, gentlemen, get into the vehicle and help me with the paper work on our way to the hospital, please? We need to get going right away!” The ambulance officer said clearly indicating that there could be no arguing.
The pair climbed into the ambulance vehicle and it immediately took off with its flashing bright lights reflected on the puzzled faces of onlookers who gathered around the Boathouse attracted by this unusual event.

 

“So, what is your full name, sir?” The ambulance crew member asked looking at Dr. Rouleau who was sitting on a narrow ambulance bench right beside Michael and was trying very hard to keep his balance when the ambulance was making sharp turns in and out of the 5th avenue evening traffic. “Do you have any photo ID with you by any chance?”
Dr. Rouleau turned sideways trying to reach into his jacket. Michael politely moved slightly towards the ambulance’s door giving the professor some extra room.
“Here it is. My name is Dr. Pierre Rouleau,” the professor said handing his Canadian Passport to the ambulance officer,” I am staying here in Manhattan at the WC hotel; my room number is 1211. I should still be here for the next couple of days or so, however, you can also reach me using the numbers listed on my card.” With these words Dr. Rouleau handed to the officer a very elegant business card with his name, phone numbers, email and his office address printed in both English and French.
The officer took professor’s card without even glancing at it, stapled it to the official form he was writing on and looked inquiringly at Dr. Rouleau. “You are saying, Dr. Rouleau, that you have just met these gentlemen, and you did not know Mr. McCarty prior to this evening, yet you called the ambulance about ten minutes before you saw him collapsing on the ground from the apparent heart attack?” The officer asked the professor with obvious disbelieve in his voice.
“Yes, it is correct,” the strange professor replied with the hint of a smile, “I have detected the subtle signs of the developing heart attack while observing for a while Mr. McCarty’s facial expressions and his body language that he involuntarily exhibited during his conversation with this gentleman”, he nodded towards Michael. “You see, I am a psychologist and one of the fascinating subjects I study is the imprint of our feelings and emotions onto our subconscious body movements. Over the years I got quite good at reading the facial “micro-expressions” of people and the involuntary exhibitions of feelings through their gestures. Of course, I was not a hundred percent sure when I called “911” and I was definitely aware of the consequences of a false emergency call, however, the risk was very low and the benefits of saving this highly distinguished gentleman’s life were huge. I simply took the risk of using my intuition and subliminal perception analysis to make this judgement call.” At his last words Dr. Rouleau turned his head towards Michael and winked at him again. Michael’s long face produced an expression of sheer astonishment and he was about to say something but the ambulance officer interrupted him.
“Well, whatever the reason was you have definitely saved his life” he said nodding towards the stretcher, “He owes you one for sure!”
“I cannot take the full credit” the professor said politely smiling at the officer, “we should really thank psychology, don’t we, Michael?” he said turning his head to completely confused Boulez. “If it wasn’t for this wonderful science and its abilities to enhance our intuition and sharpen our perception skills our dear Mr. McCarty’s portrait would appear in tomorrow’s issue of his magazine encased in a black frame. Understanding how to “amplify” our intuition and how to make it our trusted and reliable decision making tool is what I have been doing for years. I am glad that tonight it came handy …”
A few hours later the taxi was carrying Michael Boulez to his New Jersey apartment. Day was breaking, and still burning street lights looked unnecessary and unpleasant to him. The taxi driver was tired at having worked the whole night shift, drove the car as fast as he could. The Manhattan high-rise buildings dropped off, stayed somewhere behind, and the Hudson River slid slowly to the side. Michael was jolted and tossed about in the rear seat of the cab. It was becoming clear that the last night events left the deepest mark on him. Michael tried to collect his thoughts. He was thirty-six years old and most of his adult life he spent on the trading floor. But those days are gone and what then? So then he would go on writing his “technical articles”. Into old age? Yes, into old age. What would these articles bring him? Glory? ‘What a nonsense! Glory will never come to someone who writes boring articles. And honestly, all he ever wanted to do anyway is to trade! He wanted to be back on top so badly! Like in those old days on the trading floor he wanted to be in control of his own destiny. He did not want to feel replaced anymore by those geeky “quants” and their smart-ass computers and algorithms; he wanted to show them all that an art of trading is still an ART! The burning desire of getting back to his trading roots, the new hope and this strange and totally unexpected twist in his life made Michael’s head spin. The four hours he spent outside the emergency room talking to Dr. Rouleau opened his eyes to the unknown and strange world of intuitive and subliminal decision making. It made him a believer of the possibility to succeed in what he thought was a “lost game”. His heart was racing for the first time in the past three years. “Intuition it is!” he said out loud to much surprise of the tired taxi driver.

 

Yes, and thanks for the thorough response.

 

Yes, Dr. Maestro already elaborated that H/L points in combo with other (purely technical) market information are valid reference points.

What you have to say about it?

 

Here I feel a bit uncomfortable with intuition, because it's relatively difficult to objectively distinguish "valid" intuitive calls vs. "random"...

 

Thanks MAESTRO, great thread seeking answers where few traders have questions. My mum was slightly autistic and it seems I am visually oriented to pick up on PA relationships that few others see. To my mind, intuition is simply super speed logic except the logic trail can be more creative and lateral than we are often conscious of. For example it looks like the next 20 yrs will open up all kinds of discoveries in space time understanding combined with intuitional awareness resulting in one of the biggest technological transformations ever seen, but every dream of the future requires a logic key. I'm a TA trader, but "not as you know it" to quote a favorite space time show. Not to apply space time to the markets is irrational, but few traders realize what they are looking at when they view a 2D chart let alone how it can fool the eyes. Jack thinks time is not a variable in the markets (making it unique where time, space and velocity converge) but even linear time has variables and suffers from coordinate transformations. A 1 min trend line is not the same as a 2 min trend line at various points because of the effect of time and every linear time cycle has to self destruct because of non linear forces acting on it.

From my limited perspective we trade time on a 1 min time chart much more than we trade price, so really most of what is written about as PA is Time Action, however that price movement also contains a space time component. Time and space-time is much more of a market fulcrum than price alone can ever be. I like what Gann said, that time overbalances price and it was Gann's interest in how time ruled price that set me off on a life long journey (but I am not a Gann trader). Using the 3 variables on the trade ticket of Time, Price & Volume is what I call 3D trading and I use that to help build reflexes that result in faster reactions leading to better intuition. Also the splines on PA create a natural flow which is like a story telling the past, present and future of PA and the greatest indicator of future accuracy of a spline is past reactions. There are only two options the market has as ultimately it only goes up or down (sideways is a holding pattern waiting for the due "time" to move on), but it attempts to deceive the eye and thinking process to its true intent and we believe what we think we see.

The interesting thing is that space time is itself multidimensional and then each of the internal cycles are also representative of their own dimensions and splines. This is how I differ from Ehlers viewpoint where he tries to isolate an ever changing dominant cycle and ignore the out of phase period whereas I think there is tremendous value in the resolution of the cycle conflicts. Later the multi-cycle evolution into a common thrust can be observed before the dominant cycle is confirmed offering the opportunity to enter a trend early with a high degree of confidence. Switching from a sub 1 min scalp entry to a 4hr hold pattern can thus be achieved. Hurst thought cycles were inaccurate below 40 days or so but I have found them to be excellent below 1 min.

As far as developing intuition and Blink thinking is concerned, I have noted when a trader says, "I felt that was going to happen!" after he missed a big fast move and my reply is, "What part of your body did you feel it in?" At that point I am joking with them because the "feeling" is struggling against a background of confusion so intuition is hit and miss. However if the flow of the market is understood better there comes a point when that trader's intuition develops beyond the speed of his conscious awareness so that when he says, "I felt it was going to do that" he is very close to the real time awareness of Blink thinking. Intuition has already joined the dots, but developing that intuition can only happen if a trustworthy set of logical trading rules (or MAESTRO's indicators) is developed so the inner man is convinced that you know what you are doing and that is where trading peace is found. The inner man knows if we don't know, he knows when we only know in part and are over stretching, and he knows when we know that we know. Thus when we trade without convincing him he will set up court and fry us like the most aggressive lawyer when we make a mistake. This is where intuition and discipline either breaks down or is cemented into the actions of the trader as per the Inner Game of Tennis. Getting into the flow is more important than silencing the inner critic and better still is to win him over than silence or distract him.

But the problem facing a trader is not just the complexity of a multidimensional market, it is that our visual perception continually fools us unless we have the means to correct it. But the worst part is we can see what we want to believe so someone who is convinced TA doesn't work has the greatest difficulty being objective and has no dream to inspire creative tools to find solutions. As far back as the Egyptian pyramids architects and engineers understood how it was necessary to lie to the eye to make us see what we want to believe. For example, in a large building tall "straight" columns are not straight at all, for a tall straight column looks concave but by making it convex it appears straight to the eye http://www.thefreedictionary.com/entasis

I had a few threads touching upon this problem for those who think everyone sees the same TA, which is in part why we get all kinds of arguments for and against TA. Notwithstanding this, the greatest argument against TA comes from those who simply failed to make sense of its complexities and I find most so called scientific studies on TA breathtakingly naive if not just downright stupid. To think any scientist can test 6500 TA signals inside an hour and conclude his failure to make anything work proves TA doesn't work only proves how someone can be highly educated but analytically handicapped. I posted some further examples of natural trading handicaps covering optical illusions to genetics to poor workmanship here...

inattentional blindness - why the obvious in TA goes unnoticed
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=259416

but I explored most of these problems in "the politically incorrect truth why TA can't work (for you)
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=247779&highlight=why+ta+work

In my approach, confidence doesn't come from past results alone because the market is subject to change: it comes from being able to predict what should happen next and if I find myself on the wrong side of the market then the future map needs a complete review instead of trading what I think should happen. In other words there must be harmony between the expected spline reaction at an energy point and the actual PA performance and movement to the next energy point. With that in mind I will be very interested in looking at the tools you are using as there seems to be some overlap in our thinking and I would enjoy picking your brain further.

 

well written spurt ,to paraphrase,this is a good statement... This is where intuition and discipline is cemented into actions

 

I must have missed that, show me please. Certainly the "other" purely technical info is not accessible via price charts. surf

 

"Quote from MAESTRO:

I am sorry, but in my point of view H/L points by themselves cannot be very efficient reference points as they only partially represent the points in event-time space. However, H/L points combined with their timing characteristics and other attributes like volume, size, bid/ask flow etc. become valid reference points and could be used very efficiently. The trick is to deliver this information in a format that excludes logical thinking and could be perceived intuitively."

 

surf, theres an entire universe out there,would love to add your price drivers to the work shop,but would be foolish to throw away all the other tools