238 THE INTUITIVE INVESTOR
The competitive edge to be gained from honing intuitive skills
could be substantial. Consider this account by Dr. Brian Weiss,
chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Mount Sinai Medical
Center in Miami Beach, about a gifted patient who was able to
pick winners at the racetrack: “I was both shocked and fascinated
by her psychic abilities, especially the episode at the racetrack. This
was tangible proof. She had the winning ticket to every race. This
was no coincidence.” As a result of his involvement with this patient,
Dr. Weiss now says, “I listen to my dreams and intuitions. When
I do, things seem to fall into place. When I do not, something
invariably goes awry” (Weiss, Many Lives, Many Masters, Simon
& Schuster 1988).
Another example from the realm of horse racing is found in
Sandra Weintraub’s book The Hidden Intelligence: Innovation
through Intuition (Butterworth Heinemann 1998). She and a friend
performed the following experiment at the Kentucky Derby:I put the name of each horse on a separate card, turned the cards
over, shuffled them, and numbered them on the back side from
one to ten. The names of the horses were on the underside[s] of
the card[s].... We then held each card for a few minutes, look-
ing at the blank side of the card, until we received a mental image
of the horse and its position at the finish line.... To our mutual
surprise, we had chosen the same two horses to finish within the
first three places.The real surprise, though, occurred the following day, when they
repeated the experiment and chose the same three horses. And how
did the race actually come out?I had chosen the exact order of the finish for the three horses.
My partner picked the same three horses, with the first two
in reverse order. Considering that the race was a photo finish,
it could just as easily have been his line up that predicted the
winners.26-29 ware 238 1/19/01, 1:19 PM