Charles Parsons Department of Philosophy, Emerson Hall, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 E-mail: parsons2@fas.havard.edu Title: Two conceptions of intuition The philosophical conception of intuition most often appealed to in earlier studies in the foundations of mathematics is derived from Kant's and shares some basic features with his. The primary notion of intuition is intuition of objects; intuitive knowledge rests on such intuition. It is restricted in its application roughly to space and time. This has had the consequence that the demand that mathematics have an intuitive foundation led to severe restrictions on mathematics, as in Brouwer's original version of intuitionism and Hilbert's finitary method for metamathematics. A more generally applicable conception of intuition might be called that of rational intuition. In contrast to Kantian intuition, rational intuition is primarily and in some versions even purely propositional. The conception begins with the tendency in inquiry to take certain propositions as evident, or at least plausible, without observation or deriving them from others by means of argument. The term "intuition" is often used in philosophy for instances of this tendency of quite varying epistemic weight. It can be argued that it is central to the exercise of reason and thus not restricted as to content as Kantian intuition is. This is in agreement with the views of Goedel. Some comments will be made on the relation of these two conceptions to each other and to the use of the term "intuition" by mathematicians.