Edward Tsang 2010.05.20
Choices are good, in principle. Is more choice always better? Barry Schartz pointed out that sometimes choices can lead to confusion, regret and raised expectations. Decision making is not cost-free. Not everyone enjoys, or can afford too much time for reasoning. Therefore, sometimes we could benefit from being constrained.
This is a brief summary of Barry Schwartz's talk on YouTube, which is based on his book, "The paradox of choice: Why More is Less", published by HarperCollins 2005.
Schwartz introduced the Western dogma: To maximize happiness, maximize freedom to choose.
No one doubts that freedom is welcome. No one likes to be forced to do things, whether it is joining the army or getting up in the morning. But Schwartz argued that freedom is not without problems, especially when one does not know how to face it.
Schwartz gave an example: When you see a doctor in the United States, the doctor will tell you that you can do A, which has benefits and risks as follows, or B, which has benefits and risks as follows. It's your choice. This is fine if you know how to choose. But faced with complicated decisions, many people don't. In order to make an informed decision, one has to study the choices.
Schwartz pointed out that choice leads to regrets. When there are no choices, when something goes wrong, you couldn't have helped it. But when there are many choices, when something goes wrong, you'll say "I could have done better" (because I made the choice). Whatever you choose, you'll wonder if you could have made a better choice. "The more options there are, the easier it is to regret." Whatever you are doing, the alternatives always have attractions that you miss. And when things go wrong, you can only blame yourself if you chose it. When there are no choices, you can blame the society or fate.
Choices lead to raised expectation. After spending a lot of time to pick a product, you expect higher of it. Raised expectation lead to less satisfaction. "The secret of happiness is to have low expectation."
Schwartz argued that, like gold fishes, "we all need a fish bowl" -- to constrain us. "The lack of some metaphorical fish bowl is a recipe for recipe, and possibly disaster".
What people don't understand is that decision making requires reasoning and reasoning costs. Sometimes reasoning involves computation, which cost can easily escalate to an unaffordable level. This is explained in the CIDER Theory.
[End]
All Rights Reserved