Painful Puzzle

[madnak]

People will make decisions based on their interpretation of the situation. Their interpretation may not be correct.

I imagine some of the people choosing the billion year option might start regretting it around year 5 million.

[Cumulonimbus]

A. I'd then either be put in a coma or take lots of drugs.

[soon2bepro]

people respond inconsistently because their preference is... well, it's wrong. It's based in a reasoning that at some point has a flaw, which makes this happen.

Theoretically we could all be wrong whenever we say we prefer something over another thing, but ultimately "real" preference IS transferable. It just depends on what you want more. If you want A more tan B and B more than C, then you want A more than C also. Even if you don't know it.

The OP's error was that he stated that then it must be true that you prefer A over all the other options he could give following the same patter (more years, less pain), but that is ultimately wrong, because then you're changing the option that you're presenting the person, and you may present an option that is better overall than A. This would also of course mean that it's better than B and C.

Summarizing: People DO prefer A over C if they prefer A over B and B over C. But they may not know it. They may think they prefer C over A. But that can be wrong. Especially if you haven't yet provided them with the other alternatives.

No one knows for sure what they'll prefer. My guess is you just have to experience it and see for yourself what you liked best (then again, you can be wrong there too, but that's much less likely to produce major errors)

[Bobb]

How about if someone were to give you the two options with specifics?

For example:

A) 1 year of having razors inserted into all of your food and drink (assume they somehow do not injure you, but only give you pain). With every bite of food and every sip of a drink, you have to chew and swallow the razors. You then have to deal with the pain of them making their way through your body and the pain of excreting them. (Assign whatever size and shape to the razors that would be most painful to you).

or

B) A minor headache for the rest of your life


Choices?

[soon2bepro]

assuming you can't stop the pain from A with painkillers or anything, you won't adapt to the headache as to dimish it's effect, and your life will be long enough (say 100 years), i'd take A all the way. Think most of us try to do just that with our lives, in a different kind of way... don't we? [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[madnak]

Assuming the pain is actually greater overall with the headache, A is the correct answer. If the total pain is greater under option A, I choose option B.

Now imagine if it were only one day of razors? That is more similar to the "billion years" issue.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
So is it true that you would pick the one year over the billion years? If not where is the flaw in the reasoning?


[/ QUOTE ]

The flaw is that you assume a linear reduction in pain levels. I would say it's more of an exponential reduction. Overall, you'd probably want to minimize the amount of pain you feel that is *over* a certain threshold.