The Axiom of Choice

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
An example. Whenever you fire up your internet browser, you cross a threshold of nearly infinite possibilities. Are you going to read sports commentary on ESPN? Buy groceries? Read 2+2? Watch dog porn? A billion other things? You could do any of them, but very few people are paralyzed by choice, hovering over their keyboards with a look of pained indecision on their faces. Why? Because the internet is the king of organized, guided information.

[/ QUOTE ]

No!

The internet itself is totaly DISorganized. Decentralized.

Some *individual sites* make it their business to provide organization - whether that organization is of "internal" data (a la Wikipedia) or external (a la google) or some mix of the two (yahoo) is interesting, but not a relevant distinction in the context of this thread. Further, there are tools that help in these orgnaizational tasks that are local (firefox) or remote (gmail). The point, though, is that none of this organization is inherent in the internet - it's all value that participants are adding *to* the Internet.

[ QUOTE ]
The real point is that most people lack the ability to competently deal with all the options they are presented with.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes! Think about how lost you'd be without all that stuff you mentioned. And it all emerged from the market, not from central planning.

[nietzreznor]

[ QUOTE ]
The internet itself is totaly DISorganized. Decentralized.

[/ QUOTE ]

The internet strikes me as both organized and decentralized.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The internet itself is totaly DISorganized. Decentralized.

[/ QUOTE ]

The internet strikes me as both organized and decentralized.

[/ QUOTE ]

Parts of it are organized - but those parts are basically held by a single participant. Amazon, for example, organizes it's own data. Wikipedia members have organized the data in their domain. On the wider internet as a whole, organization is only an illusion, provided by filters that other parties provide to screen junk out. Even domain names - amazon.com, google.com, mit.edu, etc are really just a mapping of externally-provided organization (but decentralized organization!) onto a less-organized collection of 32-bit numbers that represent each computer's "address".

[bobman0330]

[ QUOTE ]

The internet itself is totaly DISorganized. Decentralized.

Some *individual sites* make it their business to provide organization - whether that organization is of "internal" data (a la Wikipedia) or external (a la google) or some mix of the two (yahoo) is interesting, but not a relevant distinction in the context of this thread. Further, there are tools that help in these orgnaizational tasks that are local (firefox) or remote (gmail). The point, though, is that none of this organization is inherent in the internet - it's all value that participants are adding *to* the Internet.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think we disagree. There are two elements to a web surfer's experience: the chaotic, open jungle of information and the organizing machines that chop it up, sort it, and present it to the individual. Without google and other organizing agents, the internet would be much less useful than it is. I don't think it's useful to view the internet as JUST the individual web pages which exist scattered across a billion computers in no discernible order. The indexers and search engines and browsers which add order are just as much a part of what I think of as "the internet."

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

The internet itself is totaly DISorganized. Decentralized.

Some *individual sites* make it their business to provide organization - whether that organization is of "internal" data (a la Wikipedia) or external (a la google) or some mix of the two (yahoo) is interesting, but not a relevant distinction in the context of this thread. Further, there are tools that help in these orgnaizational tasks that are local (firefox) or remote (gmail). The point, though, is that none of this organization is inherent in the internet - it's all value that participants are adding *to* the Internet.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think we disagree.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, we don't. It was just pointing out that the organization you see is an emergent trait - it wasn't designed into the internet by a central planner.

There have been attempts to "engineer" this type of organization, AOL being the most famous.

[hmkpoker]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Some magical amount is what economists call market equilibrium.

He has absolutely no clue, nor can he ever have a clue, as to what number of choices *I* want to have, or what number of choices *someone else* wants to have.

[/ QUOTE ]

How can you just randomly assert this? I'm fairly sure there are studies done that show quite clearly that people are happier when they have less choice, and he references many of them in his talk. So yeah, he knows, generally speaking, that people often prefer having LESS choice.

To say that market equilibrium is infalliable is absurd.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's a good video for you to watch.

Cliff notes: when you're stuck with an option, you tend to rate your satisfaction of that object as much higher than an option with which you have a choice.

Gilbert doesn't make a political statement about this like Schwartz does, though. In fact, he says that we all have the ability to synthesize happiness from within, and thus manufacture the very thing that many of us are seeking to gain from commerce.

Given that we can be brought to know this, we can approach this situation from two directions: personal and economic.

Personal method: Take a few minutes each day to appreciate the things you have.

Economic method: Brutalize the markets so that the citizenry have no choice but to accept whatever is provided by a state monopoly.

And that's why happiness should not be a consideration of economics.

[Zygote]

Im not really following your point about capitalism. Capitalism always provides you the choice to limit your choices. There are millions of thing i could choose to do right now but i'm only focused on the limited things around because thats what i choose. The fact that some people make bad choices, and focus on too wide a range of options, is not the fault of anyone but themselves.

blaming "choices" for the acts of people is no different than blaming a gun barrel for the crime of a murderer.

Again, if they ever do feel focusing on too many choices is hurting them there is nothing stopping them from choosing to choose less. Interfering with freedom doesnt follow from my understanding of this guy's conclusions of choices. More choices never hurts. never.

Also, in a general market sense, as choices become difficult for most, there becomes an incentive for information centers and review guides. Look at the information provided by amazon, ebay, wikipedia, cnet, and others for an example of how a free market helps us make choices when choices are difficult.

[xorbie]

I think a lot of you are focusing too much on the political commentary here, it's really IMO a minor part of what he's trying to say and certainly not something that necessarily follows from the first half of his talk.

There's an important difference between saying "I think redistribution of resources is good for society" and "I think a society which believes redistribution of resources is good will be better off". FWIW, I strongly believe the second, the first varies.

There are other points that I think are being misunderstood. I actually agree with Bobo, there's definitely a lot of that going on. What Schwartz was trying to say was that the reverse process is actually in place a lot today, i.e. doctor's asking patients what the patient wants, drug manufacturers advertising directly to patients and so forth.

It's true that the internet is a fantastic tool for spreading information quite rapidly and that hopefully we can use it to have others choose things for us, but I'm not really sure this adresses some of the more general problems re: depression in industrialized countries.

I think a large part of that depression is what Schwartz is talking about but on a lot larger scale... we each have to choose our entire lives. I'm not saying preordained marriage or forced labor is good, but the fact is that having so much to choose from seems to make a good number of people less happy, and at least makes a small number of people far less happy.

[xorbie]

There is of course valtaherra's line of objection, but I find it to be patently absurd. Anyone who believes that any person (even themselves) always knows what is best for themselves is simply deceiving themselves. People ask for advice... this every day activity is precisely a demonstration of this. Drug addicts who can't (although you can argue about "can't" here, simply put "don't") clearly don't act in their own self-interest.

That is to say, we are both aware of the limitations of our knowledge about what is the best course of action (asking advice) and often unable to act even when cognizant of this course of action (i.e. addicts).

[xorbie]

As to hmkpoker, interesting topic. Let's consider something else instead of happiness. Say a bunch of coal companies are doing something bad for the environment. One may say that the research focus of economics is not the environment (perhaps until someone has to pay to clean it up, and which point it can be quantized). Fair enough. This does not mean that economics of coal mining should be considered entirely seperate from the environmental effects, it simply means that something beyond the economics of the situation needs be analyzed.

So, if you want to say that the study of happiness is outside the realm of economics, it doesn't really bother me much. Either economics itself must incorporate these findings or we must turn outside the field. Either way, I think this is a very important issue to be adressed.

You of course would reply that it ought to be adressed, but at a personal level. I agree more or less, although I'd say it's certainly an inter-personal issue in that we need to become aware as a society of this.