Prometheus 6

Maybe he needed to get the bad taste of his defense of the CoulterThing out of his mouth. It's not out of my mouth yet, but the central assertions of [TS] Free and Easy Riders are just...correct.

Until his head collided with a windshield, Ben Roethlisberger savored the liberty of riding a motorcycle without a helmet. Now the Pittsburgh Steelers' quarterback says he has "a new perspective on life."

...If Roethlisberger had done a sober cost-benefit analysis, he never would have gotten on a motorcycle. Even a minor accident — a spill that shattered his elbow — could have ended his career and cost him tens of millions of dollars.

Now he's got a new perspective, and so do the many motorcyclists who will be wearing new helmets this weekend after the publicity about his accident. But their new perspective isn't entirely rational, either. Their odds haven't changed just because of one accident. Why should they start wearing helmets now?

Because they're making decisions the way most humans do — haphazardly. We're guided more by one recent horror story than by reams of statistics. Unless pressed, we tend to avoid thinking about unlikely events, like traffic accidents, or problems in the distant future, like how we'll finance our retirement.

We'll choose something simply because we think it's what most other people would do. Our decision often hinges not on the facts but on how the facts are presented: if told there's a 10 percent chance of dying from a medical procedure, we're less likely to go ahead with it than if we're told there's a 90 percent chance of living.

Given all these foibles, Sunstein and Thaler argue, it's naïve to assume that people are making fully informed choices. Since people's choices often depend on how the options are presented, authorities should practice a mild form of paternalism: point people toward what experts think is best for them, but don't force them to go there.

I think you can do more than point. I would go so far as to shove you over there and make you stand and look at it for a while.

I am fully aware that what the options actually are is far more important than their appearance. That's why I only have a streak of libertarianism. The philosophy works to the exact degree that information is complete and both individual and collective decision making is rational. But as far as it goes, Mr. Tierney's op-ed is correct. It just has to be seen as describing a basis, not a limitation.

I find it seriously heartening to see the FACT of human non-rationality introduced into the discussion.