Reason or emotion?

Homo Sapiens Sapiens, which corresponds to the category within which Human Beings are classified, have been guided to think that we respond to rationality in order to make the best decisions. The scientific methods that have provided great benefits to society, particularly increasing knowledge related to phenomena that are not evident and managing to methodically apply them to the manufacture of artifacts, advances in all fields of knowledge and rigorous procedures when managing interventions between human beings, make up a generalized knowledge that inevitably affects the perception of individuals.

Scientific evidence from neuroscience can prove without hesitation that, on the contrary, when we make our individual or group decisions, most of them are influenced by our emotions more than by reason. Recently, Stanford professor Baba Shiv showed that expectations play a crucial role in decisions. He conducted a test in which subjects had to try 5 varieties of wines, with their price displayed between $5 and $90 dollars. In reality there were only 3 different types and two repeats with a fictitious price. The curious thing was that even during the monitoring of brain activity, the area of the brain responsible for the sensation of pleasure, had greater activation when the subject thought that the wine had a higher price than when it was cheaper, even when it was tasting exactly the same wine.

In the same way, everything that is important, pleasant, tasty, interesting, or "better" for our family, social circle, culture or region becomes a trigger of pleasure for all the participants in the group, so that we prefer those products. , colors, flavors, customs, etc. throughout our lives, without even suspecting that we have been conditioned. It would be very prudent for you to be able to recognize the cognitive bias that inevitably influences your consumer choices, friends, partners, policies and others, to be able to step back and truly question whether, in the light of reason, you are correctly choosing what is best for your well-being and that of everyone around you.