SCHEMATIC: A Universal Overview of Human Decision-Making | Matthew J Pierce on Patreon
Dante-Gabryell Monson
This is a handy graphical summary of how I think human decision-making works.
It sacrifices precision for accuracy, but it is enough to jumpstart your thinking.
I've reproduced the text below, for those who don't want to click on the graphic:
S2: Origins
C4. Instinct handles the basics of human life.
(Heart rate, reflexes, thirst/hunger, circadian rhythms, fight/flight reactions…)
C5. Conscious attention has functional limits.
(Speed, latency, power, focus, bandwidth…)
C6. Human intelligence uses patterns and mental habits as workarounds.
(Categories, associations, arguments, analogies, routines…)
S3: Logical Flow
C7. Human intelligence constructs a sprawling, abstract sense of self.
(“You” expands to include your possessions, your family, your childhood home, your beliefs, your career goals...)
C8. The nonrational logic of human intelligence ensures self-conflict.
(Your career goals, politics, and family needs aren’t perfectly aligned.)
C9. Instinctive mind-body entanglements create the nonlinear world of emotion.
(Bad news hits like a punch in the gut; happiness and envy can be triggered by the same event.)
C10. Conscious attention “sees” very little of what is actually happening.
(Mental habits enable, but they also conceal.)
S4: Conclusions
C11. The true shape of the emotional self-constellation can never be known.
(No one — not you, or anyone else — can list everything you know, let alone feel.)
C12. This is part of why humans can make rational arguments, but never rational decisions.
(Remember that time you convinced yourself not to, but did it anyway?)
C13. All human decision-making is instinctive, powered by purest individual self-interest.
(Non-rational self-interest rules the world, with no escape possible.)
C14. But since the human sense of self is infinitely expandable, our instinctive decisions get really, really interesting.
(We’re all in this together, in an overlapping sort of way, and this is an encouraging thought.)
Thus, "Instinct inspires self-preservation, but the human sense of self is infinitely expandable."
See also my companion INTRODUCTION/ORIENTATION post.
