Predictably Irrational Op Ed

The NYT 7/19/08 Op Ed article titled " Eyes Off the Price" by Dan Ariely (the author of Predictably Irrational) is indeed predictably irrational. The article demonstrates author's irrational convoluted argument and thinking which is expected from a predictably irrational author, a predictable phenomenon nevertheless.

Just take your eyes off the oil price, and do not multiply the price x item (gallons of oil) purchased, then you would not consider the oil price as high, is the implicit message from a so called predictably irrational professor at Duke. Mr. Ariely is a presumptuous writer which is expected from an irrational writer who thinks consumers are concerned about high oil prices but not as much about the high health care cost, food, electricity or telephone prices, because he himself (a single subject biased sample) does not pay much attention to food prices while shopping or he forgets or does not remember what used to be the price of a gallon of milk or does not multiply x purchased items, however he pays more attention to gas price because he is watching the meter role. Mr. Ariely's arguments are based on his personal irrational experience. If there are more of Mr. Ariely's colons around, then he is correct in his supposition that decisions made by those colons (and those colons only) that the oil prices are high and health care cost, food, electricity, and telephone prices are not high. However, Mr. Ariely's irrational supposition can not be generalized among those who make decisions based on some other proposition which may be rational and logical. Also, if Mr. Ariely's types irrational decision makers make predictably irrational decisions, as Mr. Ariely says they do, then by Mr. Ariely's own logic predictably irrational decisions whatever they are, become logical and predictable, and thus rational?

A time to ponder....................