It cost exactly $0 to not drink poison
Meanwhile, the investors and executives of the companies that produced these compounds are quite wealthy.
Good luck using your personal consumer choices to avoid Pesticides in aquifers and breathing Tire dust in the air.
It cost 0 to not drink and drive
It cost 0 to ...
It's not a cost issue, it's a "we're slightly above average IQ monkeys, but we're still fucking monkeys" issue, we're easy to use and abuse, companies know that
Ironically all of the rich people migrating to waterfront property may be what finally gets us past where we are today with waterway pollution and global warming.
Hang on, that would be awesome. No survelliance, everyone has identical gear with added features like gait protection and infared protection. iPhones built in, with HUD on facemask interior. Heating/cooling pads in clothing. Ventilation as required, optional battery pack addon.
Oh gosh... star wars and space marines aren't meant to be a pratical solution to societal problems....
You're sneaking free will in the back door. In your view, "victims" don't have free will but big companies do.
Weirdly enough the money is available when it generates more money or to lobby against regulation...
It's not, it is against fundamental animal/human instinct and hormonal response developed during evolution: eat as much as you can when you have access to food.
It’s a very strange möbius loop of self-contradiction.
You can say “companies should do more research on the consequences of this chemical before releasing it”, and you can also say “people should do more research on this chemical before drinking it”.
Second, these people spend their entire life mastering the art of manipulating large populations into consumerism and induced demand. Humans have limited bandwidth, and it wouldn't be most people's specific domain knowledge to spot the mechanisms and the resist them.
And, calling back to point one, even if you know the mechanisms of propaganda, you are not immune to propaganda.
Do you think people wake up one day with the bright idea of becoming obese and dying at 45 of heart issues ?
You can only make decisions between the choices you're being provided, and if half of these choices are engineered to be addictive, on a global scale you're fighting a losing battle
> is more responsible for people making bad choices than engineers at facebook.
But... they're the same mentality, don't you see it ? It's been studied and developed by marketing people
Do you avoid food containing Disodium Inosinate? Why or why not? What about Agar-Agar? What about Calcium Propionate? Cyclamate?
And yes if you're on this forum chances are you're above average, if you're college educated you're already above average, it's not that hard really. I think you're overestimating what the average human is and underestimating what the top minds of google &co are being paid millions for.
> I suppose it's pure selflessness that leads you -
What about lobbyist ? The tobacco industry is run on goodwill too ? After all cigarettes were advertised as improving your lung capacity, why don't you smoke ? Don't you want better lungs ? Why would you want kids not to smoke ? Are you anti freedom ?
It has nothing to do with “propaganda”. Are people just supposed to magically know the long term effects of every chemical they ingest? And if not, why are companies supposed to magically know it? Do companies have a crystal ball that normal people don’t have?
Try arguing in good faith for a bit it really isn't that hard. I'm not asking them to see the future, I'm asking them to study their products so we don't discover decades later that "oh snap lead in gas was bad!?", "Oh what, breathing asbestos isn't so good in the end?!"
They have unlimited money when it comes to finding new ways to make more profit but as soon as we talk risk assessment and management the money printing press runs dry, how convenient
Do you think the top behavioural scientists at facebook working on how to make you more engaged don't know what they're doing ? If so why are all people in the loop not giving phones to their kids, not allowing them to access social medias, &c. ?
https://www.independent.ie/life/family/parenting/the-tech-mo...
> Evil Companies pull off one decades-long too-secret conspiracy after another
Famous conspiracies such as DDT, asbestos, freon, lead in gas, lead in paint, madcow disease, &c.
Don't you think it's a bit less simplistic maybe ?
If a well-dressed person states it loudly and confidently over the tv/internet/etc, it's probably a lie.
Regardless, they have a point. Our system is driven by financially motivated, and subsidized action. Most people are just trying to live their lives with minimal interference and are not sampling for sources of psychological manipulation. Self-generated or external-to-self originated. In point of fact, metacognition is not last I researched on it, a universal thing for everyone.
I do not exclude myself from this population of non-samplers either, but as a tester, I am also well acquainted with the fact that testing costs and nature selects to minimize costs. Just as bacteria will abandon costly resistance mechanisms to a stressor given sufficient time removed from a stressor, so too do we in terms of our mental safeguarding behavior.
probably more Americans spent time physically working, and not sitting 10h/d in office and another 2h in the car commuting.
> Especially rich folks who have access to infinite amount of food
I am sure there are obese rich, also rich likely in general have more willpower to control their instincts, and that's partially how they become rich.
That's good but have you considered that this is motivated reasoning? I.e. you think you have free will but all those shlubs making bad choices don't. This casts you as a hero with special insight into various oppressive "systems" to which you are apparently immune.
It would be better to judge people for their bad decisions. Although this strikes many people as cruel, judgment involves respecting other people's agency and creates a culture that encourages people to take responsibility for their lives and make better decisions. To put it another way, people don't intend to be obese...but they also don't believe they have a choice, and that's not good.
Finally, I think you seriously overrate the ability of behavioral sciences to do anything useful. What you're really pushing is the always-seductive idea that shadowy forces manipulate the masses through quasi-magical powers.