Genuinely Liking

The basis of economics rests on the idea that man consumes goods and receives enjoyment from those goods. Goods can be almost anything. They can be a physical product like potatoes or a service like tax consulting. They can also be abstract things like leisure time, morality or the "warm glow" of giving to charity. A person receives enjoyment from a good and goods are consumed because they are enjoyed by a person (if they not enjoyed, they are fittingly called "bads"). It is all very circular. If one sees a friend eating Doritos, one assumes he enjoys Doritos. And if he enjoys Doritos, he will try to consume them. People enjoy what they do and do what they enjoy.

But, of course, enjoyment is never that simple. Cola companies do blind taste tests all the time. In tests, about 50 percent of people prefer Pepsi and 50 percent prefer Coke. In the real world, Pepsi only sells a third of what Coke sells. What gives? That means 25 percent of society enjoys Pepsi's taste more, yet buys Coke anyway. Don't people want to enjoy themselves?

There must be another layer at play. I was surfing the net recently and saw a post that asked "Does anyone like Iron Maiden? Not in an ironic way, but genuinely like?" Enjoyment of music can involve more than simple listening? And I've met countless people who claim that they don't like Taco Bell or McDonald's. How can people not enjoy a fairly clear cut pleasure fulfilling food - fat, protein, salt and sugar. One's body has evolved to enjoy these nourishing ingredients. There are those who claim they do not like pornography and others who say they don't like alcohol. Assuming that these people are honest in their convictions, what is the second layer that makes them flip from enjoyment to unenjoyment or from unenjoyment to enjoyment?

Well, the Coca-Cola company knows that it doesn't just sell cola. It sells their brand. Advertising and packaging give people some sort of strange enjoyment other than taste when they consume the product. Perhaps Coke hits a subconscious trigger that makes someone think of a happy commercial. Maybe it makes people think of friends and family who drink Coke. Maybe it reminds people of their childhood when they drank Coke. Maybe it connects people to a celebrity who they admire who drinks Coke. Whatever-the-case, the second layer is strong enough to tip the scales from Pepsi to Coke.

This second layer is ubiquitous and comes in many forms. I know that mayonnaise tastes good, but the thought of so many extra calories makes me not want to consume it. Do I like mayonnaise? A Phish head may have such a strong connection to his friends and the shows that he begins to listen to their music. Does he really enjoy Phish? A food critic, after eating enough "complex" cuisine, may find a hamburger dull. Does he really not enjoy the hamburger?

Social reinforcement is strong and can not only alter our choices, but alter our cravings. Shying away from mayonnaise began as simply a choice, but now mayo sort of makes me ill. And we are all aware of the "acquired taste" aspect of food, music and art. Not to mention, the subtle, but powerful nature of peer pressure. If everyone else thinks bell botoms looks funny, we will; if everyone else thinks bell botoms looks normal, we will.

Still, the web poster on Iron Maiden introduced the idea that social reinforcement is not truly liking, that genuine liking is a simple aesthetic feeling and everything else is, somehow, is not genuine. But that seems awfully strong. Surely, we have preferences other than our biological responses. If that were the case, we would all only prefer the same carnal things.

But, the poster is on to something. At some point social reinforcement moves from subconsciously influential to consciencely coercive. Does one want to see a movie? What if everyone else is seeing it? What if one's girlfriend wants to see it? What if one's girlfriend insists on seeing it? What if one has a gun to their head? If one was forced to see it, did one really enjoy it? If one was subtly influenced to see it, did one really enjoy it? At some point, most of us would say that action done under coercion is not genuine enjoyment, but it is hard to pin point where. Ironic enjoyment of Iron Maiden is in that gray area.

Let's take the other extreme. Say all social reinforcement is part of our genuine enjoyment. After all, we choose our choices and we choose what pleases us the most. That includes not only the biological triggers, but the effects from society such as pleasing girlfriends and not taking bullets. Of course, if everything we did was what we liked, then we would be constantly enjoying things. At all times, we would be as happy as we could be simply because our choices were our choices.

And so the whole universe breaks down (or at least economics and our ideas of enjoyment of goods). It is difficult to determine what we truly enjoy due to social reinforcement. We do stuff because we enjoy things, maybe. But, we might actually not really enjoy those things "genuinely." And, what is enjoyment anyways?

When someone asks "Do you like it?" all we can say is "I think so."