If people temporarily prefer shortsighted alternatives on a regular basis, how do they talk about the experience? It's not something that's supposed to be happening. It not only makes us ineffective in following our own long-term plans, it puts us at risk of exploitation by people who find out what our temporary preferences are. Therefore we might be expected to try to keep it from happening, and when we can't, to conceal it, perhaps even from ourselves. How we try to prevent it is the main subject of this book, and I'll get to it in the next chapter. First we should examine how temporary preference actually feels, since this discussion may otherwise seem rather removed from real life. It will turn out that many diverse experiences that have been thought to require special mechanisms can be explained instead by hyperbolic discounting.

ZONES OF DURATION OF TEMPORARY PREFERENCES

First of all, a temporary preference probably produces different experiences, depending on how long it lasts. Very short ones might not be noticed as preferences, while very long ones might seem wholehearted and not temporary at all.

Addictions

If we start roughly in the middle – not seconds or years but hours or days – we can see the clearest examples, which lead to the common clinical tragedies as well as personal frustrations.