Intoxicants don't make you irrational!

Well, you have nodded your head reluctantly that most people are rational. But hasn’t it occurred to yet that not “most” but “all” people are rational. And that includes drunkards, drug addicts, and even infants.

Let me start with drunkards and drug addicts. Drunkards and drug addicts when in the influence of their respective drugs seem to be acting irrationally. Even more so, it is claimed that these people are so addicted that they would be unaffected by price changes-both monetary and non-monetary. If you believe that these people are indeed irrational, just ask yourself were they before they took these substances?

If you answer yes, then you have accepted that their decision to take up alcohol or drugs was a rational decision. Anybody who gets into drinking or drugs is full aware of the consequences of taking them. If he still continues with it, they he has simply calculated the cost of taking drugs i.e. monetary, psychological etc. to be much less than the benefit rendered by intoxication. This explains why people drink more often than they take drugs or why those who take drugs are more likely to experiment with softer ones than harder ones. Hard drugs have a very high cost compared to the relative benefit it confers. So most people stay clear of it. On the other hand, having a beer occasionally will do little, if any, harm to your body and hence most people do consume it frequently. In some cases, there is asymmetry or it is claimed. Drunkards cannot anticipate the future consequences of drinking well enough to take a rational decision. That is far from the truth. Even if drunkards do not know the exact scientifically precise result of their consumption, they are well aware of the general effects of drinking. We buy cars, televisions, mobile phones and other gadgets without ever having read a page of engineering. Why are drunkards any different? Just like a public course on automobile engineering will not alter the demand for cars by much, a public education project against drinking will hardly stop drunkards from quitting. Most people knew smoking was bad years before any medical journal published the evidence that cigarettes were harmful.

Are infants rational? Why do babies cry to attract attention? Even without the power of language infants are able to satisfy their needs by calling out for assistance.  And while it may seem basic, infants are also able to smile and cry to convey message to their parents, hence assuring them of the optimal care. They don’t cry too often or too infrequently, they use it sparingly yet put their vocal chords to full use to ensure that they are taken care of. As I said, we don’t act rationally because we have fully-developed brains or because we have studied economics, rationality is in our very biology, economics is merely a first step in applying it universally to all our actions.