"Philosophy" Meetup - The Paradox of Choice

The Paradox of Choice is a 2004 book written by Swarthmore College professor Barry Schwartz.

Wikipedia has a pretty good article about the book. It begins, "Autonomy and freedom of choice are critical to our well being, and choice is critical to freedom and autonomy. Nonetheless, though modern Americans have more choice than any group of people ever has had before, and thus, presumably, more freedom and autonomy, we don't seem to be benefiting from it psychologically."

AI offers some interesting questions about the paradox of choice, such as, "How do I decide when faced with too many options?" "How do I feel after making a choice when there were many alternatives?" and "How does having many choices affect my satisfaction with the final decision?"

You may also want to think about it in the context of existentialism. Maybe life is easier without so much freedom and autonomy.

Here are links to the Wikipedia article and to a second article about it. For those who like lectures, YouTube is full of lectures by Schwartz.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paradox_of_Choice

https://thedecisionlab.com/reference-guide/economics/the-paradox-of-choice