[This is post 5 in the "Structure and Cognition" series; links to all the posts can be found here ] I. A major motivation for starting this blog was to clarify my thoughts about an idea that wouldn’t leave me alone. I see it everywhere, which is ironic, because the idea is about seeing (or not seeing) common structure lurking beneath different-seeming surfaces. Framing is a big topic in the psychology of decision making. The way choices are presented can influence the decisions we make. This is why food sold in the supermarket is more likely to say '99% fat free' than '1% fat.' Sanitizing wipes 'kill 99.9% of germs,' they don’t 'only leave 0.1% of germs alive.' Obviously, these values are identical, so it shouldn’t matter one way or the other, but it does. From the perspective of traditional economics, this is insane. People should prefer whatever they actually like – every product should have (or be translatable to) a utility value. You sh...