Decisions

What is a decision? A decision is the conscious selection of an option and the subsequent commitment to realise it. Whether a decision is objectively good or bad is hard to say (See pluralism), but the subjective success can be considered to be whether or not it is implemented in reality.

The life of a decision

Imagine there is a small door in a building. You have to duck your head every time you come in and out. This irritates you, but not enough to do something about it so you live with it. One day you almost forget to duck and nearly hit your head - pretty annoying - you wonder if the door frame could be made higher... but that seems like a lot of work and you forget about it. Eventually, you hit your head off the frame - and it hurts! You decide that something has to change and consider the options: Making the frame higher would require digging into the ceiling and create a hole in the floor above... Moving the items from this room elswhere is tricky as there is not enough space elsewhere... What about attaching some fluorescent foam? It's easy, you won't forget to duck and if you do it won't hurt so much. You decide to attach some foam and begin looking for some.

From this example an abstract model can be made to account for all kinds of decision lifecycles.

• Stimuli causing an internal response. (e.g. having to duck, nearly hitting your head, actually hitting your head)
• Dissent with current situation [internal response] (e.g. being irritated, being annoyed, being in pain)
• Exploration of the ways to change. (heighten frame, move items, attach foam)
• Decision on a way to change. (e.g. to attach foam)
• Implementation of decision [external response] (e.g. looking for foam, spreay paint and tape)

If you're a fan of biomimicry, this model can be easily likened to a neuron... hang on, the metaphor is really nice! The neuron is a brain cell that receives energy from a stimuli at one, leading to a change in the internal (electrical) energy. Below a certain intensity, stimuli fail to elicit any further changes. However, if the neuron receives a stimulus of sufficient intensity to push the it past its threshold, the neuron 'fires' in an all-or-nothing response leading to the output of further stimuli