Understanding why many of these controversial diseases are problems in the first place is made a little clearer if we look at the problem through the lens of be

Understanding why many of these controversial diseases are problems in the first place is made a little clearer if we look at the problem through the lens of behavioural economics. Alcoholics, nicotine addicts, many obese people, sexaholics, etc place huge discount rates on future rewards so that in the present, these future rewards are almost worthless. Put another way, these people place the most value on their next item of consumption which allows them to overcome the long-term costs of their destructive behaviour or the long-term benefits to quitting (if we assume these people make an instantaneous cost-benefit analysis each time they eat/drink/smoke/etc). This sort of radical discounting behaviour has been shown to be reversible in those who seek treatment. Now, to one of the main points of the article: What constitutes an acceptable form of treatment to these gray-area diseases? An economist would probably say that you would have to consider the individual in question and then formulate a solution based on that individual's preferences, likelihood of success, and cost of change. For one obese person, gastric bypass might be the only solution between life and death. For another obese person, paying $25,000 for gastric bypass surgery might be "worth it" and allow them to change their eating habits in a way that would benefit them long-term without having to go through the anguish of months or years of diet and exercise. For another obese person with another preference set, diet and exercise would be far less costly than gastric bypass. Why bring right and wrong into the argument when looking at treatment methods? Edit: Giving the issue some further thought, some might make a value judgement as to how bad or good heavy temporal discounting is. Given the assumption that it is wrong or bad, then you could hypothesize that the American culture of consumerism has gradually conditioned our population as a whole to shift their preferences to the present, valuing the quick fix over long-term, less costly approaches.