[sokoloff]

> It's mostly a case of people not knowing what they really want

While this is possible to be true, I suspect on a per-utterance basis, it’s wrong way more often than it’s right. People often do know what they want; it’s just inconveniently not the same as what the utterer prefers.

[quadrangle]

"really want" is a poor phrase, but it was intended to mean not "what people sincerely/honestly want" but instead "what people would choose if they really had deeply informed understanding of the options".

People's utterances about what they want are almost never in light of the question of what they "really want". We rarely have the space and perspectives to reflect on and learn about what we "really want" to be able to even answer that question.

Most of life is people having low-level fears about loss and acceptance and so on and expressing our wants from that position. We rarely settle into our deeper values enough to even ask what we "really want" let alone find answers.