[corentin]

So, if (let's say) you raise a group of boys isolated from the rest of the world until they are 15 and then, all of a sudden, tell them: "oh, by the way, there's this thing called 'girls', have a look, you'll probably like it", you've created an artificial want?

It's true that before seeing the ad for a MegaBananaChoco cereal bar, I didn't want to eat one. Yet I've always wanted to eat nice things. That's what's so great about ads: they provide information about good stuff.

[tome]

No, Galbraith would say, I think, (and I would agree with him) that sexual and social needs are innate and would express themselves even if information about possible means of expression is suppressed.

You might as well say "raise a group of boys without clothes" and then tell them "there's this thing called clothes that will keep you warm". It doesn't matter if you don't tell them: they'll still be cold.

On the other hand, no one has a need for a MegaBananaChoco bar in particular. If you never tell anyone about the bar, they're not going to suffer from not having it.

[anamax]

> On the other hand, no one has a need for a MegaBananaChoco bar in particular. If you never tell anyone about the bar, they're not going to suffer from not having it.

You're cheating. While it's fair to say that no one has a "need" for a specific bit of sugary goodness, it's not fair to say that no one needs better food and won't suffer from not having it.

Yes, the "need" for better food may be expressed, but that's rather uninteresting without a mechanism for determining how to satisfy that need. The "eat Reese's pieces" ad is actionable. "Eat good food" is both useless and uneconomic in that there's no point in someone paying to say it.

[turkishrevenge]

You're still missing the point tome is trying to make. Unless there is an innate need for a particular thing, often on the basis of utility as it relates to survival or reproduction, a person cannot want what he is ignorant of. Only through exposure, can a person form a desire and adequately articulate wanting something, as in "I want to buy Reese's."

[anamax]

> Unless there is an innate need for a particular thing, often on the basis of utility as it relates to survival or reproduction, a person cannot want what he is ignorant of.

That fails wrt "good food". There is no innate need for any specific food. Yet, there is a generic expressed need.

Heck - it even fails wrt clothing and warm. There are many ways to be warm. (When my cat gets cold, she doesn't put on pants.)

> You're still missing the point tome is trying to make.

I'm pointing out that the interesting version is wrong and the correct version is uninteresting.

Yes, one can't want a specific solution of which one is unaware, but that's not a very interesting result. One can easily want a solution to a generic problem ("cold", "food") and thus value information wrt specific solutions ("little black dress", "Reese's").