How your brain buys a sofa

Almost every popular commercial product owes its success to two different qualities. First, it does the job it is ostensibly designed to do pretty well. Secondly, it has some quality that you might call ‘limbic appeal’. It delights or soothes our unconscious mind in ways which defy objective measurement.

Much as it delusionally believes that it runs the show, the power granted to conscious reasoning within the brain is that given to a slightly colour-blind, utilitarian man when he buys a sofa with his wife. The man may have his own preferences, but he has a minimal role in the selection, involving as it does many complex factors that defy male comprehension (my wife has names for colours that seem not to exist on the visible spectrum). Yes, the man might influence things a bit — perhaps being offered the casting vote from a shortlist of two, or in rare instances attempting a veto; however, there is zero chance of his ever buying a sofa his wife does not like.