Heroin only, no tobacco smoking

In Norway addicts can inject heroin in special government sponsored rooms. I am not objecting to this, but I do find it slightly ironic that they are not allowed to smoke tobacco there.

Absurd tax to increase demand?

Here is a rant about something that seems bizarre: In Norway we sometimes watch commercials about the benefits of eating meat. It turns out that these commercials are financed by a tax on farm products. This is regulated by a law from 1936 in which the government promised to help the industry by increasing demand. The result was a tax on meat which finances advertisements for meat consumption. The tax amounts to about USD 2 per capita every year. This sounds a bit absurd. There is no lack of desire to buy meat. Could such a tax be justified?

Rational self-torturer?

W. Quinn has argued that there is something wrong with rational choice theory since it implies that a person given the choice between a negelectible increase in pain (too small to be perceptible) and a reward, will continue to select the reward until she ends up in excruciating pain. Chrisoula Andreou has written several papers on this and here are my comments on her paper.