Heuristics-What are they and are they needed?

     A heuristic approach or a heuristic is simply a problem solving technique which gives immediate results and is driven by intuition rather than judging the options logically or rationally. It may be driven by some past incidences of similar kind and one's approach to that incidence. It may instinctively strike you when put into a situation. Heuristics are not exact and need not necessarily guarantee expected results but nonetheless our brain is used to having them since we are constantly judging a problem and that leads to formation of some impressions. The next time you see a similar situation, you quixotically jump to conclusion based on the experience of the past heuristics.

     This might be helpful in some cases but might be pernicious in other cases. To give an example, let us consider the following instance. I will not mind paying a dollar more for a 1000 dollar item but would definitely hesitate at the prospect of buying an item worth 2 dollars for 3 dollars, even though buying the respective items costs me equal energy, time and both are available at the same store. Our brain is trained to this heuristic of weighing the cost of an item on a relative scale. In the first case, a dollar is 0.1% of the selling price of 1000 dollars whereas in second it is 50% more than its actual selling price of 2 dollars. Although I must think on an absolute scale with respect to the work and time put in purchasing the item, I don't. This is the bad side of heuristics.

     Also, in situations of peril, it is this heuristics that comes to help us make quick decisions. In case of leak of a toxic gas from a pipe, one will search for something to seal the pipe based on whatever is available in the vicinity. Now, heuristics will help him fetch the sealing agent quickly or help him decide which of the available substances can suffice the purpose. 

     It has both positive and negative sides and if you're not in any hurry it is always better to pause and think at the decision which you are going to make heuristically as to whether it will effectively serve the purpose.