" Psychologist Robert Zajonc takes this claim one step further: “For most decisions, it is extremely difficult to demonstrate that there has actually been any prior cognitive process whatsoever.”28 It isn’t that the decisions people make are irrational; it’s that the process by which decisions are made are utterly unlike the step-by-step rational process that might be used to solve, say, a math problem. Decisions are typically made in the unconscious mind, by means of some unknown process. Indeed, "

― William B. Irvine , On Desire: Why We Want What We Want