‘Entire evenings of my life have been shaped by the

From movies to gyms to holidays, we all love handing out a star rating. Joel Golby explains why – and reviews his life over the past week

Humans are compelled to review. The five-star and 10-point rating systems just make implicit sense to us, each number having its own gravity and texture that can be transposed on to a gut-feeling or opinion. So, last night’s dinner: what was that? I had a sort of dal and paratha thing that I’d put at about 7/10 (it was nice, but 8 feels too much). Obviously Dune: Part Two was a five-star movie whereas Dune was maybe only a four.

But we are powerfully swayed by other people’s reviews, too. I am forever in some area of London, not knowing where I am or what I want to eat, squinting at Google Maps through raindrops, deciding whether I want to eat at the 4.4-rated pizza place or the 4.3-rated Vietnamese place. Entire evenings of my life have been shaped by the aggregated internet review culture of Rotten Tomatoes telling me one streaming-service film is slightly better than another. I have blindly bought fragrances, books and music just based on what 1,000 or so anonymous reviewers sort of rated each one out of five. The number out of five having an experience pipeline is an intrinsic part of our lives.