The context is specifically a description of the theory of utility and how it is inconsistent with the preferences people actually exhibit.

Also, let me emphasize that the solution to the problem is not to say that people’s preferences are correct and so the utility model is wrong. Rather, in this example I find utility theory to be useful in demonstrating why the sort of everyday risk aversion exhibited by typical students (and survey respondents) does not make financial sense. Utility theory is an excellent normative model here.

Which is why it seems particularly silly to be defining these preferences in terms of a nonlinear utility curve that could never be.

It’s as if you went into a bathroom in a bar and saw a guy pissing on his shoes, and instead of thinking he has some problem with his aim, you suppose he has a positive utility for getting his shoes wet.