I seem to see the absolute dichotomy in question used as a way of minimizing or justifying the bad parts of a sequence of events, which Ralston seems to do - like that he had EITHER to be exactly as reckless and thoughtless as he was, and thus suffer the really huge consequences, OR he'd've been a mouse at home and had none of the good experiences. Ergo his bad experiences (and - and this is the part that I kinda side-eye him specifically because you mention that he mentions it - their consequences for other people) are justified/necessary/worth the good experiences.

I would agree with that actually. I don't buy the idea of taking back all the climbing in exchange for no accident false dichotomy in particular, I think. I knew people in SAR who probably would have been considered adrenaline junkies, and their opinion of people like this guy was....not kind. With him, his pattern of behaviour, and I don't mean to sound harsh, goes way beyond not leaving a note. Yeah, there's no way of staving off disaster, there's no absolute fail safe, but he was acting way beyond reckless IMHO, and repeatedly -- Jon Krakauer talks about some similar behaviour of his as a young man in Into the Wild, IIRC. And you can get hit by a bus crossing the street, or wind up getting stranded in a surprise whiteout blizzard just driving home from class in the early evening, which happened to me several times in Santa Fe.