Why say short=feminine? Don't more people think short=weak, without making the further connection?
The whole 'lord and master' thing is astonishingly repulsive. I dated shorter men. I find them to be pleasingly compact. Tall men are nice, too, but I have never thought 'that guy is too short- I can't date him'.
I refuse to believe the whole bullshit evo-psych nonsense about genetic predetermination, especially since all the research I've read over the years seems to point to the notion that a) we are influenced just as much, if not more by environment and b) a lot of what people claim to be 'genetically predetermined traits' are incredibly recent developments in Western culture.
Lobster H? Have you been seeing Fafblog?
I dated a 6'6" guy for awhile, and his height just got to be annoying. Mind you, he got to be annoying to me.
Any ideas how good behavior ought to be modeled, on both sides? Or on all sides, I guess I should say, how many permutations are there, that are significant, I wonder.
I don't have any problem whatsoever with a tall glass o' water.
Lobster H... didn't they do "Bound for the Ocean Floor" and "All the Kids are Right Clawed"?
lots of men are reluctant to date taller
I think taller women is a quite prevalent kink among US males. See the œuvre of R. Crumb sometime -- obvs. R. Crumb is not a significant portion of American men but I think the kink he portrays so well is not uncommon.
So, does 3 fall into the category of comments so criticized in the other thread?: "I don't think that way. I think they're attractive."
I have a male friend who's about 5'5". For over a year he dated a woman who was almost 6 feet tall, and it was so weird to see them together because it made you realize how unusual that sort of pairing is. Besides Sonny and Cher, I can't think of another example.
In fact I don't have any problem with R. Crumb girls. I have just one friend who will commiserate with me on RC's ideal.
I can honestly say height has never been a factor for me in dating. I'm rarely conscious of just how tall my female friends and acquaintances are. (I discovered recently to my surprise that one of my best friends is actually an inch or so taller than I.)
I'm very conscious of being shorter than other men. I always end up feeling like a little kid looking up at a tall co-worker.
2: Because most women who think consciously about a height standard think about it in relation to themselves. It's usually not "no one under 5'10" it's either "No one shorter than me," or "No one shorter than me in heels." It's not about an objective standard of 'big', it's about who's bigger -- which member of the couple reads as more masculine on the size scale.
If we can get some other women to fess up that they have implicit height standards (Jack? You said you did?) I'll bet you that they agree that you can trade height for muscle, to some degree. It's not nearly so much about height as it is about total relative size and strength, and that reads to me like a masculine/feminine issue.
I was responding to a statement in the previous thread that generalized that all women were solely attracted to taller men because it was 'genetically pretermined'.
There were no pictures of basketball centers next to a garden gnome to kick off my comment.
reads as feminine, and feminine as sexually unattractive.
Wow, that's a real shot at ogged from out of nowhere.
2: Ogged, seriously, do you mean they don't make the connection consciously? Or do you think that it isn't made *unconsciously*? Because I find the latter hard to believe, and harder not to be all, "what, are you kidding!?!" about, while flailing my arms and making my incredulous face.
Wow, that's a real shot at ogged from out of nowhere.
Predictable, though, in a thread about men with size insecurities.
3, 9, 13: I don't think height standards are universal -- this is an issue lots of people don't have. (Dr. Oops does just fine at 6'1". But she's awfully pretty.) But it shows up a fair amount, and people are uninhibited about admitting to having height standards.
As a short guy, I like taller women, and they could sure have me if they wanted me. To me it means I get more woman in my bed, which is great.
But I think it may be genetic, or deeply cultural, that a woman needs to look up to a man before she can "succumb" to him.
Maybe that's why it took feminism so long to rear its head.
The truly feminist thing to do might be to go after short men, to uproot the genetic -- or cultural -- call to succumb to a lord and master.
(There's a whole dom/sub thing going on here too.)
I wish these hierarchies of attractiveness were less salient.
I'm 6'0" and most of the women I have dated have been in the 5'5" to 5'7" range which, I suppose, most women are generally. Roberta is 5'10", I've dated one woman who was 6'1", and one who was 5 feet even. Can't say that I've developed any sort of preference, aside from short women being more eyecatching when I was dating tall ones, and vice versa.
However, slow dancing seems to work best with about a 6-inch height differential.
Most women don't 'succumb' to men' - they fuck them. It's not all bodice-ripping romance novels in the world of sex, ya know.
Feminism has been with us forever, albeit not as a formally described ideology.
Adam, it's not genetic, don't be silly. It is highly cultural, but I don't think it's so much "succumb to a man" (although I do think that that's at the root of a lot of bdsm stuff) as it is that for men, height functions as a synechdoche for power, status, and influence. Women are as status conscious as guys are: a boyfriend who is taller than you are raises your social standing, while a boyfriend who is shorter lowers it, just as for a man, a girlfriend who is thin and pretty raises theirs, while a girlfriend who is heavy or not especially attractive lowers it. The implication is that one couldn't get anyone better.
it's not genetic, don't be silly. It is highly cultural
As always, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.
It's not nearly so much about height as it is about total relative size and strength
At least for me, this seems to hold true. At 5'6", I once dated a woman who was four inches taller than me, but because she was quite thin (not that I like that sort of thing), we probably displaced about teh same amount of water. (And that's what it's all about in the end, water displacement.) My current girlfriend is slightly shorter than me, but has a bit more meat on her bones (not that I like that sort of thing either). Just like the gangly one, she weighs pretty much the same as I do.
I'm hoping to one day date a really fat dwarf.
Ok, I've already admitted that I prefer to date men who are taller than me. However! My longest relationship was with a man who was only literally taller than me, maybe by a centimeter. And I don't subscribe to the "trading height for muscle" standard, since, um, I like my guys on the skinnier side, no matter how tall they are.
You think there's some truth to the idea that women are genetically programmed to date men who are taller than they are? Really?
slow dancing seems to work best with about a 6-inch height differential.
Yes! Finally, a reason to offer my wife for my incompetence.
30- you think there's not? Really?
To elaborate on 33: height would seem to be a reasonably good partial indicator of evolutionary fitness, no? So the idea that women would have evolved in part to prefer taller males (along with stronger males, and smarter males, and more successful males, and more symmetric males) doesn't seem at all odd to me.
33: Yeah, I really don't see why there would be. And I've never heard any evidence that this is actually so. And I *have* seen evidence to the contrary. And it certainly seems pretty obvious that the arbitrary division of "six feet" is *completely* a social construct.
OK, I'll 'fess up. I would probably be reluctant to date someone my height or shorter. This issue hardly ever arises, though, because I'm 5'4".
For me, muscle doesn't compensate. Last year I dated a guy who was about 5'8" -- he went to the gym every day and was pretty muscular, but I secretly thought he was trying to compensate for his height, which to me was pretty cheesy. And I'm not really into bulky guys anyway.
But there's also this: In the winter I met a guy who was cute, and about my height. At first I thought (not totally consciously), "he'd be dateable if he weren't so short" but then I got to know him, and saw all his stellar qualities -- extremely smart, accomplished, socially deft, charming, nice, modest, funny. I probably would date him now.
who are taller than they are?
Who are tall in general. Bigger males tend to have better reproductive success all up and down the vertebrates. It seems a bit dodgy to insist that we're immune from that.
34 -- but how does the whole clown makeup/big floppy shoes/rubber nose preference thing fit in here?
Of course it's genetic, too, silly. Men are genetically taller than women on average. So culturally women and men adapt to this genetic destiny.
36 -- you make me blush!
I probably would date him now
That's exactly what I was talking about at the end of the last thread. Eventually, we short guys get laid, often by working harder or being more charming or whatever. But we don't get that one-night stand action that taller guys get, and short guys with poor social skills end up trying too hard and getting all shrill and icky, wihch does no one any favours.
But maybe the mechanism that LB describes in #14 explains ogged's position in the post below. Ogged is 6', 110 lbs. If he chooses his girlfriend with an eye towards being able to feel masculine, she's going to have to weigh less than tripple digits. But ogged's a pretty special case.
34: No, I am a little sick of these evo-psych rationalizations for the status quo.
That said, my own version of evo-psych is this: we're social animals, and therefore status-oriented. We care about status. Whatever defines "status" in a given society is going to be perceived as more sexually attractive.
I mean, think about it for five seconds. There is *no reason* why a man who is over six feet and makes six figures sitting on his ass all day is going to be more "naturally" attractive to a woman than a man who is 5'10" and does manual labor. If the whole "women are genetically predetermined to prefer stronger, more successful males" thing had any truth to it, then the physically stronger guy would be clearly more sexually attractive. And the way we measure height--inches, feet, and so on--is *obviously* something we just made up, so there's no material difference between 5'10" and 6'+.
But if things like "success" and "height" are social constructs and thumbnail measures of status, then the rich out of shape guy who is two inches taller than the poor strong guy jumps to the head of the pack.
*And* this is true for men as well as for women; surely you guys have noticed that other men, who are presumably not trying to fuck you, also "prefer," i.e., offer a lot more respect to, men who are rich/tall (and other status markers: education, certain speech patterns, how good-looking a guy's woman is) than they do to guys who are "below" them but could beat the crap out of them.
Adam, Apo: So a tall guy who is a farmworker is gonna get more tail than an average height or even short guy who is rich as shit? Uh huh, sure.
36: I'm 5'3", and I'm crushed. I still think I'm a better catch than reuben, because even though he's three inches taller, he's also £350 poorer per year, because (see previous thread) I didn't give up cutting my own hair.
there's no material difference between 5'10" and 6'+
By the same token there's no material difference between 3' and 8'. The objects represented by the numbers would however be materially different.
Bigger males tend to have better reproductive success all up and down the vertebrates.
Yeah, and if men achieved reproductive success through beating up other men and raping women, as happens in other animals, then sure: being bigger would be an obvious advantage. But I thought we were talking about what women *prefer*, rather than about what men enforce.
My point, B, was that there are both cultural and genetic factors at play. The fact remains that, particularly with mammals, larger males have better reproductive success. Clearly, cultural forces are stronger than genetic ones at this point in our evolution, but just declaring the evolutionary ones inoperative is silly.
height would seem to be a reasonably good partial indicator of evolutionary fitness, no?
Wasn't there a thread about how height is a reasonably good partial indicator of how well-fed and free of infectious disease you were growing up? Which would probably be a desirable quality in a mate, but we shouldn't think height itself is mostly genetic. (Still, this means I agree with 27.)
Reuben, as a short guy, I can tell you some one-night stand stories that would make your pecker stand on edge. Maybe you haven't considered the mutual imbibing of wine as a river which sweeps the woman/man thing along on a tide of mounting lust, drowning all anxieties about disparate heights in its brimming wake. Wine goggles and all, mate.
47: My point is that "six feet" is the magic cutoff point. And "six feet" is a nice round number, but only because of our system of measurement. No one is going to seriously argue that there's some genetic factor that just happens to cause us to unconsciously calibrate six feet, exactly. Are we now making some kind of natural language argument that if we raise children in complete isolation, they'll measure things by yards and inches?
I mean, think about it for five seconds. There is *no reason* why a man who is over six feet and makes six figures sitting on his ass all day is going to be more "naturally" attractive to a woman than a man who is 5'10" and does manual labor.
Obviously that's true. What if you replace "over six feet" with "taller than the woman", and replace "5'10"" with "shorter than the woman"? Then I think it's not true. And that's what we're talking about.
It's not nearly so much about height as it is about total relative size and strength, and that reads to me like a masculine/feminine issue
I'll fess up to being guilty of this, which is at least partly why I can't get het up about women who reject short guys out of hand. In my own case, I often find tall women especially good looking (there's something about the line of a long torso), but when it comes to the sexual, I do find that I'm not particularly attracted to women who would displace more water than me. So I'm just as guilty as women who think I'm too short - and I've made a rod for my own back. So yeah, I agree with LB's premise - and I say all this being someone who everyone agrees is a markedly feminine man in terms of attitudes, goals and behaviours. (Luckily I have a disproportionately large penis, much like this man.)
Any sense of what long-use metric societies use? 1,8?
49: Then let's have some *evidence* about the evolutionary factors, not just speculation. Let's show that height, specifically, is the measure of size that women actively choose for, absent cultural/social factors. Let's show that men's income is a natural measure of evolutionary success for offspring. (In fact, the evidence points the other way: it is women's wealth, not men's that is the best predictor for good outcomes for children.)
Otherwise, it's all speculation. And it's speculation that implicitly argues that the status quo, which is demonstrably sexist, is inevitable and something we can't do much about. That is, it's an argument the negative consequences of which are pretty clear, and the positive evidence for which simply doesn't exist.
So yeah, I'm inclined to say that, given those things, I prefer to focus on the social/cultural argument and wait until evidence for the evolution thing actually shows up before I start accepting claims that naturalize the status quo.
How 'bout this theory: In interactions among men, height confers a social advantage, all other factors being equal. This contributes to greater self-confidence, which in turn contributes to increased attractiveness.
Hmmm. I'd never considered this "wine" strategy. Do tell.
54: Luckily for you, reuben, there are women out there with long torsos who wouldn't displace more water than you.
Did Toulouse Lautrec get major action because of his large dick? Maybe they thought of him as more of a sex toy than an actual guy -- a talking dildo.
t's not nearly so much about height as it is about total relative size and strength, and that reads to me like a masculine/feminine issue.
Yup yup. I'm 5'4''ish, and while I have dated short (5'5'') guys, I'm attracted to guys who are about 5'10'' with bulky builds. Too much taller and I feel loomed over.
B is right to the extent that 'six feet is tall' is just a product of American norms, and I'd say further that when most of us say 'six feet', we mean about 6'2'', but I'm not sure how much deeper the point goes, especially since no one is arguing for a genetic natural language of height.
It's not that height is a wholly arbitrary preference for women; what counts as tall floats, but is somewhat dependent on the average height for the population. This seems to me both relatively uncontroversial and what everyone on the thread is saying.
Not that I want to get into a fight with you, Dr B, 'cause I'm pretty sure you could kick my tiny little ass, but I think you're throwing up a straw man with the six-foot thing. Isn't what we're talking about here whether or not the man is shorter than the woman? In a conversation about short guys / taller women, talking about the difference between guys who are 5'10" and 6' is kind of heading off in a different direction, it seems to me.
For my part, I think that most of the reason that a woman who is four inches taller and 30 pounds heavier than me doesn't find me as hot as if I was taller and less scrawny is cultural. But it doesn't strike me as outrageous to posit that it's possible that somewhere along the evolutionary path, the female of our species found it wise to cuddle up to guys who weren't smaller and lighter than her, and that somehow, at least in a little way, that has stuck.
implicitly argues that the status quo, which is demonstrably sexist, is inevitable and something we can't do much about
Nonsense. It only says that there is a biological component to why almost every woman here has admitted to preferring taller men. What that has to do with sexism is teh very obscure. I stated above that cultural factors are now more important than the evolutionary ones in partner selection, so clearly it isn't inevitable or insurmountable.
so they drink this wine, and they get amorous, you say?
57: Yes. "All other factors being equal" is key, however, and when you spend all your life with height issues (and other people's chests) in your face, you tend to think about those other factors a lot.
59: Frankly, I found you much more attractive before your ears were clipped.
So, 50 means that height is also a measure of status. But I agree that it's reasonable to look at social factors until evolutionary factors can be proven.
And, note (all around) that saying "X is genetic" means very close to dick about what we should do about X. If preference for height is genetic, does that mean that people shouldn't consider striving to overcome their bias against short guys, or whatever? Clearly not, any more than our (I figure) genetic preference for fatty and sugary foods means that we shouldn't try and eat healthy.
On preview, this means I'm agreeing with 63; though note that B is by no means throwing up a straw man when she complains that people say "It's genetic, so there's nothing to be done." No one here has made this argument, but lots of people do.
66: Also, quit peeing on the carpet already.
Let me tell you, text, a little vodka in her soda pop, and you'll be in poontang heaven.
59: If it means anything, based on your flickr picture I expected you to be about 4-6 inches taller.
(Biscuit conditional! Mwahahaha!)
67: Also, 'X is culturally determined' doesn't mean we need to man the barricades and start finding short guys to screw to prove we're sufficiently enlightened.
Also, quit peeing on the carpet already
Actually, that's just the kind of water displacement I'm talking about.
66: so it wasn't being spayed that put you off.
66: so it wasn't my being spayed that put you off.
71 -- Adam begs to differ.
73, 74: Hooray! Spayings for everyone!
>"X is genetic" means very close to dick about what we should do about X
Good. It is true that the idea that "X is socially constructed" means very little about how malleable a practice it is. False inferences (natural --> intractable/beneficial; social --> easy to change) are a real problem here.
As a matter of politics, we may want to default to a 'it's all nurture' point of view until natural differences have been conclusively established. It doesn't make much sense intellectually, however, to place much higher burdens of proof on nature as a causal factor for a phenomenon than nurture.
to place much higher burdens of proof on nature as a causal factor for a phenomenon than nurture.
Well, we know nature arguments have been used and abused to bad effect in the past, so there is a rational reason for being suspicious of such arguments.
Also, 'X is culturally determined' doesn't mean we need to man the barricades and start finding short guys to screw to prove we're sufficiently enlightened.
Au contraire, I think it behooves every woman on this thread to go out tonight and bang a short guy's brains out of his tiny head as a gesture of enlightened fourth wave feminism. This discrimination against short guys has to end. Women have to fight their essentialist urge to succumb to tall lord-and-master types. Strike a blow against the tall patriarchy!
I just don't see the naturally sexist inferences that fall out of assuming arguendo that women prefer big, strong guys. Maybe I'm being obtuse, but I like strong guys and still manage to want my own career and pick my own fights.
If we continue further to assume that 'natural is right' or 'preferring big, strong guys means a preference for being thought of as weak and helpless so therefore we don't need to teach girls math', sure, and while those arguments have been made, the problem is with the inference from 'natural' to 'good', and should be remedied by pointing out that most of what Nature wants to do is grind us up into little bits and feed us to tigers, not by insisting that nature couldn't have anything to do with preferences.
One vote for the culturally determined side. I grew up with short Asian kids, and my tastes run to men my height or a little shorter. Only one of my boyfriends has been taller than me. I can fall for taller men if they are especially charming and witty, but with no other information, I'll head straight to guys who are about 5'6".
I find short guys don't consider me at first, because they've found women taller than them to be low-percentage in the past.
doesn't mean we need to man the barricades
Unless you're a plate-scraper, in which case, start baring the mannicades!
82: You forgot: "I'll bring the booze!"
I'll head straight to guys who are about 5'6"
This is how you ensure that you can beat them up? By fishing in the genetically inferior pool?
Like baa, I see very little benefit in arguing whether a preference originates in nature or nurture unless we clarify quite strenuously what difference it makes. Are we really to believe that all naturally selected behaviors are socially acceptable or at least excusable? Are we contrariwise to believe that all socially selected behaviors are willfully mutable? I think neither proposition tenable.
But then, I'm over six feet tall.
This thread has made me realize that we, the Unfoggetariat, have been asking ourselves the wrong question all along. The key issue is not "Who wants to sex Mutombo?" but rather "Why does everybody want to sex Mutombo?"
86: No, women have got to bonk a shorter man without the aid of booze, otherwise it's not truly feminist. This is a revolutionary act that subverts the geneticism of nature itself. Fuck a shorter clown now!
81: The Nazis used Mendel to bad effects, but it doesn't mean that any of his work is suspect.
89: But we know the answer to that question. No, the real question is, "Who doesn't want to sex Mutombo?"
Nature, nurture, schmature, schmurture. We're human, we have brains and experiences and idiosyncrasies, and when it comes down to real interactions between two people, they matter at least as much. A girlfriend who perhaps shouldn't have found me desirable from an evolutionary standpoint (as if!) may nevertheless have been attracted partly because her dad, of whom she was very fond, was also a short man -- just one example.
That said, I've never dated a woman stronger than me. And incidentally, from what I hear, I could snap ogged like a twig.
I could snap ogged like a twig
Watch out for his big brother Labs!
91: Right, but I don't know that Mendel made any claims that might be described as "social" claims. And I'm not saying that we shouldn't allow for the possibility that there are genetic reasons for a host of characteristics. I'm saying that we are at the very beginning of our understanding of genetics, and we ought to be suspicious of answers to questions that require much greater knowledge than we currently have to answer with any rigor. I think I've made basically the same statement about cultural explanations about a variety of ills.
91: But Mendel's arguments were good. There have been a lot of bad genetic arguments used to bad effect, and that's enough reason to raise the burden of proof on genetic arguments a touch. (I mean, we aren't exactly bringing rigorous data to bear in this thread). It's the falsity of the past arguments that counts; it's relevant that they reinforced existing prejudices because that's why people were able to get away with such bad arguments.
96, 97: But what do we really gain by saying that preferences are social and cultural? Does it make them less legitimate or forcible?
what do we really gain by saying that preferences are social and cultural?
The ability to say "stop oppressing me."
I mean, okay, here's an example. Margaret Mead says that sexual modesty is culturally constructed. Why, just look at the Samoans frolicking and trysting indiscriminately under Pacific skies.
Now, 1. it turns out this was a bad argument on the merits; i.e., evidently, the Samoans are at least as surly a bunch as the rest of us when it comes to sexual transgressions (LB may correct me) and
2. it also turns out that this argument did not have the anticipated consequences, i.e., it did not reveal American sexual mores to be insubstantial culturally constructed stuff that would blow away in the analytical breeze.
The ability to say "stop oppressing me."
So what, this is just about defining more torts?
But what do we really gain by saying that preferences are social and cultural? Does it make them less legitimate or forcible?
Nothing. I'm not sure it matters, except that people making the "nature" argument are often making the "nothing can be done" argument. I should also note that it's not clear to me that we should always care at all about other people's preferences, even when they disadvantage us or others. There has to be some sort of "good enough for government work" rule of fairness at play.
Well, as a guy who's 5'5" and in a long term relationship with a 6' tall woman, I think it's hugely culturally determined. But I am also not so sure that it is as impossible to change as other folks here.
If you read the personals, it seems that everyone's looking for a tall man and a thin woman. Now certainly standards of attractive weight are a cultural thing, and have changed fairly recently, and I've not seen any evidence that height is any less so. It seems to me that any argument for a biological source for tall man=attractive could equally well be applied to women. If there's a biological advantage to height, why would there be any less advantage for tall women (who presumably would have taller kids). But many (most?) men won't date a woman taller than them. Anybody come upon any evidence that the tall thing existed, say, 100 years ago? It seems easy to say "well, we can't change it," without looking at the history of it.
Oh, and #1, not so much.
I couldn't comment on the pig-in-heels post for fear of being called a hysterical bitch, because that subject do make my blood boil.
But I do feel the need to drop in here and say "But I think short, trollish guys are sexy! I mean, his head is so much closer to my crotch! Plus, he'll be so grateful for the attention, he'll do anything I want. Think of the benefits, girls! Sex up a shorty today!"
That is all.
(Seriously, I've never cared about a guy's height one way or the other. Like, at all. I guess that means I was either natured or nurtured wrong.)
It seems to me that any argument for a biological source for tall man=attractive could equally well be applied to women. If there's a biological advantage to height, why would there be any less advantage for tall women (who presumably would have taller kids).
I was just coming in to point this out as a bad argument. If a quality (say, size) is useful in itself, and inherited from both parents, there's no obvious reason why it should be attractive in one sex and not the other.
For once making a 'nature' argument, hasn't it been shown that people tend (over broad populations, lots of individuals don't do this) to seek out sex partners similar to themselves on a lot of dimensions? Under that theory, I'm genetically most similar on the height dimension to a 5' 11' man (I think -- don't gendered height differences within a family come out to about 4", on average?). So it makes sense for me (if this similarity preference is operating) to be attracted to guys about that height rather than much taller or shorter. Given that most women are shorter than most men, this turns into a substantial penalty for short guys over all.
Wait, a 5'5" guy named sasha who is dating a much bigger woman? I feel a Tucker Max story coming.
What that has to do with sexism is teh very obscure.
I articulated what I think the whole "tall men are more attractive to women" thing has to do with sexism upthread. Twice, I think.
100: Right, the only reason we care about these things is so that we can play the victim.
the only reason we care about these things
No, but that's not the argument I'm making. Suppose it's Whitey's preference not to sell houses in Lily White Area to swarthy people. I don't really care whether Whitey's preference is genetically or culturally determined, I support a law to stop him exercising it because it's unjust.
So I don't see much point in arguing the origin of these preferences.
Oh, and 101: Samoans are at least as surly a bunch
Surlier.
104: It would be pretty fascinating to chart the history of the thing, especially given that average height has risen as nutrition has improved over the last few generations (the change in Japan over the past 50 years has been especially striking).
Wrenae: bless you and your crotch.
there's no obvious reason why it should be attractive in one sex and not the other
Again, refer to the rest of the animal kingdom. Size matters less for females across all sorts of species, and probably for different reasons across species. With early humans, the selection pressures would likely be youth and a build for easier birth. Height would be much less important than, say, hips.
But now I'm really just pulling things out of my anustart.
109: Yeah. A couple of years ago there was a huge discussion all over teh interwebs about whether rape was genetically selected for (there was probably an article making that argument that got it started), which struck me as about as interesting as whether theft is genetically selected for. In either case, the laws stay the same.
there was probably an article making that argument that got it started
And probably penned by Vox Day.
Size matters less for females across all sorts of species, and probably for different reasons across species.
Wanna back this up a bit? This form of evolutionary argument annoys me: "Men needed keen hearing to avoid predators! Women, on the other hand who were (someplace perfectly safe and civilized with no predators. On the plains of the Serengeti. They had condos.) had no similar needs."
And this:
With early humans, the selection pressures would likely be youth
How, exactly, do you genetically select for youth, pray tell?
Wanna back this up a bit?
Don't know that I can (hence the anustart). But females are smaller than males in a wide majority of vertebrate species, without intervening human cultural pressures. There is clearly a biological basis to that, right?
How, exactly, do you genetically select for youth, pray tell?
You kill off all the old people so they can't breed more old people, obviously.
That's different from saying that it doesn't advantage females to be larger than they are. It's perfectly possible both for a hormonal system that produces a larger male than female from the same size genes (or vice versa -- aren't some of the big cats that way) to be a successful adaptation, and for a female larger than other females to be more successful (better hunter, likely to have larger, so more successful, male and female offspring, whatever.)
Any sort of physical basis for attractiveness is inherently unjust, right? It would be a better world if our access to sex partners were determined exclusively by our level of kindness, or something. (actually, kindness is attractive.)
But that isn't how it works. We make choices based on physical characteristics, at least somewhat. Or at least, the idea of physical beauty is out there, and it isn't going away. We are drawn to some forms and not to others. The worse for us.
But unless there's something inherently pernicious going on, why should we care what the preferred characteristic is? Would the world be any better off if women universally preferred shorter men? Why is this something to care about?
I mean, preferring your women to be footbound is bad, because it necessitates footbinding. Preferring women to be extraordinarily thin could create similar problems.
But dispreferring actual obesity, preferring tall to short, preferring, I don't know, curly hair to straight, why does it matter at all? Given that, in the sexual marketplace, something is going to be preferred.
"Preferring women to be extraordinarily thin could create similar problems."
"could" here should be "would" or probably "does." Inasmuch as some men prefer emaciated women, that causes problems for women and is obviously bad.
If you read the personals, it seems that everyone's looking for a tall man and a thin woman
I'm looking for someone who likes piña coladas.
And getting caught in the rain.
Text, that's a great comment. You are very far away from being a talking-point spouter.
Also, it's not implausible that different traits might be advantageous for different genders. Indeed, it is plausible.
Part of the danger, I think, of subjecting 'nature' arguments to a higher standards of truth for political reasons is that people will make false inferences the other way. They will imagine the political cause (gender equality) depends on the scientific result (gender expectations are mainly socially constructed). That's a bad inference to make, and a losing one for gender equality if you think that genetics and evolutionary biology have a great deal of explanatory power. As Steve Pinker says: "feminism does not depend on lab results."
How, exactly, do you genetically select for youth, pray tell?
This is the scientific grail for which John Derbyshire quests.
females are smaller than males in a wide majority of vertebrate species, without intervening human cultural pressures. There is clearly a biological basis to that, right?
As I understand the standard evolutionary argument re: size differences, it's that males have more pressure to be big because we are more likely to fight amongst ourselves for access to females; the greater selection pressure on males for size doesn't come from a different environment, so much as it does from other males of the species. In other words, males are bigger than they need to be in order to be effective hunters etc on the Serengeti, because they also need to cope with other males, who are dicks.
And the reason for this different pressure is because one male can in theory impregnate every female in the herd, if it beats up every other male, but a female doesn't get any corresponding evolutionary advantage in terms of number of offspring produced from seeing off all other females.
And the evidence for this is supposed to be that size differentials between male and female are much greater in very highly polygamous species, and almost non-existent among species where there's no polygamy.
Thanks, baa. I think you're swell, and take pleasure when we can agree. I'm really just trying to get the "women prefer curly hair" meme out there.
Also, it's not implausible that different traits might be advantageous for different genders. Indeed, it is plausible.
Baa, we are members of a sexually dimorphic species. Without ever having met you, I know that odds are that you're taller than I am. (Not terribly strong odds, but it's still the way to bet.) So obviously there's nothing impossible about it.
But arguing that larger size (generally, rather than in proportion to females of the species) is advantageous to males across species and isn't advantageous to females is really poorly supported.
Shorter 126: short dudes should discourage polygamy.
11: Besides Sonny and Cher, I can't think of another example.
Sophia Loren and Carlo Ponti; Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, Michael J. Fox and Tracy Pollan.
short dudes should discourage polygamy.
They can try.
a female doesn't get any corresponding evolutionary advantage in terms of number of offspring produced from seeing off all other females.
In fact, seems logical that not only would it not be an advantage, would be a huge disadvantage to her.
126: But that doesn't separate selection for size in one gender from selection for size in the other. I'm my mother's daughter, but I'm my father's daughter as well, and I get my height from both of them.
but a female doesn't get any corresponding evolutionary advantage in terms of number of offspring produced from seeing off all other females.
Dominant female baboons kill the young of other female baboons. Just because they're female doesn't mean they're not competing for resources.
I think Nicole Kidman's new husband is also short, or at least less tall than she is.
132: Well, if we have a restricted food supply, it's possible that fewer females mean any single female can produce more supportable infants.
Dominant female baboons kill the young of other female baboons.
But do they kill the other female baboons too? Or "just" their offspring?
"Dominant female baboons kill the young of other female baboons."
That's why I propose chimp-eachment, and not baboon-eachment.
"Any corresponding advantage" was overstated. Certainly females compete for resources. But there's one particular scarce resource they don't have to fight over, and that's wombs. So while they still have pressure to fight among themselves (and with males) it's somewhat less severe.
that doesn't separate selection for size in one gender from selection for size in the other. I'm my mother's daughter, but I'm my father's daughter as well, and I get my height from both of them.
Well now this is entirely my anustart talking, but presumably there can be genes that you can get from either parent that express themselves for size more dramatically if they occur in a male than in a female. After all, there are pressures not to be big, too, if you don't have to. (You need less food, all other things being equal you live longer).
129: Show me a short Mormon, and I'll show you an unhappy Mormon.
re: 128 Felix's points on dimorphic ratios seem relevant. There are species where the females are larger than the males. That's evidence that size is more selected for in females than in males. Likely then, in this species females derive more advantage from size than males. If they didn't, why would they be bigger, etc.
Well now this is entirely my anustart talking, but presumably there can be genes that you can get from either parent that express themselves for size more dramatically if they occur in a male than in a female.
Sure -- I'm shorter than I would be if I were exposed to male hormones during puberty. That's where the shorter average height for girls than boys comes from. But that doesn't mean that there's evolutionary pressure on males to be larger, and no corresponding pressure on females to be larger -- size and strength, to some degree, are useful to any animal in the wild regardless of its gender.
Show me a short Mormon, and I'll show you an unhappy Mormon.
Actually, the conventional wisdom I've heard from that side of the family backs up LB's point about size and strength being important for both genders. Mormon wives, you see, did a lot of farming...
So it makes sense for me (if this similarity preference is operating) to be attracted to guys about that height rather than much taller or shorter. Given that most women are shorter than most men, this turns into a substantial penalty for short guys over all.
An it may be inferred from this that some men are too tall or large to be immediately thought attractive by a substantial number of women. I have many times experienced it.
More generally, if you want to express authority and dominance, you almost can't be too large. If you don't, if you're very ambivalent about such impressions and would much rather not give them, then you may have a perception problem. I remember having a needlessly, foolishly rancorous exchange about this with Emerson and LB months ago
There would appear to be a sweet spot. It might vary by situation. I can't say how often in the last few years I've been interviewed by a younger, smaller, less-experienced woman, who had to think about being my boss, and I've wished I could throw a lever, like the early-sixties Marvel SH "Giant Man," and scale myself appropriately.
141: Sure, but there are also pressures against size, otherwise we'd all be as big as whales. The bigger you are the more food you need, the more strain on your heart, etc. There's a balance of pressures and it may be that the balance-point is slightly different for males than females.
Relative to spiders on the one hand and whales on the other, male and female humans are almost exactly the same size, because we obviously occupy the same evolutionary niche. But if, because males achieve slightly greater benefits from competition amongst each other than females do, and so males have slightly more pressure to be big than females do, while both males and females are under the same pressures not to get too big, then you're going to find that males are slightly bigger than females.
Mormon wives, you see, did a lot of farming...
And someone's got to pull the plow when the mule's sick.
144: Right. The argument I was calling dopey was the one saying that there was obviously evolutionary pressure toward increased size for males and not for females. An argument saying that there's pressure toward a sweet spot -- not too big, not too small -- for both sexes, and that that spot can be different for each sex, is perfectly plausible.
Right, LB, but now we're talking about two different things - size and strength in terms of surviving disease or animal attacks or the like, and partner selection.
146: As I understood it, the argument wasn't pressure toward increased size in a vacuum, but in women preferring men that are taller than themselves.
But isn't dimorphism prima facie evidence that selective pressure on size differs by gender? If it didn't, wouldn't genders be the same size?
147: But the partner selection pressure should be the same as the other pressure (it's not always, for things like markings, etc., decorative feathers, you name it, but it's a good first guess). Both sexes should prefer partners who are best suited to survive and leave offspring who will also survive; what the average partner prefers, size-wise, should be the size that's best adapted to survival.
146 says 144: Right. The argument I was calling dopey was the one saying that there was obviously evolutionary pressure toward increased size for males and not for females. An argument saying that there's pressure toward a sweet spot -- not too big, not too small -- for both sexes, and that that spot can be different for each sex, is perfectly plausible.
Well, yeah, no duh! :-)
150: It's evidence that what I have been calling the 'sweet spot' (I thought I'd picked it up from Felix's 144, but apparently it drifted in from IDP's 143, who was using it in a different sense) is different for men and women. It's not evidence that there's a systematic average preference among women, choosing between any two men, for the taller of the two. Nor is it evidence that there is no evolutionary advantage to women from being larger than other women, depending on the specific circumstances.
The problem about these loose evolutionary arguments is that they don't make any sense at all, or mean anything, unless you pin them down quite closely, and generally people don't.
146: Ah. I was trying to be careful to speak in relative terms to avoid looking like I was making that argument, which is of course dopey.
The annoyingly 6'6" guy I mentioned in #5 ate like a horse, which also got on my nerves because since he didn't know how to cook, I ended up doing a lot of cooking for him and because since he didn't have any money, I ended up buying a lot of the groceries. Genetic factors had designed him to need lots of calories, and I ended up holding that against him and his kind.
The anecdote in 155 was more relevant earlier in the thread. I endorse LB's "sweet spot" theory.
the 'sweet spot' (I thought I'd picked it up from Felix's 144, but apparently it drifted in from IDP's 143,
I considered using "sweet spot" instead of "balance point," but decided against it, because it sounded dirty.
This whole evolutionary biology detour was occasioned by apo's 112, which was casual and silly. I'm sure the rest of you don't make evolutionary arguments unless they make more sense.
I was considering marshalling an evolutionary argument in favor of chimp-eachment. Shall I have a go?
apo's 112, which was casual and silly
I did include in the anustart caveat in that comment.
Well it *could* be evidence for different sweet spots, it could also be evidence for different 'all things considered' advantages to size based on gender. Indeed, that seems like an entirely reasonable hypothesis. It's yet more reasonable when the sweet spot for men appears to be "taller than the median height." I presume that if one re-ran the experiment I linked above, and showed no correlation between reproductive success and height for women, that would count as evidence, right?
Man, you straight people are pretty messed up.
I agree with text, in that I think it's silly to worry about because the available pool is sufficiently large that someone is going to prefer whatever aspects describe a given person, so that person is, in fact, probably going to be attractive to somebody, ie, a lengthy version of the ol' "there's someone for everyone" saw. Obviously, we have a high cultural awareness of one or two specific flavors of attractive (tall men, rail-thin women, etc.), but if you're in the dating market and those sorts of definitions don't apply to you, or don't interest you, do you really want someone who's hung up on those standards in the first place? The real problem I see with those standards is not how they stand between me and happiness (I'm quite happy, and did not hold up any magazine ads next to pictures of Rah or myself to decide if we were "good enough" in any sense). The problem I see with them is how they shape the preferences of youth in ways that lead them to dangerous behaviors, but the solution there is to educate said youth, not re-wage the nature vs. nurture wars.
I haven't read all the preceding comments so I may be pwning myself here, but:
In species that are highly dimorphic between sexes (in favour of males) it's usually evidence for a degree of polygny. That is, the more dimorphic a species, the more likely it is that males of that species have multiple reproductive partners in a 'harem' like structure -- gorillas are the classic primate example.
Humans really aren't that dimorphic compared to most other primates. Which is what you'd expect in a species that's largely pair-bonded.
I don't know if it's come up, but David Buller's excellent Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature is a an excellent piece of work by a philosopher of biology which is a pretty sustained critique of most of the Evolutionary Psychology literature on sexual selection and mating behaviour in humans.
He pretty pwns all the standard EP tropes -- that men are attracted to nubile women with a hip-wait ratio of 0.7, that socio-economic status and 'dominance' is the primary attractor for women, etc. In fact, much of the EP literature comes across as pretty weak once the details of the experiment design is looked at.
Are we really calling it the "sweet spot" rather than the "growth spot" or "g-spot"?
163: Bought. I think you'd mentioned the book before, and I'd lost the reference, and kept on meaning to ask about it again. I get so cross about casually silly evo-psych that a nice dismantling is just what I could use.
155: I have a friend who says this very much contributed to her dumping a 6'6" boyfriend. They were poor, he took food-related things for granted, and the cupboards always seemed to go bare within 24 hours of returning from the grocery store. She said if he'd been a great guy he'd have been worth the food hassle, but he wasn't, so he wasn't.
That's so sad. That poor majestic simple beast.
He probably starved when winter came, you know.
I could use someone with an appetite like that. While Buck is a wonderful, wonderful man, he doesn't eat much but has the instincts of a squirrel, and so the refrigerator is always packed to the gills with food that is slowly going bad but that he doesn't want to throw out. I'm afraid of our refrigerator and our cupboards.
Not to lower the tone, but does anyone know if, on average, there's a direct and regular relationship between height and penis size? For instance, if the average american male is 69 inches tall or so, and the average penis length is 6 inches, you get a ratio of one cock inch for every 11.5 height inches. Which would give Mutombo a 7.25" member and a 5'5" guy something like 5.7 inches. Does it work like this? Or are more complicated maths required?
I feel loved when people eat my food. I should find someone like that. A short someone like that.
Since you asked, my short exes did not have correspondingly small cocks.
re: 165
I think the last time I recommended it, I had just bought it and read the first couple of chapters. Since then I've read the later chapters on mating and marriage and his arguments, to me, seem pretty compelling.
What's particularly powerful about it, is that he doesn't get into any hackneyed nature/nuture arguments -- interesting though they may be -- but rather he addresses the specific experimental literature held to back up the EP claims and the more fundamental underlying methodological presumptions that they make from the perspective of a philosopher committed to evolutionary biology. He sidesteps a lot of the political rancour between sociologically/culturally inclined writers and biologically inclined writers and largely leaves the politics alone. His point is that EP doesn't stand up as science or as philosophy -- irrespective of the political stance we take towards EP's conclusions.
167: Actually, he moved to Florida, so clearly some sort of migratory, follow the food instinct must have kicked in.
a direct and regular relationship between height and penis size?
No, just between penis size and political affiliation.
The suggested link between penis size, foot size and height has been investigated by a relatively small number of groups. Two of these studies have suggested a link between penis size and foot size, while the most recent report dismissed these findings. One of the studies suggesting a link relied on the subjects measuring the size of their own penis, which may well be inaccurate. The second study found statistically significant although "weak correlation" with the size of the stretched penis with foot size and height. A potential explanation for these observations is that the development of the penis in an embryo is controlled by some of the same Hox genes (in particular HOXA13 and HOXD13[9] ) as the limbs develop. Mutations of some Hox genes that control the growth of limbs cause malformed genitalia (hand-foot-genital syndrome[10]). However the most recent investigation[11] failed to find any evidence for a link between shoe size and stretched penis size.[8] Given the large number of genes which control the development of the human body shape and effects of hormones during childhood and adolescence it would seem unlikely that an accurate prediction of penis size could be made by measuring a different part of the human body.
I am apparently the average American male.
I am apparently the average American male.
Walt Whitman's genius rather deserted him in the later poems.
hand-foot genital syndrome
If you took off Washington's boots, you'd see the dicks growing off his feet.
His penis, on the other hand, remained with him to the end.
"hand-foot-genital syndrome"
Is that what George Washington had?
totally pwned. Till we meet again, Smasher.
If you read the personals, it seems that everyone's looking for a tall man and a thin woman.
I wouldn't take this as evidence, as all the people searching for tall men and thin women themselves are tall, slim to average build, well-read, and enjoy long walks. You put searching 'thin' in a personal ad because if you put 'average' you get everything from average to obese.
On our just-so stories: dimorphism explains the size difference between men and women generally, but one can't conclude from that there's a significant pressure for men to desire smaller women, or that a taller, stronger woman is at an evolutionary disadvantage.
Part of the problem with just-so stories is that we can make them up to suit whatever needs we want. Like big butts? Back on the veldt, you see, the .7 ratio guaranteed fertility. Don't like big butts? Back on the veldt, you see, slim hips meant one could run long distances to protect one's children from harm. Like big men? Strong, powerful men to fight the lions on the veldt. Like small men? See, smaller men are likely to have smaller children, thus meaning easier childbirths and less likely of mother-child death.
I want an evolutionary explanation of curly hair and why random people comment on it.
In my entirely anecdotal experience, there is zero relationship between feet/height/dick.
However, the Details I picked up at the newsstand this morning says Wilt Chamberlain is no longer entirely the ideal, anyway.
Back on the veldt, you see, curly-haired people were used to distract the tigers while the normal people ran away to safety. This caused selection pressure against curly hair, so it's now unusual enough that random people comment on it.
I thought nose and penis size correlated. Cyrano de Bergerac had a massive dick.
Ain't no tigers on the veldt, though. I think it was that the kudu were jealous of other creatures with curly heads, so they gored the curly-haired people to death. That's why modern Africans all have long, straight hair.
the curliness is associated with superior attributes in males. On the velt, the curly headed male was able to store bits of food in his hair, keeping his hands free for killing lions and wildebeasts. The genes associated with curly hair are also triggers for enormo-cocks, superior intelligence, and heat ray vision.
This is why all women desire curly-headed males.
random people comment on it, however, for no particular reason at all.
The genes associated with curly hair are also triggers for enormo-cocks, superior intelligence, and heat ray vision.
I can totally confirm this.
Back in the forests, when curly-haired people ran through the trees to escape the tigers, they would become tangled on the thorns and brambles and then the tigers would eat them. This is why everywhere there are tigers and forests, people have straight hair.
The genes associated with curly hair are also triggers for enormo-cocks, superior intelligence, and heat ray vision
Unfortunately, it's an either/or situation.
Possessors of the gene are, unfortunately, often slowed by the presence of a large and cumbersome Internet in their back pocket.
167, 176: That's twice you've made me laugh out loud. Which is pretty painful when I'm stretching my dick to measure it.
This was made more difficult on the veldt, before the invention of internet tubes. The entire Internet was written on stone tablets.
In olden days, our ancestors would point and laugh at the curly-haired, saying, "Your descendants are going to have a hell of a time explaining that stuff," and so no one would sex the curly-haired, except in tribes in which people were missing fingers, and could not point.
190: So what genes trigger fine, straight, blondish, fuzzy hair? 'Cause I'm thinking I may be in deep shit.
SWM ISO mate with whom to share the veldt. Me: Unlikely to give you a life-endangering pregnancy. You: Slim hips mean you can run long distances to protect the children from harm.
Weiner, what do think about a Felix/Standpipe fixup?
you're all just jealous about the heat-ray vision. Nature is cruel.
often slowed by the presence of a large and cumbersome Internet in their back pocket.
Ssssh, the laydeez think it's my wraparound gonopodium.
a direct and regular relationship between height and penis size?
An inverse relationship. Wilt the Stilt has a wee little weenie and Danny DeVito is hung like a horse.
The reason that women like our men to be taller is that then we don't have to look at the bald spot, which can be frighteningly reflective on a sunny day.
Re: curly hair.
I did read somewhere that, across 'races', it's generally true that men of a particular group tend to have curlier hair than women of the same group.
This would fit with 188.
Also, re: 204:
'I read somewhere that' s/b 'it is indubitably true that'
It occurred to me on the drive home that we accept without question that parents have a biologically-based urge to protect their children. This is ev-psych at its most basic, isn't it? Or am I missing something?
re: 206
No. Ev-psych has a very specific set of claims about modularity of mind, about the relative lack of neural plasticity in humans, the fixed and universal nature of humans driven by our adaptation to a particular Pleistocene living environment, and so on.
There are lots of scientists applying evolutionary thinking to human nature who recoil in horror at EP.
EP doesn't just mean thinking of humans as evolved primates -- it has a concrete set of claims it wants to make that are much more specific than that.
People like Buller, for example, are fully on board with the idea that the evolutionary history of humans provides important explanatory and predictive information about why humans are the way they are but emphatically not on board with the specific claims made by advocates of EP.
How do those penis-size studies account for the grower vs. shower difference?
Haven't read all the comments, but I've been in this conversation here before: http://www.unfogged.com/cgi-sys/cgiwrap/unfogged/managed-mt/mt-comments.cgi?entry_id=5112#367960
Shorter Mary: I don't find being a 6'4" heterosexual woman as much of a problem as being a 5'4" heterosexual man apparently is. Except I guess that it leaves me out of "I only date taller" conversations, because that's always seemed to narrow the field just a little too much to me.
I think the thing for women to get together with taller man is partly cultural, but also, although Hom. sap.isn't all that dimorphic, if you average out the entire population (all 6.5 billion of us) men are 10% bigger than women. So, there'd be a tendency for women to pick bigger men even if their choice was random. (Full disclosure: me 5' 4", Mrs OFE 5' 11")
Having said which, a Spanish guy once told me that little dark Andalucian men had to fight off leggy Swedish blonde tourists with a fire hose, because they represented an alternative that wasn't usually available. (The guy in question was 6' 5" and married to the most beautiful woman I've ever met, so he didn't have a dog in this fight.) Is the lure of the exotic stronger than your early conditioning? Seems unlikely.
169 onward: I've read in several places that the median human penis is in fact about five and quarter inches when erect, and I've never met a woman who has actually challenged this. There is no well-documented relationship between body size and penis size.
What gets me is that 5 1/4" is far better known as the diameter of the earliest floppy disks. I worry about IBM hardware engineers.
"Did you hear that two studies just came out? The first said that the average erect penis is 5 1/4" long -- about the length of a Coke can. The second showed that women have weak spatial skills -- when asked to estimate the length of a Coke can, the average woman guessed 8"."
>People like Buller, for example, are fully on board with the idea that the evolutionary history of humans provides important explanatory and predictive information about why humans are the way they are but emphatically not on board with the specific claims made by advocates of EP.
One advantage of EP's "stone age mind" theory is that it means that the functionality of the human mind was pretty much set before different human population groups seperated. If Buller is right and minds are "adapting" rather than "adapted", it is likely that different human population groups will have different brain functionality based on the evolutionary history of these groups after seperation.
re: 214
Actually, there's some recent research that suggests that may be the case. There was a survey article in New Scientist a few months back covering some of the recent research.
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18925421.300 is behind a pay wall, unfortunately.
208: In relative seriousness, what renders that handful (ha ha) of studies with which I'm familiar so unfathomably stupid, IMO, is that they use "stretched" as their value. Unless I am somehow misinterpreting "stretched," it seems to me that metric really isn't useful other than as a very specific fetish. I have assumed thus far that dick size has to do with its dimensions when erect. If so, the concept of grower vs. shower tosses all "stretched" results out the window as pretty irrelevant, doesn't it? Also, self-reported data = not terribly trustworthy data, and surely in this area more than any other.
Caveat: I do not read about dicks anywhere except Unfogged.
The only other place I read about them is New Scientist (see 215). It's often difficult to remember they're discussing the same organ.
That's because as a British magazine they use the word "todger" instead of "dick".
It cheers me immensely that Unfogged has snapped back to the central topic of penile elasticity. This time let's stretch it out even longer.
This recent turn of the thread gives a whole new meaning to the post title.
Back on the veldt, redheads were prized as the tigers mistook their fiery locks for burning brands and ran away, so redheads had more sex.
What do women prefer: a short man with a big dick or tall man with a short dick?
222: Because women are pretty much alike, except maybe the fatasses, and they don't count anyway.
No, women all share a hive mind, even the fat ones.
I would tell the answer but I'd be violating the women's union bylaws and someone from Local # 453 would give me a very thorough wax job with boiling wax.
I agree about the absurd irrelevance of the stretched measurements. Sanctioning bodies that need to measure dimensions for rules compliance, like NASCAR, use go/no-go gauges.
212 -- I heard that as a joke, more than 25 years ago. I was a surveyor. Team leader asks, 'why are women such bad surveyors?' [Pause during which protest to premise is considered] "Because they keep getting told that this [holds thumb and forefinger 4.75 inches apart] is eight inches.'
[makes rimshot banging instrument against tree]
Given that the true Ev-Psych believers are psychos and have tainted the juxtaposition of the words evolution and psychology. I have a question for the Ev-Psych haters about these here parts on the nature nurture thing.
It always struck me that if there was a set of behaviors that were present in other animals and also present in modern humans, why is the onus on the nature camp to show mechanism and cause? Aren't we being a bit full of ourselves assuming that we are not as driven by instinct as our critter cousins?
It stands to reason that culture can modify and direct our instinctive behaviors but it does not replace them. We are only semi-rational creatures on our best days and so what if a degree of the input into that equation is driven by genetic determination.
Maybe I am just being oversensitive but it just strikes me that many of the objections to nature based explanations come from the perceived loss of agency when some non-rational instinct is contributing to a behavior. It insults our image of ourselves as being above that sort of thing.
Because usually evo-psych people are talking about behaviors that are solely limited to Western culture after the nineteenth century, and never mention the thousands of counter-examples from other cultures/time periods.
I think there's something to that, but the other side of the coin is that nature based explanations for psychological/social/cultural stuff generally seem to be deployed as defenses of the status quo. When the argument is over whether the status quo ought to be changed, nature is really not very relevant unless the change that's under discussion is just physically impossible (e.g. "men should bear half the babies").
re: 229
Actually, that's a little unfair to the Ev-Psych people. They have, in fact, carried out a number of large cross-cultural studies on some of their key claims and, where their claims are based on data they don't collect themselves, there is often some attempt to seek out data from non-Western sources.
As it happens, I think they -- the EP people -- are largely wrong about, well, just about everything. But, in their defence, it isn't true that they haven't done cross-cultural work.
re: 228
I suspect something like that may be a psychological explanation for why a lot of people are uncomfortable with EP models of human behaviour.
However, I'd caution against identifying evolutionary explanations of human behaviour, in general, with EP. That conflation is pretty useful for EP advocates as they get to claim that their opponents are motivated by political and emotional concerns while they are dispassionate scientists.
As I said above, you can be an opponent of EP, as a set of specific claims, while being quite comfortable with the basic idea that we are primates amenable to the same sorts of evolutionary explanations as other primates.
That said, when you write:
We are only semi-rational creatures on our best days and so what if a degree of the input into that equation is driven by genetic determination.
It's pretty clear that a degree is driven by genetic determination. However, there are quite compelling arguments from developmental neurology, for example, to suggest that much* of the specific 'mental architecture' we have as humans is not and cannot be the result of a strongly genetically predetermined developmental 'program'.**
* But not all.
** Indeed, these arguments from developmental neurology are one of the big problems that Buller has with some of the EP claims about modularity.
126 basically repeats what I said in 48: men might tend to be bigger in order to compete with other men. But that has nothing to do with what women actually prefer--in fact, in some species where there's a big size differential and polygyny, females often sneak off and mate with smaller, sneakier males on the side.
Anyway, as someone pointed out upthread, the size differential between men and women isn't very pronounced, compared to other species. For all we know, it's getting smaller because women don't, in fact, give much of a shit about the height of their partners, all other things being equal.
I think women everywhere should know that the sex tends to work out much better with people close to your own height. It often cures them of the "tallest is bestest" instinct.
However, doesn't seem to have worked on me, as I'm currently seeing someone a foot taller than I am.
233:
126 was addressed to some comments that seemed to be questioning whether there were different pressures for size (as opposed to size preferences) on men and women. I completely agree that size preferences are a different thing.
Yes, selection pressures for size and female preference for size being quite different. Dimorphism is no evidence for the latter.
However, on a purely anecdotal level, I'm fairly sure that:
is false. In my experience, they do all other things being equal.
"women don't, in fact, give much of a shit about the height of their partners, all other things being equal."
They don't care about it to the exclusion of anything else and height doesn't trump lots of other things, but just about every woman I know when this has come up in conversation expresses a preference for guys who are, at the minimum, taller than they are.* I've never heard a woman say she prefers short guys. I've heard women say they prefer tall guys often.
That's not supposed to be a claim that all women everywhere, etc. In fact, I'd be surprised if there was some kind of 'innate' preference for tall men and I'm equally sure that what counts as desirable in members of the opposite sex is strongly culturally mediated.
* I don't know anyone as tall as Mary (in 209) so that's a realistically achievable preference for them.
As I said above, you can be an opponent of EP, as a set of specific claims, while being quite comfortable with the basic idea that we are primates amenable to the same sorts of evolutionary explanations as other primates.
And one of the adaptations which makes us more successful than chimps is that we have developed the ability to override our instinctual programming to a far greater degree than other primates. A lot of that overriding takes the form of adopting behaviours which make it possible to live in industrial cities (or above the arctic circle, or in the middle of the Gobi, or on small islands), rather than in small troops on the savannah. So appealing to evolutionary hypotheticals to justify this or that behaviour both underestimates the power of our specifically human adaptation and tends to go dangerously off topic.
Well, a lot of Evolutionary Psychologists would argue that:
And one of the adaptations which makes us more successful than chimps is that we have developed the ability to override our instinctual programming to a far greater degree than other primates.
is question-begging. Since it's precisely their point that in many key respects we haven't overriden any 'instinctual programming' and that many of the traits exhibited by modern humans are the result of mental 'modules' designed to operate in Pleistocene conditions being made to operate in, say, modern urban environments.
Pigeons, for what it's worth, can also live in forests, cities, cliff-sides, etc. As can rats and cockroaches, to take two other examples. The fact that a species is adaptable to many different environments doesn't count as prima facie evidence that they've transcended their evolutionary 'programming'.
It always struck me that if there was a set of behaviors that were present in other animals and also present in modern humans, why is the onus on the nature camp to show mechanism and cause?
I think it's largely because the ev psych crowd tends to:
1) Pick a behavior that they a) disapprove of or b) feel nostalgic for, usually something out of Pleasantville, and
2) concoct an explanation for why a) that behavior is evolutionary disadvantageous or b) fighting the idealized version of the 50s is fighting Nature Herself.
It's remarkable how much the 1950s resembled the Pleistocene era.
Actual evolutionary explanations of behavior, llike pretense as a way of learning, or depression as a result of continual stress, don't get made fun of because they're not stupid.
re: It's remarkable how much the 1950s resembled the Pleistocene era.
I've always been pretty sympathetic to that line as well -- I'm sure I've said pretty much the same thing, many times.
However, more recently, and getting a bit more into reading about EP I've come to think that's a bit glib.
They, the EP crowd, do make an attempt to conduct experiments to verify the claims they make. While it's true that there is a certain amount of 'Just-so-Story-telling going on, there's also something a bit more sophisticated happening. That, I think, partly accounts for the appeal of EP for those who are nostalgic for Pleasantville but who are seeking a scientific basis for their nostalgia.
It's still wrong -- I don't buy any of their base methodological presuppositions and, to the extent that I am familiar with their experiments, their experiments are weak -- but its wrongness needs a more nuanced diagnosis.
Pigeons, for what it's worth, can also live in forests, cities, cliff-sides, etc.
I thought the whole point of pigeons and cities was that in the wild they're rock doves, adapted to living on cliffs rather like a cityscape.
re: 241
Yeah - I think you're right about pigeons. But there are many ways in which cities are not like cliffscapes.
The general point -- that lots of animals adapt to multiple living environments, including cities, and we don't make claims about them transcending 'evolution' -- holds, I think.
Would you say the giant mutant cockroach has transcended evolution or is it too part of the great cycle of nature?
The thing is that as I understand EP the way it gets used in casual argument, it's support for a claim that "Behavior X (whether or not something most obviously identified with 50's suburbia) is hardwired by evolution -- it's just not going to change. You can drive nature out with a pitchfork, but she will return." So pointing out that humans have done fine with changing behaviors like living in small family groups on the savannah to living in industrial cities on the Arctic Circle, and don't appear to spend a lot of effort keeping themselves from reverting to savannah living, seems relevant to the 'not going to change' part of the casual EP argument.
Rats and roaches haven't 'transcended' evolution, nor have people. But their adaptablity seems to be pretty good evidence that EP isn't an obviously useful way of finding constraints on human behavior.
But I'm arguing against pop EP -- I haven't encountered the respectable stuff much.
232: It's pretty clear that a degree is driven by genetic determination. However, there are quite compelling arguments from developmental neurology, for example, to suggest that much* of the specific 'mental architecture' we have as humans is not and cannot be the result of a strongly genetically predetermined developmental 'program'.**
From the perspective of how many "bits are in there" it is a given that our mental architecture cannot be rigidly predetermined. There are just not enough bits of information in one's genes to describe one's neural makeup, it has to be an emergent structure that is guided but not determined. The kicker is how much of this is predetermined and set still given this lack of direct determination. Again it is useful to think about the complex array of behaviors that are present in other animals that are somehow genetically determined. The interesting question is how did the fit all that in there and how does that manifest itself in our lives?
I can sort of understand the argument that people have used bad evolutionary arguments in the past so we should be circumspect. But (again I may be reading things more harshly that they were intended) there also appears to be a bit of a reaction like that is is contemptible to even suspect a non cultural cause. Kind of like the argument against evolution that "My grandma was not a monkey, maybe your was!" The idea is wrong because it affronts our image as specially dignified above those lowly animals!
It is just the human hubris that grates on my nerves. I mean on the internets you never know who might just be a dog, or a disembodied intelligence living as a brain in a jar.
... or Hitlers' dog's brain in a jar...
Anthony O'Hear wrote a lengthy book more or less arguing precisely that:
"The idea is wrong because it affronts our image as specially dignified above those lowly animals!"
Or, at least, arguing that humans uniquely transcend evolution.
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/oso/public/content/philosophy/0198250045/toc.html?q=evolution
Feel free to enjoy the nice abstracts for each chapter which were written (for cold hard cash) by some Scottish chap not a million miles away from this correspondent.
FWIW, I didn't think the book was particularly great.
Would you say the giant mutant cockroach has transcended evolution or is it too part of the great cycle of nature?
I'm actually a believer in intelligent design. You think atom bombs just assemble themselves? No siree! That Oppenheimer fellow? Can't tell me he wasn't intelligent.
nattarGcM ttaM, I looked at the abstracts and I agree that it does not look particularly great. I am willing to give it a bit of the benefit of the doubt assume some degree of "breathless abstract writing" took place. It just seems to make what you could call the first order evolutionary argument, "Ha, Ha, Socrates removed himself form the gene pool! Reason and morality transcend evolution so there!"
That sort of argument can be dramatic but it fails to take into account that you are looking at a set of behaviors over time and not a single point. It also fails to account for selection operating on populations and not individuals. It is necessary to look at the cumulative impact over all these points and not just at a single instant.
LB: Lets look at one of those 50's suburban issues that was recently popular here in the Mineshaft, adultery. Now I would assert that sexual jealousy is an innate biological feature that is the result of nature. While the expression of this feature is culturally molded and modified but not truly eliminated.
The 1950's aspect is actually interesting as a specific culture's reaction to this innate biological pressure. Another community possibly closer the the hearts and minds of the Mineshaft are swingers. One would assume that that population would not have any adultery taboos where in fact there are very strict and tightly regulated norms. This allows the construction of a space where they can engage in sexual behavior that is not adulterous. Real adultery will get you shunned, because as a community they are already playing with fire I would not be surprised if they were more forceful in their condemnation.
The point being that there are a set of instinctive basic drives that will bubble up and then be directed and molded by our personalities and culture. I think that this whole subject then becomes totally fascinating as we look at how competing drives, needs and obligations play out.
Now Dr. B, will disagree with me on this and say that sexual jealousy is just one more feature of the jack boot of the patriarchy. But aren't we all about the jack boot 'round bout these parts.
In the end the breeders will win by the only scale that matters evolutionarily. In 1000 years we will all be mulch but we may have left some kids to follow us.
re: 248 - As I alluded to above, I wrote the abstracts. Oxford Scholarship pays grad students and junior academics to read books and summarise them in abstract form. I think, to the best that I can tell, that I was fair in my summaries. O'Hear might disagree, I suppose.
I largely disagree with almost everything O'Hear has to say. Although the book is interesting in places.
Ouch, I got that you were related to the project but not that you had written the abstracts I then panned. Sorry 'bout that.
Well, actually the measure of the abstract is in the reflection of the content and whether it works as a hook to get one interested. So they might well be might fine abstracts in and of themselves while the argument they are abstracting. Ummm, not so much.
1.) I think that I mostly agree with Weiner and Apo, particularly Weiner in 67.
2.) I think that I agree with Ukko too, at least with his point about human hubris. It is interesting to me that 'we' (not just those of us at the Mineshaft) have chosen to describe the genetic component of things as 'nature.' It goes back to a pretty ancient dichotomy that we've set up between nature and civilization. The Greeks contrasted nomos (law, but it also means order and reason as in rationally organized civilization) with phusis (nature or chaos). But aren't our very culture and civilization part of nature? I think that other people have raised this point, better than I am, when they criticize branches of the conservation and environmental movements for excessively exalting the value of pristine wilderness.
3.) On a personal level, I grant that I am generally attracted to taller men who are bigger than I am. I am not attracted to super tall, super thin guys many of whom are pale and sickly looking. I do find that really big guys, by which I do not mean fat, are not attractive to me. They tend to look like oafs, particularly if their hands are too big. Maybe this is an issue of selection for status, since giant oafishness can be ridiculed. I'm probably inclined to think that they're kidn of stupid which is not at all fair of me.
4.) I once read a really interesting article comparing Darwin to contemporary anthropologists. What was really interesting was the differences in their approaches to studying cannibalism. The anthropologists--and I think that one of them was named Lubbock--sort of looked at it and said, "this exists in certain human cultures." Darwin had a basic premise that Victorian social values were right (note that I am not advocating that cannibalism is okay) and thought backwards to see this as justified by evolution, which is similar to the basic criticism that many of us have of a lot of ev. psych. Darwin saw cannibalism as a regression evolutionarily and said something to the effect that cannibalistic humans were less evolved than the plucky little monkeys. In other words, Victorian Englishmen were closer to monkeys than they were to humans practicing cannibalism. Cannibals were thus less human than monkeys. The anthropologists were probably a little too inclined to see humans as distinct from other animals, but Darwin tended to use pseudo-science to justify contemporary practices. He was also guilty of anthropomorphizing a lot of animals. E.g., he refers to the "plucky little monkey" and "the loving and devoted songbirds."
I am not attracted to super tall, super thin guys
Not even if they play cello?
re:
Darwin saw cannibalism as a regression evolutionarily and said something to the effect that cannibalistic humans were less evolved than the plucky little monkeys. In other words, Victorian Englishmen were closer to monkeys than they were to humans practicing cannibalism. Cannibals were thus less human than monkeys. The anthropologists were probably a little too inclined to see humans as distinct from other animals, but Darwin tended to use pseudo-science to justify contemporary practices
I don't know the source of this claim but I find it a little hard to believe. Darwin, in his lifetime, advocated the view that there was only one human species and that the differences between races were largely superficial. I find it hard to reconcile that view with the claim that he thought cannibals were less human than monkeys.
There is only one reference to 'cannibalism' in the whole of the Descent of Man and not in remotely that context. Nor does it appear at all in The Origin ... either.
Neither of the anthopomorphic phrases cited ring true from my (admittedly incomplete) reading of Darwin.
I suspect Darwin is being traduced here. None of 4) remotely corresponds with how Darwin reads to me.
MM, I fully admit that I'm not an expert, and I read the article a long time ago, so I'm probably getting huge wathes of it wrong. I think it referred to some of the stuff he wrote in The Descent of Man and some comments he made in more popular venues, but don't quote me on that.
Ladder theory and evolution:
The genetic strategy "figure out what status you are and choose a mate of comparable status" seems pretty reasonable to me. People tend to be attracted to a certain types which aren't neccessarily the media ideals of attractiveness. People's genes make them fall in love and they don't all fall in love with Rachel Wacholder.
