What an odd confluence of blogs I read. On the other hand, I heard about The ISB, and thus Bahlactus, from John & Belle Have A Blog, so clearly this is Farber's fault.
Man. Just when I think I'm no longer a giant, giant nerd, they pull me back in.
Man, I've been thinking of starting up a blog just so that I can participate in Bahlactus' Friday Night Fights. That's my nerd cred, right there.
I don't even read comics anymore, but I'm jealous of Zöe. Go figure.
That's great! I love it when Zoe and Violet's work shows up and J&B.
Hey, there's a story to go with it!
This article seems like prime Unfogged material. Summary: Let's use armchair evolutionary psychology to explain everything about everybody.
Example: Blond hair is unique in that it changes dramatically with age. Typically, young girls with light blond hair become women with brown hair. Thus, men who prefer to mate with blond women are unconsciously attempting to mate with younger (and hence, on average, healthier and more fecund) women. It is no coincidence that blond hair evolved in Scandinavia and northern Europe, probably as an alternative means for women to advertise their youth, as their bodies were concealed under heavy clothing.
Christ, that article looks terrible. I have no desire to read it, though.
No matter how hilariously bad it may be, that is.
re: 8
Hah.
It is no coincidence that blond hair evolved in Scandinavia and northern Europe, probably as an alternative means for women to advertise their youth, as their bodies were concealed under heavy clothing.
Rather than, say, because of the need for pale skin (correlated with lighter hair colour) to get enough vitamin D at high latitudes without much sunlight. Hence also all the red-headed Scots [and red-hair doesn't change with age]. Fucking dumb-as-a-post article-writing idiots.
Also, congratulations to Zoe!
Their contention that all suicide bombers are Muslims because of polygamy is even dumber.
Dude, read carefully: it's not just the polgamy, it's also the 72 virgins in paradise.
Virgins, raisins -- the evo-psych incentives are prety much the same.
In the context of eternity, O take the raisins and let the virgins go! Can you imagine spending forever in the company of people who do nothing but listen to the Cure and complain that nothing's their fault because they didn't ask to be brought into paradise anyway?
Besides, you could probably trade some of the raisins with the Mandaeans, who do a mean dried apricot.
And, Zoe, that's a fine picture.
"Until very recently, it was a mystery to evolutionary psychology why men prefer women with large breasts, since the size of a woman's breasts has no relationship to her ability to lactate. But Harvard anthropologist Frank Marlowe contends that larger, and hence heavier, breasts sag more conspicuously with age than do smaller breasts. Thus they make it easier for men to judge a woman's age (and her reproductive value) by sight--suggesting why men find women with large breasts more attractive."
But during the 1920s, men responded to Prohibition by seeking out women with smaller breasts, who were likely to be able to survive poisonings by bathtub gin.
"Healthy women have lustrous, shiny hair, whereas the hair of sickly people loses its luster. Because hair grows slowly, shoulder-length hair reveals several years of a woman's health status."
It's like Steven Pinker wrote a Prell ad. Jesus, I feel like I fell through the Schwarzschild radius of stupid ev-psych Just-So Stories. Tell me the one about how we prefer women with full cock-sucking red lips because it indicates they've been eating a healthy diet of juicy, vitamin-filled fruit, just like on the veldt! (David Brooks told me so.)
In conclusion, Psychology Today is a horrible rag.
"Women often say no to men. Men have had to conquer foreign lands, win battles and wars, compose symphonies, author books, write sonnets, paint cathedral ceilings, make scientific discoveries, play in rock bands, and write new computer software in order to impress women so that they will agree to have sex with them. Men have built (and destroyed) civilization in order to impress women, so that they might say yes."
It's the ev-psych version of a Dashboard Confessional song. At this point, can we agree that regardless of the merits as an academic argument, popular understanding of ev-psych usually boils down to making up a rationale for sexism to be not just okay but a biological imperative?
Mystical moons of Munipoor! That's an awesome drawing.
17: I thought the large breast thing had been settled long ago. It's 'cause they remind men of buttocks, and thus sex, something we are liable to forget about completely unless reminded.
As life on the veldt gets more and more distracting (what with the iPhone 2.0, global warming, and all) you can figure breasts will become ever larger.
On the veldt, it's Myst all the way, baby.
If one of you chicks would manage to mutate a vagina between your faux-buttock boobs, you'd really have a leg up on the competing ladies.
25, they wouldn't need any legs up, really.
Men have had to ... paint cathedral ceilings... in order to impress women so that they will agree to have sex with them
Can anyone name an artist known for painting cathedral ceilings who wasn't, in fact, gay?
Zoe's drawing is awesome, but the coolest part is totally unexplained by either Bahlactus or Dad Holbo. What's the deal with the happy alien dude? Is he Galactus's new herald, is he some other Zoenanian creation, is he just kickin' back with the devourer of worlds for the afternoon? I need context.
Wow. Master of Orion. Is there a funner game? I don't think there is.
Can anyone name any artist at all known for painting cathedral ceilings?
This guy didn't write symphonies for the laydeez, either.
22 - that's roughly how I've heard it from academic evolution guys. The claim is that all primate that do it face to face have a sex cue on their front that resembles their ass. Many primates have faces with the same color pattern as their ass. Bonobos, who sometimes do it the way the missionaries tell them to, have small boobs.
The problem is that the evolutionary question isn't psychological, it is physical. Why do humans have distended breasts even when they are not lactating? Why do these distended breasts develop at puberty? The easy answer is that it is a sex cue, but to phrase the question in terms of male preference is to rule out any other sort of explanation.
Sarah Hrdy likes to explain female anatomy in terms of efforts to confuse the paternity of offspring by concealing when one is fertile. I bet you could come up with a similar explanation for distended breasts. Males don't know if you are in lactational amenorrhea
lactational amenorrhea
When prayers keep showing up in your milk?