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Last night I followed a link, via Reality Carnival,, to a Psychology Today article: Ten Politically Incorrect Truths About Human Nature:Why most suicide bombers are Muslim, beautiful people have more daughters, humans are naturally polygamous, sexual harassment isn't sexist, and blonds are more attractive.
I can't say anything about the other subjects, as I only got through the blondes-are-more-desirable argument and left to fume and muse upon it:
Short version - blonde hair tends to darken, and large breasts to sag, with age, therefore men lust after busty blondes because they have to be young and healthy and Fertile in order to carry the look off;
Shorter version: men want women with an obvious biological expiry date so they'll know when to get a new one.
I'll skip over the "ew" part of my reaction because the authors of this article, Alan S. Miller and Satoshi Kanazawa, would probably just take it as evidence that I Can't Handle The Truth.
So ok. I argue:
They admit that blondes are not found throughout the human world (they argue they evolved in N. Europe because the heavier clothing required by the climate concealed the presence or absence of huge gazongas. (Um, oh, and fewer hours of sunlight make light colouring less of a burn liabilty; I think I read that on a gum wrapper once) ; which is good, because I was worried for a moment about all those thousands of generations of men in Asia, Africa and the Americas who lived their whole lives without ever seeing a blonde - but apparently, large bosoms are sufficient. Wait a bit - I'm no scientist, but I am an artist and my time looking at artworks from different periods suggests to me that breast-size preference is one of the biggest cultural variants when it comes to ideals of female beauty. Check. It . Out:
ADD: more beauties from different times/places:
Ginevra d'Benci.
Of course there's Rubens (this is his sister-in-law).
Mrs. Rubens.
The godess Hathor greets Nefertari.
Some Minoan ladies.
You'll notice that even when they are display, they are not, prior to the 19th c. and more sophisticated support undergarments (ie the Victorian corset), all that big; maybe a C-cup at the largest. I think big ones were considered low-class. Which is where my argument is headed: generally speaking, Europeans and to some extent, the Meditterranian area admired blondes, with the pale skin that went with the hair. Asian cultures typically thought pale women the most beautiful. I'm ashamed to say I don't know enough about African cultures to know what physical attribute they considered a sine qua non of womanly beauty ( though skin free of accidental blemishes would appear to be admired there as everywhere else), but the point I'm getting to is that what the desired feature indicated was social status - a woman whose family hadn't had to send her out to labour in the fileds. Not to belittle the grief of couples who have trouble conceiving, but for humans, the problem isn't usually producing children, it's keeping them fed and clothed and healthy once they're born; and finding jobs/marriages for them when they grow up. For that, property and social standing are a big help. So, instead of the Everyman walking around with his brain going "must have sex with big blonde - oh wait, this is Edo Japan. D'oh! I shall die unfulfilled," I posit that he's thinking, "must sleep with - well, whatever I fancy/can get, actually; must marry woman who fits local ideals of classy looks*"
That's where I think the ev-psych people go wrong - they think the driving force in human behaviour is the goal of creating as many copies of one's personal genes as possible** - but this isn't even the reproductive strategy that most mammals and bird species use - evolution gave us the "have relatively few offspring and then care for them so more survive" trick. In many creatures, this has become the more sophisticated "live together in groups and look out for each other so everyone's chances are better" trick. By assuming quantity of offspring is the be-all-and-end-all, they write themselves into a corner in which every trait considered attractive in women is supposed to be an indicator of Fertility, or if it isn't directly linked, to youth and health and threrfore Fertility, and every piece of heterosexual interaction is supposed to be about Fertility. But young, fertile women are a dime a dozen (sometimes close to literally). Humans have no fixed breeding season and in the absence of reliable birth control methods tend to increase more rapidly than they can provide for.In the long run, it makes more sense for the driving force to be "help ensure the sucess of your offspring by amassing wealth and building alliances".
I do think there are lots of (sometimes nasty and racist) subconscious things guiding people's tastes, but I think they're more likely to be cultural, and recent, in origin - culture (more flexible than instinct) being the big human advantage.
*which generally boil down to "as unlike a field hand/factory worker as possible;" and actual possession of money and status can trump youth and beauty a lot of the time.
** homosexuality and voluntary celibacy both tend to throw them for a loop.
I can't say anything about the other subjects, as I only got through the blondes-are-more-desirable argument and left to fume and muse upon it:
Short version - blonde hair tends to darken, and large breasts to sag, with age, therefore men lust after busty blondes because they have to be young and healthy and Fertile in order to carry the look off;
Shorter version: men want women with an obvious biological expiry date so they'll know when to get a new one.
I'll skip over the "ew" part of my reaction because the authors of this article, Alan S. Miller and Satoshi Kanazawa, would probably just take it as evidence that I Can't Handle The Truth.
So ok. I argue:
They admit that blondes are not found throughout the human world (they argue they evolved in N. Europe because the heavier clothing required by the climate concealed the presence or absence of huge gazongas. (Um, oh, and fewer hours of sunlight make light colouring less of a burn liabilty; I think I read that on a gum wrapper once) ; which is good, because I was worried for a moment about all those thousands of generations of men in Asia, Africa and the Americas who lived their whole lives without ever seeing a blonde - but apparently, large bosoms are sufficient. Wait a bit - I'm no scientist, but I am an artist and my time looking at artworks from different periods suggests to me that breast-size preference is one of the biggest cultural variants when it comes to ideals of female beauty. Check. It . Out:
ADD: more beauties from different times/places:
Ginevra d'Benci.
Of course there's Rubens (this is his sister-in-law).
Mrs. Rubens.
The godess Hathor greets Nefertari.
Some Minoan ladies.
You'll notice that even when they are display, they are not, prior to the 19th c. and more sophisticated support undergarments (ie the Victorian corset), all that big; maybe a C-cup at the largest. I think big ones were considered low-class. Which is where my argument is headed: generally speaking, Europeans and to some extent, the Meditterranian area admired blondes, with the pale skin that went with the hair. Asian cultures typically thought pale women the most beautiful. I'm ashamed to say I don't know enough about African cultures to know what physical attribute they considered a sine qua non of womanly beauty ( though skin free of accidental blemishes would appear to be admired there as everywhere else), but the point I'm getting to is that what the desired feature indicated was social status - a woman whose family hadn't had to send her out to labour in the fileds. Not to belittle the grief of couples who have trouble conceiving, but for humans, the problem isn't usually producing children, it's keeping them fed and clothed and healthy once they're born; and finding jobs/marriages for them when they grow up. For that, property and social standing are a big help. So, instead of the Everyman walking around with his brain going "must have sex with big blonde - oh wait, this is Edo Japan. D'oh! I shall die unfulfilled," I posit that he's thinking, "must sleep with - well, whatever I fancy/can get, actually; must marry woman who fits local ideals of classy looks*"
That's where I think the ev-psych people go wrong - they think the driving force in human behaviour is the goal of creating as many copies of one's personal genes as possible** - but this isn't even the reproductive strategy that most mammals and bird species use - evolution gave us the "have relatively few offspring and then care for them so more survive" trick. In many creatures, this has become the more sophisticated "live together in groups and look out for each other so everyone's chances are better" trick. By assuming quantity of offspring is the be-all-and-end-all, they write themselves into a corner in which every trait considered attractive in women is supposed to be an indicator of Fertility, or if it isn't directly linked, to youth and health and threrfore Fertility, and every piece of heterosexual interaction is supposed to be about Fertility. But young, fertile women are a dime a dozen (sometimes close to literally). Humans have no fixed breeding season and in the absence of reliable birth control methods tend to increase more rapidly than they can provide for.In the long run, it makes more sense for the driving force to be "help ensure the sucess of your offspring by amassing wealth and building alliances".
I do think there are lots of (sometimes nasty and racist) subconscious things guiding people's tastes, but I think they're more likely to be cultural, and recent, in origin - culture (more flexible than instinct) being the big human advantage.
*which generally boil down to "as unlike a field hand/factory worker as possible;" and actual possession of money and status can trump youth and beauty a lot of the time.
** homosexuality and voluntary celibacy both tend to throw them for a loop.
