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Are Women Getting More Beautiful?
FelxH writes "Scientists have found that evolution is driving women to become ever more beautiful, while men remain as aesthetically unappealing as their caveman ancestors.
The researchers have found beautiful women have more children than their plainer counterparts and that a higher proportion of those children are female. Those daughters, once adult, also tend to be attractive and so repeat the pattern." I just thought my
standards were changing as I got older, but it turns out it's just science!
Women get more attractive. Men develop bigger wallets.
Deleted
If more attractive parents have more daughters and if physical attractiveness is heritable, it logically follows that women over many generations gradually become more physically attractive on average than men.
Except that the standard for "beauty" changes over time. I'm not sure I'm buying this.
Proverbs 21:19
As a male, let me just say that it is sometimes good to be in the minority. The downside is that unless you are a dirty old man, there is no way to take advantage of the beautification of the female portion of the human race.
Rich. Not dirty, rich.
Why, without your clothes, you're naked, Miss Dudley!
While characteristics that define somebody as "beautiful" VS "plain" may vary, there are quite a number of things that are considered "ugly" to the majority of a given area. So, while women may be on average no less "plain", perhaps they're less "ugly"
Then again, so aspects of beauty have been fairly consistent over the last while as well, so perhaps evolution has had some chance to catch up on that, at least on a regional basis. My own standards are a little different than the pack, so really I'd worry about my own chances with 'regular' women, but as long as guys that look like Ron Jeremy can get some, I suppose I'll be fine.
If anything the reasons a woman has a baby has nothing to do with her looks and everything to do with her sense of well being, security along with cultural beliefs. Women are plenty attractive enough to get some sort of a sex partner and I'm trying to identify a time when that has not been the case.
In today's day and age, culture matters for birth more than looks. There are some women out there having nearly 10 children simply because they feel it is a christian thing to do. How does evolution account for that, unless it accounts for obvious social influences. On the opposite end of the scale, you have some green women who are deeply concerned that bringing too many children into the world might somehow compromise the planet.
It's almost like environment plus culture need to be considered as a holistic system in order to really understand human evolution.
This is my sig.
Agreed. If you look around, those cranking out the most rug-rats are either frumpy welfare queens or religious fanatics. You'd have to believe heavily in magical Godly rewards to have 8+ screaming barfing kids.
Table-ized A.I.
now that's a rejoinder that you could only find on slashdot...
This thread is useless without pics
They used old photographs in the study of people from past generations and their method of "objective" measurement of beauty were to have modern-day people judge them.
It seems almost a foregone conclusion that people in modern times would find the women of modern times more attractive; standards of beauty change.
My personal experience is that the more beautiful a woman is, the less she likes to, um... procreate.
Analog photoshup is an airbrush. Beer is more like chemical photoshop.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I know I'll get modded troll or flamebait for pointing this out, but there is a very definite tendency for looks and smarts to go together. Despite stereotypes and Hollywood scripts to the contrary, good looks get one a better selection of dates and have a much better shot at not having to compromise. Hence the suggestion that's been made that we'll probably end up with a fork eventually between the good looking geniuses and everybody else. Admittedly that's highly theoretical and could definitely turn out wrong in many ways, but it's not exactly baseless either.
Also, humans mostly just seem stupider these days than in the past. It's mainly an issue of confirmation bias, we know more about the people living right now than in the past, we also don't have a full accounting for all the hidden genius that is likely around and we still don't necessarily have a good grip on the implications of the work people are doing right now. There's always been a huge number of incomprehensibly stupid people, it's just that most of the ones from the past have been forgotten and the ones from now we run into everywhere.
"Gee, more women appear to conform to modern standards of beauty, than at any time in the past!"
Mid 19th century beauty can be deduced by portraiture. The pre-raphaelite stuff from Rosetti does a pretty good job of this:
http://www.rossettiarchive.org/img/s356.repro.jpg
http://www.rossettiarchive.org/img/s536.repro.jpg
They'd have seen Jessica Simpson as a freakishly stretched elf - on the verge of starvation.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
It is not only attractive women. What you are saying here is actually known as a social disease. Urban centers, overpopulation etc will have the effect of making woman want to have less kids. If you get those same woman and leave them on less populated places for a few years (6+), they will start wanting to have kids again.
As a father, I can say this doesn't happen only to women. Having a child will actually completes you and make you happy. It is natural for men and women to want to have kids. All the other "career" bullshit (given as a reason for men/women not having kids) is a symptom of a social disease.
morcego
Except that has more to do with diet and nutrition.
Either that or evolution happens *much* faster than I thought given that a single generation sees a 4" change reasonably often.
That's true.
What I don't understand is why evolution would self-select for prettier women, but not prettier men. A man who is ugly is not going to get any play or opportunity to pass his ugly genes to the next generation. Right? So then men should be becoming more attractive.
The only reason I can think is that women are being honest when they say, "We don't care what the guy looks like."
What you are noticing is the fact that men are "attractive" to women for different reasons than women are attractive to men.
"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget." -Thomas Szasz
Huh. I had no idea that watching my wife grow in beauty over 15 years was watching evolution in process. Nice.
This discovery has lead to the solution to a particular slashdot meme.
a. Yes, this post is sappy and sentimental.
b. Yes, I am sending my wife a link to this post.
c. Yes, the kids are going to bed early tonight.
d. Profit!!!
LOL, congratulations, your just figured out the true purpose of this "study". Scientifically proving the female you like is the most beautiful woman ever scores some major points. At least that is what I was thinking the whole time I read the summary.
"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget." -Thomas Szasz
Hey, whatever floats your boat man...I've spent my entire life trying my BEST to avoid having the little 'milstones' around my neck. That's what contraception is for (and abortion if those still fail).
I'm glad people like having kids, but, it just isn't right to say it "completes" you. I've never wanted any, and I feel very complete! I'm not tied down to kids and a wife, I can date as I please, trade to a new 'model' of woman when I feel like it, and I don't have to worry about what I spend my finances on, because little Suzy needs braces. I can come and go as I please, travel, experience life and all it has to offer.
I don't look down on your for your choices, but, to say one must have that 'traditional' home with wife and kids to be a complete person is just plain nonsense. Different strokes for different folks...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
As in most forum groups:
"This thread is useless WITHOUT Pics"
Kids DO complete a person because in the end, that's really what we're here for, not to be narcissistic and selfish. We can only be extremely grateful people like you chose NOT to procreate. Good choice on your part.
You experience all life has to offer? Really? You're experiencing a very limited subset of what life has to offer. Different strokes indeed, but don't delude yourself. You've traded one set of experiences for another.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Here's a theory for you - perhaps you and your friends have been self-selecting into a group of well-educated, childless folks in their 30s and 40s? Maybe this is more a function of like befriending like. Beyond the well-known fact that well-to-do, better-educated folks tend to have fewer children on average than the working, ill-educated poor.
That latter association in a modern society seems to be based on the fact that unless you are absurdly wealthy, raising more than a few children to the standard of living and education that you and your social class have become accustomed to is just too costly, and even if you can afford it, you can't devote the amount of time and energy to that many children to make sure they are educated and reared properly (private school, tutors, college, grad school, parties, play dates, etc. etc.).
Whereas the lower and lower middle classes have very little in the way of expectations for what you provide to children beyond 3 meals a day and clothing and getting them to and fro from public school.
"Breast ligaments"? Are you fucking shitting me? Breast ligaments? And modded up as well. I know that Slashdotters aren't supposed to know a lot about women, but I'd hope they'd at least have read an anatomy textbook. Breasts are sacks of adipose tissue. Fat, if you will.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
I'd say "limited subset' and 'delude yourself' may be a bit harsh of a reply. I am also a male, at the point in my life where the important decision of whether to procreate or not is to be made. While all of my 'heart' and 'soul' is all in favor (I love kids), all of my other sensory apparatus is screaming nooo... Most of my peers, colleagues and friends already have kids, and what I actually -see- is contrary from what I -hear- from most of them. What I hear is... "kids are treasure, fulfilling,, makes you happy"... and what I -see- are overstressed parents, constant game of who will do what, yelling, looking for grandparents, aunts etc to offload kids, and overall, not good situation. That is what I -see-, while at same time, same overstressed parent will claim they are happy. And therein lies my dilemma... what to believe... my eyes or my 'heart'... So far my eyes never deceived me, while my 'heart'... well... it was not really reliable some times.
If you soak her in warm salt water and scorch her in 100 degree heat for for a few hours and she still looks good in a bikini standing under the noonday sun
Sounds like you're after a lobster, not a woman.
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