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Discussions like this drive me crazy. It's not hard to see what it is about society that's making so many people not have sex, and it's not, like, some subtle m

by ajkjk 8y ago

Discussions like this drive me crazy. It's not hard to see what it is about society that's making so many people not have sex, and it's not, like, some subtle market effect involving their attractiveness. No matter how much you want find a market effect, it's due to _human stuff_, like people's actual lives and problems, not their behavior in some sex economy. There is nothing even close to an economy around sex. There's just the real world. (This kind of) economics is valuable when it can tease out and explain underlying trends that you can't figure out from just looking at the world. But in this case, the only thing you'll be missing if you proceed by intuition is, like, numbers on the size of the effect. If you want to solve the problems at a societal level, while numbers are useful for prioritization, maybe, you're going to be trying to solve the actual problems that you identify with your human analysis. For instance living in this world provides me ample evidence to dismiss the line "It also won’t do to point to changes over this time period that effected all ages and genders similarly, such as obesity, porn, video games..." as laughable and clueless with, say, 99.99% confidence.

throwaway20148 8y ago
You are free to break down your theory on what’s happening rather than mocking OPs methodology...
Macross8299 8y ago
>No matter how much you want find a market effect, it's due to _human stuff_, like people's actual lives and problems. There is nothing even close to an economy around sex This kind of wishy washy thing I'm sure feels nice to say but doesn't seem to me to have any real explanatory power except at an individual level, which is not what this discussion is about. I bet you anything that if I had access to tinder backend data and a couple of hours to mess around in Python, I could show you the similarity in the supposedly "non-existent" market forces there to well-studied phenomena in the world of economics and finance. Just imagine a lorenz curve describing the # of "swipes" a user gets!
- Mirioron 8y ago
  Somebody did actually create a Lorenz curve based on Tinder data: https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-guys-unless-you-are-really-hot-you-are-probably-better-off-not-wasting-your-2ddf370a6e9a https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g... I can't speak to the accuracy of the article though.
insickness 8y ago
> There is nothing even close to an economy around sex. Absolutely wrong. Dating is one of the most efficient markets. Every individual decides who they will sleep with, date and marry based on a hierarchy of what they can get, what they think they're worth and how attractive they find the other person. There is far more agreement than disagreement in standards of attractiveness from person to person, if not, it would be fairly easy to go out and date just anyone. But no one wants to do that. Everyone tries to date the most attractive person they can get.
- ajkjk 8y ago
  I dispute the word "everyone": I think it's a fraction of adults, probably less than a quarter, who fit into that system (I was maybe being extreme by saying "there is no market", but I don't think there's _much_ of one). And I think that people who _do_ "play the dating game" don't realize how many don't. Among people going on dates every week, perhaps there is an economy. Among people who don't go on dates because they don't really try, because optimizing for partner-finding isn't even on their radar -- of course there is not a market there. [.. edited to be less combative]
  - insickness 8y ago
    Just because some people choose to exclude themselves from the dating market doesn't mean that the market doesn't exist. Everyone has standards of exclusivity when dating, even if they are only excluding the people who are very very physically unattractive, mentally unattractive, least capable, unintelligent, boring, etc. Not everyone uses the same exact standard to judge everyone else's attractiveness. For example, women on average tend to be less focused on physical attractiveness. But even when a woman is attracted to someone physically unattractive, that person usually has some time of other factor of attractiveness, such as status or personality, which other women find attractive as well. There are exceptions but the fact that those exceptions are so few and far between only proves the rule.
    - ajkjk 8y ago
      My point is that attractiveness, and any market forces around it, are pretty secondary if people aren't even _trying_ to have relationships. Which, I think, they are not, in massive proportions. There is (I believe) a significant fraction of young people who meet fewer than one person they're interested in per month. That's not losing to market forces; it's just not participating. Among active participants, sure, there might be a market, but if you want to figure out why people aren't having sex, look at why so many people aren't participating.
arandr0x 8y ago
What you're saying isn't rational but it's 100% true. People's relationships aren't part of a market; rather the economy is placing constraints on their relationships. People work further from their homes so they don't have evening hobbies. People don't live close to their parents so single moms and dads are busy with childcare vs meeting each other. That sort of thing.

by ajkjk 8y ago

throwaway20148 8y ago

You are free to break down your theory on what’s happening rather than mocking OPs methodology...

Macross8299 8y ago

>No matter how much you want find a market effect, it's due to _human stuff_, like people's actual lives and problems. There is nothing even close to an economy around sex This kind of wishy washy thing I'm sure feels nice to say but doesn't seem to me to have any real explanatory power except at an individual level, which is not what this discussion is about. I bet you anything that if I had access to tinder backend data and a couple of hours to mess around in Python, I could show you the similarity in the supposedly "non-existent" market forces there to well-studied phenomena in the world of economics and finance. Just imagine a lorenz curve describing the # of "swipes" a user gets!

Mirioron 8y ago
Somebody did actually create a Lorenz curve based on Tinder data: https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-guys-unless-you-are-really-hot-you-are-probably-better-off-not-wasting-your-2ddf370a6e9a https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g... I can't speak to the accuracy of the article though.

insickness 8y ago

> There is nothing even close to an economy around sex. Absolutely wrong. Dating is one of the most efficient markets. Every individual decides who they will sleep with, date and marry based on a hierarchy of what they can get, what they think they're worth and how attractive they find the other person. There is far more agreement than disagreement in standards of attractiveness from person to person, if not, it would be fairly easy to go out and date just anyone. But no one wants to do that. Everyone tries to date the most attractive person they can get.

ajkjk 8y ago
I dispute the word "everyone": I think it's a fraction of adults, probably less than a quarter, who fit into that system (I was maybe being extreme by saying "there is no market", but I don't think there's _much_ of one). And I think that people who _do_ "play the dating game" don't realize how many don't. Among people going on dates every week, perhaps there is an economy. Among people who don't go on dates because they don't really try, because optimizing for partner-finding isn't even on their radar -- of course there is not a market there. [.. edited to be less combative]
- insickness 8y ago
  Just because some people choose to exclude themselves from the dating market doesn't mean that the market doesn't exist. Everyone has standards of exclusivity when dating, even if they are only excluding the people who are very very physically unattractive, mentally unattractive, least capable, unintelligent, boring, etc. Not everyone uses the same exact standard to judge everyone else's attractiveness. For example, women on average tend to be less focused on physical attractiveness. But even when a woman is attracted to someone physically unattractive, that person usually has some time of other factor of attractiveness, such as status or personality, which other women find attractive as well. There are exceptions but the fact that those exceptions are so few and far between only proves the rule.
  - ajkjk 8y ago
    My point is that attractiveness, and any market forces around it, are pretty secondary if people aren't even _trying_ to have relationships. Which, I think, they are not, in massive proportions. There is (I believe) a significant fraction of young people who meet fewer than one person they're interested in per month. That's not losing to market forces; it's just not participating. Among active participants, sure, there might be a market, but if you want to figure out why people aren't having sex, look at why so many people aren't participating.

arandr0x 8y ago

What you're saying isn't rational but it's 100% true. People's relationships aren't part of a market; rather the economy is placing constraints on their relationships. People work further from their homes so they don't have evening hobbies. People don't live close to their parents so single moms and dads are busy with childcare vs meeting each other. That sort of thing.