3 ms·

I believe this very nicely ties in with "No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=

I believe this very nicely ties in with "No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31143279 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31143279 We have turned sexual partners into an affluent commodity, thanks to apps. With a bit of paid boosting, you can show your profile to 1000+ potential partners and surely a few of them will have a favorable first impression. We've also successfully reframed being sexually promiscuous as not being limited by religion / social norms / the patriarchy. Plus we've all but eliminated potentially negative consequences with birth control. And our entire society celebrates a "hustle" and "fake it till you make it" culture. The article's complains "men signal emotional seriousness that they don’t actually feel" which I'd say is "fake it till you make it" combined with very low investment due to oversupply of partners. "you’ll likely be terrified the person you like will meet someone else they like more, or likes you but doesn’t like you enough to commit" also just means that there's a high level of competition, due to oversupply of partners. And lastly, the article nicely points out that everyone wants a "quick fix", which is why you can buy tons of books and guides on how to behave, i.e. imitating the correct gestures, but very few people put in the effort to actually learn to become a good communicator. But the article also has one huge oversight in my opinion: Pheromones and genetic compatibility. People can smell if their offspring will be healthy pretty quickly, but it's impossible to screen for this with apps. That's how people end up with so many dates where they should like the other person, but for some reason they don't. I believe this is also why some people ghost each other after the first intimate contact. "I didn't like his/her smell" is a common reason to stop dating, after all. We as a society need to accept that not everything can be fixed and improved with self-help courses. Some people just won't match on a genetic level and there's little you can do to fix that.

ge96 5y ago
> People can smell if their offspring will be healthy pretty quickly That's so interesting, it's not BO right or some bad perfume/cologne.
- fxtentacle 5y ago
  No actually females can typically "smell" (for lack of a better word) out of the sweat of males if the immune system markers are different enough to protect potential offspring from getting the same sicknesses as mother or father. "In several species, including rodents and fish, it has been shown that the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) influences mating preferences" "This study thus supports the hypothesis that the MHC influences mate choice in some human populations." https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1000184 https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo...
  - astrange 5y ago
    nb you said "typically" but the study says "some", and doesn't comment on if it's typical for any larger groups. For myself, can't say 23AndMe has ever asked if I think my partner smells good. Unless you meant female animals.
    - fxtentacle 5y ago
      Yes, with "females can typically smell" I meant that this is widely accepted as true in the animal kingdom. For humans, the effect appears to be there, but we don't have any stronger evidence. Then again, this might be unpopular to research due to its social implications.
      - SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
        > Then again, this might be unpopular to research due to its social implications. In the contrary I would suspect that being able to identify the specific chemical combinations that would make you hot would sell like crazy and there’s already snake oil on the market for this.
        fxtentacle 5y ago
        Thing is, you need the MHC markers that your dream partner lacks, so the optimal chemical combination would be different for each couple. And the stuff we use to mask this effect - called perfume - is indeed pretty popular ;)
soco 5y ago
If only you had left out the pheromones part I would have agreed with you wholeheartedly. That's a lesson I should learn as well: do not pivot in the message, rather write a new one.
- fxtentacle 5y ago
  But I really do see it as a huge issue with apps. In the "old" dating world, people would smell each other when they agreed to meet on a date, meaning before they invested time and effort. In the "new" dating world, people spend effort chatting and setting up the date but then it can still fail due to mis-matched pheromones. On the other hand, I just learned that with pill-based birth control the effect nowadays is weaker than it used to be. So maybe you're correct and my perception is just outdated.
benrapscallion 5y ago
Humans don’t have a functional vomeronasal organ to sense pheromones, only a nose. And hence no functional pheromone signaling. This is abjectly incorrect information.
- fxtentacle 5y ago
  University of Chicago disagrees: https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1000184 https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo... EDIT: actually, they show that humans can somehow perceive MHC compatibility. So you might be correct in that I'm wrong on the delivery mechanism and pheromones aren't being used.
  - benrapscallion 5y ago
    This article presents GWAS evidence for assortative mating, if anything – none for the existence of functional pheromone sensing in humans. Look up the work by Catherine DuLac and/or Lisa Stowers.
- gigaflop 5y ago
  Anecdata of 1, but I've (in hindsight) realized that certain feminine smells seem to skip my nose and hit buttons directly in my brain, so to speak.
DavidPiper 5y ago
> i.e. imitating the correct gestures, but very few people put in the effort to actually learn to become a good communicator. Reminds me of Celeste Headlee's comment: "There's no reason to learn how to show you're paying attention, if you are in fact paying attention." EDIT: I guess the reversal the article is talking about is that you now need to learn how to pretend not to be an effective communicator, because it's not part of the current social norm.
everdrive 5y ago
>The article's complains "men signal emotional seriousness that they don’t actually feel" I agree that dating apps and other modern technologies have changed the dating scene for the worse. However, this (feigning love when a man really just wants access to sex) has been a male dating strategy since time in memoriam. (and I'd certainly be open to the idea that this particular dating strategy is under a lot more pressure given the current dating environment. ie, that men are much more tempted to use this strategy than they would be otherwise.) I guess this really isn't a strong disagreement with your point. (or really much of a disagreement at all.) But, I think it's important to point out that this is not some aberrant pattern which never previously existed, rather it may be a rational pattern in certain contexts, and all we've done is change the context in which people are operating.

ge96 5y ago

> People can smell if their offspring will be healthy pretty quickly That's so interesting, it's not BO right or some bad perfume/cologne.

fxtentacle 5y ago
No actually females can typically "smell" (for lack of a better word) out of the sweat of males if the immune system markers are different enough to protect potential offspring from getting the same sicknesses as mother or father. "In several species, including rodents and fish, it has been shown that the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) influences mating preferences" "This study thus supports the hypothesis that the MHC influences mate choice in some human populations." https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1000184 https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo...
- astrange 5y ago
  nb you said "typically" but the study says "some", and doesn't comment on if it's typical for any larger groups. For myself, can't say 23AndMe has ever asked if I think my partner smells good. Unless you meant female animals.
  - fxtentacle 5y ago
    Yes, with "females can typically smell" I meant that this is widely accepted as true in the animal kingdom. For humans, the effect appears to be there, but we don't have any stronger evidence. Then again, this might be unpopular to research due to its social implications.
    - SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
      > Then again, this might be unpopular to research due to its social implications. In the contrary I would suspect that being able to identify the specific chemical combinations that would make you hot would sell like crazy and there’s already snake oil on the market for this.
      - fxtentacle 5y ago
        Thing is, you need the MHC markers that your dream partner lacks, so the optimal chemical combination would be different for each couple. And the stuff we use to mask this effect - called perfume - is indeed pretty popular ;)

soco 5y ago

If only you had left out the pheromones part I would have agreed with you wholeheartedly. That's a lesson I should learn as well: do not pivot in the message, rather write a new one.

fxtentacle 5y ago
But I really do see it as a huge issue with apps. In the "old" dating world, people would smell each other when they agreed to meet on a date, meaning before they invested time and effort. In the "new" dating world, people spend effort chatting and setting up the date but then it can still fail due to mis-matched pheromones. On the other hand, I just learned that with pill-based birth control the effect nowadays is weaker than it used to be. So maybe you're correct and my perception is just outdated.

benrapscallion 5y ago

Humans don’t have a functional vomeronasal organ to sense pheromones, only a nose. And hence no functional pheromone signaling. This is abjectly incorrect information.

fxtentacle 5y ago
University of Chicago disagrees: https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1000184 https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo... EDIT: actually, they show that humans can somehow perceive MHC compatibility. So you might be correct in that I'm wrong on the delivery mechanism and pheromones aren't being used.
- benrapscallion 5y ago
  This article presents GWAS evidence for assortative mating, if anything – none for the existence of functional pheromone sensing in humans. Look up the work by Catherine DuLac and/or Lisa Stowers.
gigaflop 5y ago
Anecdata of 1, but I've (in hindsight) realized that certain feminine smells seem to skip my nose and hit buttons directly in my brain, so to speak.

DavidPiper 5y ago

> i.e. imitating the correct gestures, but very few people put in the effort to actually learn to become a good communicator. Reminds me of Celeste Headlee's comment: "There's no reason to learn how to show you're paying attention, if you are in fact paying attention." EDIT: I guess the reversal the article is talking about is that you now need to learn how to pretend not to be an effective communicator, because it's not part of the current social norm.

everdrive 5y ago

>The article's complains "men signal emotional seriousness that they don’t actually feel" I agree that dating apps and other modern technologies have changed the dating scene for the worse. However, this (feigning love when a man really just wants access to sex) has been a male dating strategy since time in memoriam. (and I'd certainly be open to the idea that this particular dating strategy is under a lot more pressure given the current dating environment. ie, that men are much more tempted to use this strategy than they would be otherwise.) I guess this really isn't a strong disagreement with your point. (or really much of a disagreement at all.) But, I think it's important to point out that this is not some aberrant pattern which never previously existed, rather it may be a rational pattern in certain contexts, and all we've done is change the context in which people are operating.