The evolution of beauty: Face the facts

The Economist ^ | November 16, 2013 | The Economist

[BenLurkin]

Is Russian fur beautiful?

Enquiring minds want to know.

[Alex Murphy]

BEAUTY, the saying has it, is only skin deep. Not true. Skin is important (the cosmetics industry proves that). But so is what lies under it. In particular, the shape of people’s faces, determined by their bone structure, contributes enormously to how beautiful they are. And, since the ultimate point of beauty is to signal who is a good prospect as a mate, what makes a face beautiful is not only an aesthetic matter but also a biological one. How those bone structures arise, and how they communicate desirable traits, are big evolutionary questions.

"Beauty is only skin deep.
But ugliness goes right down to the marrow!"

[nascarnation]

The answer to your question is....sure.

[blueunicorn6]

Yes.....only the truly beautiful are having children. Like that lady who was yelling about who was going to take care of her what, dozen kids?

[Talisker]

The thing I have always loved - as in eating massive amounts of popcorn, drinking beer and laughing my ass off - about the social sciences, is how they treat data definitions.

In the hard sciences, you can find books - entire books - compiled by hundreds of scientists all over the world over decades, that drill down on the precise definitions of single word terms that are used for data in scientific studies. Mathematical charts, arguments, diagrams, philosophies. And why? Because the data is what is used to determin the science, so the definition of the data is utterly crucial.

But in social science, these “scientists” wave their hands and talk about “beauty” and “desirability” and other vagueries and then thrown in hard science “genetics” and voila’ - a published paper that AMCNBCCBS vomits out in the news and everyone freaks out about.

Grudgingly, over the years, I have had to acknowledge that statistical analysis does provide a basis for the social sciences - barely. Because there are more ways to abuse statistics then there are to use them properly. And you’re still stuck with deciding what data you are going to statistically crunch.

But hey, ignoring these issues mean that yes, you too can get a multi-million dollar government grant to “prove” that beautiful women attract men more than ugly women. Oops, see? I said ugly. No PC DemonRat grant for me.

[Rodamala]

Another researcher studied police photographs of children who had been abused and found such children had lower craniofacial ratios than those who had not been.

beaten with "the ugly stick", undoubtedly.

[Rodamala]

I am thinking more along these lines:

[Anton.Rutter]

I like the way you think.

[nascarnation]

очень красиво

[Oberon]

Most ochen indeed! :D

[Rodamala]

Я ударил его.

[Durus]

Even as children, according to 33 separate studies, the attractive are better adjusted and more popular than the ugly (they also have higher intelligence, which assists social skills).

Wow. I wonder what the definition of "better adjusted" means. I've never met a truly beautiful person that wasn't an ass who though the world revolved around them. Might they be more popular? Sure culture and instinct would make that true. Is popularity really a measure of anything important?

What study has ever shown that "the attractive" are more intelligent than the "less attractive". I have never seen a study that shows this realistically. I've attended Mensa meetings that indicates the opposite. Of course I've never met "an attractive person" that didn't think they were brilliant though.

I suspect there is a lot of shading being done here to define "attractive" and "ugly". In other words I suspect that anyone that isn't malformed and hideous is considered "attractive" when it comes to IQ, where the "ugly" is anyone that isn't "very attractive" when it comes to being popular.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

Another researcher studied police photographs of children who had been abused and found such children had lower craniofacial ratios than those who had not been.

So being slapped around tends to lower your attractiveness?

Who knew?

(Yes this is sarcasm)

[elcid1970]

Devushka! Ana ochen krassivaya!

[BenLurkin]

Not bad.

[dfwgator]

“Come and keep your comrade warm.”

[BenLurkin]

http://www.johnspeedie.com/healy/Ooo-eee.wav

[dfwgator]

[goat granny]

there might be something to it...no attractive men in prison. They all look ugly...