Attraction cannot be quantified. Discuss.

illusoryfindings · 2023-11-29T07:35:18+00:00

It's difficult to quantify at the level of the individual, but if you zoom out and generalize, it's pretty easy to spot things the majority are attracted to.

While an average of a given sample size is often just a caricature of a person, it's still useful for people to know. Because if they're not naturally attractive themselves, they can try to integrate some generally attractive qualities to at least make themselves a little more attractive than they were to begin with.

For a man this involves being tall, relatively fit, charismatic, confident, decisive, and having some form of status in whatever group they're involved with. Barring height, all of these things are improvable. This is useful for the men who are willing to put in the work.

im_a_little_teap0t · 2023-11-29T07:26:21+00:00

In my experience, men don’t need to be “attracted” to a woman to be interested. They will sleep with women who are willing, they will marry women who will meet their needs. but women have different layers of what they find attractive. Sure he has a nice smile but he’s rude. This guy might be a little overweight but he’s so sweet and funny. Someone’s husband might be kind and have a great body, but he is lazy and can’t keep a job.

Schmurby · 2023-11-29T08:07:28+00:00

Attraction absolutely cannot be quantified. Just look around the world or at old art for evidence that what is and is not considered attractive changes over time and space.

My favorite example is the country of Tajikistan where women paint unibrow on their foreheads if they can’t grow them naturally. Can you imagine a sorority sister doing that?!

Another great example is John Lennon. Probably one of the most popular and admired men who ever walked the earth, surely had sex with hundreds if not thousands of people. He had “options”. And look who he settled down with.

And I’m not saying Yoko was ugly. But she certainly isn’t what most incels have in mind when they imagine 10/10.

Attraction is absolutely subjective.

Excellent_Badger123 · 2023-11-29T10:26:53+00:00

I have friends of both genders who are single & dating. They’ve been at it their whole lives & are between 40 & 70 years old. They are all educated, decent looking functional people

They all have at least one of these:

1) unrealistic expectations about what they can pull 2) extremely super hard to find very specific niche requirements 3) don’t really want relationships, just short term no strings fun

I don’t judge & can’t fault 2 & 3 as long as they are honest in their exploits. If they are a friend that I can be honest with I’ve gently pointed out 1 to them - only if they say they want to find a LTR partner.

Attraction is such an individual mix of factors. I’ve had genuine strong mutual attraction with only 5 guys in my life and if you lined them all up they vary tremendously in the way they look, their personalities, interests & socioeconomic status. It’s hard to find but ime you definitely know it when you encounter it, it’s almost magnetic.

gopher_glitz · 2023-11-29T11:41:55+00:00

Most hook ups are a matter of attraction and circumstances.

Circumstances count for a lot.

Gitsumrestmf · 2023-11-29T11:24:39+00:00

a person with genuine self worth and self respect should lose feelings easy

No, that would be a person who never cared in the first place. If you really care about someone, you still may decide it's better for you two to be apart, but you won't "lose feelings" quickly, or ever.

I use Women as the example because it is they who set the guidelines for men to play around.

Oh really? Are you implying women don't chase after men just as well? You've never heard of lovestruck girls willing to go to any lengths for a guy they obsess over?

an animal, it is a primal instinct

Don't compare humans and animals. Animals don't have much of a way to fathom "attraction". They have urge to breed, they do it. Humans work on incomparably more sophisticated level.

You only choose after you are attracted, women are wiser in this regard

Quite disagree, considering how much women get burned in relationships due to poor judgement.

quite happy to be knocked around as long as I get love now and again.

And that's what you need to work on bro. Start respecting yourself.

Suzcval · 2023-11-29T13:11:11+00:00

Attraction cannot be quanitified individually, but it can be pretty easily predicted on a larger scale. If you have a guy that's super tall and shredded and a guy that isn't and have enough women pick one, the super tall and shredded guy is going to 100% have more interest with a big enough sample size - but that isn't to say every individual woman would prefer him. That's why a lot of people say "i think x person is attractive but i'm not attracted to them"

mrs_seng · 2023-11-29T07:52:26+00:00

There are women who are more emotional than others (same for men, we're humans after all), but from my observations, women might give a man their hearts, but they don't lose their heads in the process. I've seen situations where a woman loves her boyfriend, but he's lazy, doesn't do anything around the house, she already communicated what bothers her, nothing changed, so she breaks up with him even though it hurts. And it's a rational thing to do.

Women are pragmatic. The ones who don't act pragmatically have an underlay of low self esteem, no self value, a troubled childhood or a troubled mind.

AdEffective7894s · 2023-11-29T07:22:17+00:00

But it can be compared.

Hence the concept of AFBB

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AbsolutelyNobody0 · 2023-11-29T09:57:20+00:00

Depends what you mean by quantified.

Can it be quantified as strictly as the motion equation for throwing an object? No.

Are there changed statistical likelihoods based on different quantifiable traits? Absolutely.

While there may be no absolute formula, we wouldn't bother discussing attraction if it couldn't be measurably influenced.

AceOfSpadesGymBro2 · 2023-11-29T11:45:39+00:00

The reason women "change" their feelings so quickly is because their attraction is largely based on the man's behavior. When a man behaves like a man, doesn't make excuses for it, doesn't make excuses for being interested in her and is confident, all is good. But many men are fakers, so they can present a confident front, but their inner excuser slips out every once in a while and the woman can realize the guy is actually not what he says he is.

The same could happen to men as well if they figured out that the girl who they thought was really hot was all smoke and mirrors due to creative make up, fake hair, a push up bra, etc. That's the reason many women don't let men sleep over or they don't stay over, because they are afraid the guy will see them in the morning as they really are and lose all attraction to them.

But for the most part, men's attraction stays steady because a woman's looks don't change drastically, unlike a man's behavior which can change drastically to reveal he is not the hot alpha male she thought she was getting.

obviousredflag · 2023-11-29T12:16:48+00:00

Please don't make this a fancy writing contest on an international discussion board, unless you want us to think you are internally tipping your fedora and are willing to lose people for lack of clarity.

Feelings are not rational. You cannot decide to lose feelings when something doesn't line up with your rational perspective on it. Women are just as stupid in their love and lust as men. Women do not set the guidelines.

Of course, attraction cannot be quantified with a numerical value, unless you want to go by proxy of something like

Penile plethysmography (PPG) or phallometry is measurement of blood flow to the penis, typically used as a proxy for measurement of sexual arousal

But you can still speak about relative attraction levels you have towards different people.

Notanothrshitthrow · 2023-11-29T13:16:51+00:00

On a macro level yes, on a micro level no.

arvada14 · 2023-11-29T13:33:53+00:00

I agree but I still think it can be categorized on scale.

Very unattractive, unattractive, slightly unattractive, neutral, slightly attractive, attractive, very attractive.

Or on a 5 point scale very unattractive, attractive, neutral, attractive, very unattractive.

The difference between men and women is (in my opinion) women don't have a neutral setting for men. If a man is meh. He's very likely to be put in the unattractive side of the scale.

Fun_Push7168 · 2023-11-29T13:34:54+00:00

Quantified....I think it can be. It's not too difficult to put on a 1-100 scale.

Qualified.... perhaps not. You won't be attracted to everyone who checks your boxes and you will be attracted to some who don't. Most everyone has some fluidity.

dominantoneforher · 2023-11-29T15:07:45+00:00

I think attraction is an absolute prerequisite to become romantically or sexually involved with another person. Personally, I see attraction as being physical, emotional, and intellectual in nature and I tend to have a minimum standard for each of the aforementioned areas although my standard to be involved with someone is caused by a synergy of those areas where my overall attraction is greater than the individual areas combined.

DimensionVegetable37 · 2023-11-29T18:03:45+00:00

A large sum of money and large amounts of fame say otherwise 🙃

Safinated · 2023-11-30T07:53:08+00:00

“Attraction cannot be predicted or guaranteed” would be a better way of saying it

infps · 2023-11-30T13:53:45+00:00

I mean, for both genders is it just "tall and healthy?"

Tall more important for men and healthy BMI more important for women?

Basically the Skaarsgard Boys vs Jon Voight's Daughter being the standards for men and women, respectively?

Title	Attraction cannot be quantified. Discuss.
Author	GlasgaAccentfurYanks
Upvotes	10
Comments	55
Date	November 29, 2023 7:03 AM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/186ji5d/attraction_cannot_be_quantified_discuss/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/attraction-cannot-be-quantified-discuss.1239597 https://theredarchive.com/post/1239597

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