Friday 17 October 2008

Human Relationships in Evolution

Just a thought, perhaps even a gradual epiphany. Why do you never see a five with an eight? I'm talking, of course, about human relationships. When walking along the street or dining in a restaurant, or, indeed, enjoying the company of your close friends, seldom does one see an ugly person walking hand in hand with a good-looking person. Before I continue I must confess that I did see an exception once during a meal with my own girlfriend: a fairly handsome teenager wining and dining a rather snidey, overweight, and generally unappealing female. Conversely to what one might suspect, he appeared enthusiastic and eager to laugh and chat, contrasting the increasingly unappreciative girl who spent most of the time skulking and avoiding any eye contact. Immediately, we questioned her obvious stupidity; why waste a chance with a reasonable, outgoing, good-looking guy? Nevertheless, this anomaly could act to prove my point. For some, the explanation may be obvious. However, I realised that this is simply a successful cornerstone of Evolution. We have long since evolved beyond the stage of raping one another to procreate. If we still multiplied through forceful intercourse, I would argue, we'd probably not be around today. And yet, genetic coding is undoubtedly the source of one's external appearance, but surely genetic coding also aligns one's sexual desires accordingly. Rarely do the alignments fall out of place. A ten is attracted to a ten; a four is attracted to a four, and so on. Obviously, the line fluctuates due to variable factors such as, wealth, personality, etc., but the overall trend continues fairly efficiently. You can draw conclusions from this assumption; this theory results in higher rates of procreation (if every male went for the same female because she was the prettiest (a ten) then the other females wouldn't ever be subject of a male's interest, until, of course, the ten grew old or died, in which case, the next-in-line would be similarly harassed and, likely, raped - giving rise to the question of which came first: rapist desires, or this genetic phenomenon?) You can also draw questions from this assumption; where was the crossover point in our genetic history when we started becoming attracted to our gender-opposites in terms of their appearance according to our own. So how does my anomaly compound the rule? If we take my assertion as positively accurate, it's now clear as day - she wasn't attracted to him. She may have accepted that he was handsome and sprightly but that made near as no difference to her as she daydreamed about threes and fours.

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