
Why a woman's attractiveness acts as a repellent, explained using probability. - amichail
http://plus.maths.org/issue51/features/rey/index.html
======
ardit33
I don't know any good looking, smart, and single women that can't get dates.
Actually I don't know any good looking/smart girl that is actually single.

From anecdotal evidence: I got to know this cute and smart girl, but she was
in a long term relationship at the time. At some point I learned through a
common friend that she broke up a month and a half ago. I asked her out, and
she told me she has been dating this other guy for a month. So, basically, she
was single for two weeks.

With my friends, we call "high quality" girls, girls that are good looking,
smart and nice, have a job/passion in their lifes, or have something going on
for them. They are very rare. Actually, extremely rare around here. You might
meet good looking girls, but that have nothing else going on for them in their
lives, you might meet smart girls, but that are just not attractive to you.
The combination of smart + good looking is a real killer, and often is ruined
by "bitchiness", but that is very subjective.

It seems that women become "nicer" and easier to talk to as they get older.
Especially in their 30s and so, when they clock is ticking. But in their
'20s', it is tough to find a girl like this Carol.

Maybe Carol needs to move to SF. She will have the pick of the litter.

~~~
gaius
_I don't know any good looking, smart, and single women that can't get dates._

Well quite. The article mentions Uma Thurman... Well, Uma, perhaps you can't
get a date because you're a bit weird? Perhaps "kooky" isn't what the men in
your social circle are looking for? Men find normal women confusing enough,
the actually mad ones terrify us. Maybe she's actually a really nice person,
but for whatever reason she's picked up this rep and it sticks.

It doesn't make sense to me that evolution would program men to find X list of
characteristics simultaneously attractive and repulsive. It does make sense
that a woman's ego would have her believe she's "too pretty" rather than a
more honest appraisal. It's exactly the same in the male syndrome of being
"too nice".

 _Especially in their 30s and so, when they clock is ticking._

It is true that in most cases a female at 20 has many more options than a male
of the same age. The opposite is true at 40. 30 is where the balance of power
starts to shift.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
_The opposite is true at 40. 30 is where the balance of power starts to
shift._

I'm in my 40s, and happily married, so I'm not in the game anymore, but I can
tell from the people I know that in the 40s and beyond the entire teenage/20s
power situation is reversed. In fact, I'd guess it starts mid-30s or so.

It's weird and unexpected. So for all you nerds out there who can't get dates
now -- immerse yourself in what you love and work hard. If you can wait now,
in a decade or so it'll be a whole new game.

~~~
gaius
Of course, if a girl didn't want you in her 20s, you certainly don't want her
in her 40s.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
Yes of course.

But dating is like marketing, not like sales. You're not trying to win one
particular girl, you're exploring all the options, making yourself known, and
seeing where the opportunities might be.

It's a numbers game.

I think the guys who realize this early in life get lucky a lot more than the
rest of us, sadly.

------
electromagnetic
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Discworld_concepts#The_.2...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Discworld_concepts#The_.27Jerk_Syndrome.27)

"This is a condition that may be experienced by a woman who is so beautiful,
so alluring, that any man with half a brain isn't even going to think about
asking her out, because it's obvious she's too grand for the likes of him.
This leads her to believe that the problem is at her end, and that there must
be something wrong with her. This persists until she meets a man who does not
have half a brain (i.e. is too stupid to realize she'll likely reject him, or
is so used to rejection that it doesn't bother him, or has some other flaw
that stems from an even more major flaw), and he does in fact ask her out, and
she is so grateful that she says yes".

A woman may be so attractive that a guy won't ask her out, because she's a 10
and he's a 1. However there'll always be people too stupid to count and can't
tell the difference between 1 and 10 and will ask her out anyway.

~~~
fauigerzigerk
Or he may be the one smart guy who thinks, hey, she's such a stunning beauty,
I bet no one has dared to ask her out, so I will.

And maybe the smart guy doesn't need to be so super smart but simply an
attentive observer.

Also, chances are that Carol is smart (and courageous) enough to approach a
guy herself once she becomes fed up with her own situation.

------
msie
There's theory and then there's reality. There are many attractive women/men
who are wondering why noone _attractive_ is chatting them up.

~~~
mrshoe
Fear of failure is the main reason one would not chat up an attractive girl.
The point of this article is that men think they are going to fail, not
because they are not attractive, but because _attractive girls must have so
many other options_.

Therefore, it is somewhat independent of the man's assessment of his own
attractiveness. This model is probably oversimplified, however, as self-
confidence must play a role in there somewhere.

~~~
1gor
Carol situation is a case of _prisoner's dilemma_ , which may be presented in
a bit shorter way than the article does. Let's use standard game theory terms
for the possible actions of one male individual:

'Cooperate' (C) = to publicly approach an attractive girl

'Defect' (D) = to ignore the girl, read the paper instead

So, imagine yourself walking into a cafe and seeing Carol at a table. She has
been there for a while, and you have no way of knowing if some other guy has
already approached her (or if Carol has a boyfriend). Let's assume for the
sake of simplicity that the first man who dares to approach Carol always gets
her telephone number (her nice way to reward him for being brave). That
automatically means that the second guy will be rejected and feel bad.

The outcomes are (in order of preference):

CD = You dare to speak to Carol, you are the winner, the other guys didn't
dare to approach her.

DD = Every man in the room reads the paper, Carol sits alone.

DC = You choose to ignore the girl, then some lucky bastard walks across the
room and gets her number. Bad, but you have not lost your face.

CC = The worst outcome. You have approached Carol, but she is already involved
with someone else. You walk back to your table, feeling miserable.

You notice that second and third outcome are somewhat identical, there is no
gain, but also no real damage. A rational person may well prefer to do nothing
and land in the 'neutral' area where 50% of total outcomes lay, rather than to
approach Carol and to have 25% chance of success vs. 25% chance of a complete
disaster.

\---

I think it is not the women's attractiveness that acts as a repellent, but
uncertainty of her status (has or has not a partner already). The way for
Carol so improve her situation is to develop some sort of signalling that says
she doesn't mind to be approached (flirting used to do the trick in old
times).

~~~
bkovitz
BTW, the actual policy, as far as I can tell from a couple years experimenting
"in the field", is that women's policy for giving out their phone numbers is:
they give them to men who ask.

I know, it seems too hard to be true. I had to work up my courage for _months_
to ask for a phone number upon meeting a woman, even after I decided that I
would try it since I had nothing to lose. The first time I tried it, the woman
gave me her number. The second time I tried it, that one gave me her number,
too. And on and on and on. I've only been turned down a few times. And I'm a
nervous, skinny, nerdy guy.

~~~
adrianwaj
I have received bogus numbers a few times. Not pleasant, but it doesn't bother
me anymore.

~~~
bkovitz
I also got a couple bogus numbers. (I count those under "refusals".) It's
amazing how most women will avoid humiliating you in public even if they don't
want to give you their number.

Once, I asked a lesbian for her phone number, in a bar, right in front of her
girlfriend. She gave it to me. It wasn't bogus! She never returned my call,
but it's an amazing data point about how women will usually give you their
phone number if you ask.

~~~
adrianwaj
I will just ring the number back on the spot if I sense some latent refusal.

------
browngeek
Carol should put her profile at an online dating site.

Its easier for men to "chat her up" online (Option 1); and not feel too bad
when Carol rejects their move (Option 3). Essentially, Option 2 becomes a non-
option and Carol would have more men approaching her and to choose from.

Anecdotal: I saw this girl online. I considered her "out of my league". But
what the heck, I picked Option 1. Now we are engaged. If I had seen her in the
real world, I would have picked Option 2.

~~~
slig
Your anecdote inspired me to do something. Thanks, man!

------
bkovitz
There is a reason why mathematics students have the highest virginity rate of
any major. <http://www.forwardon.com/view.php?e=Id1200c8f6b7f5f813>

~~~
philwelch
Those statistics are from Wellesley, a women's college. It would be more fair
to see statistics from a coeducational college.

------
donaldc
_Guy considers the possible outcomes:

(a) He talks to Carol and she responds in a friendly manner. He gets her phone
number and a proper date next week.

(b) He does not approach Carol. He can enjoy another rewarding task (like
reading the last issue of Plus).

(c) He talks to Carol and she proves uninterested. He will feel miserable for
a week._

A week? Guy needs to lighten up, and not take rejection so seriously. His
attitude may have just cost him a date with an intelligent and attractive
woman.

------
ilitirit
Finally I understand why women are repelled by me.

------
mkfort
I think this is useless without pics of Carol

~~~
vaksel
Just picture any hot woman you'd never approach, because you are SURE she must
have a boyfriend, and if she doesn't, then there must be something wrong with
her.

~~~
mahmud
If you are in a committed loving relationship, you would have no trouble
chatting up anyone you would normally be attracted to, because you don't have
an _agenda_ ; all of the sudden, you're one hot cookie.

So if you're single and looking, the easiest way to connect with people you're
attracted to is to approach them with no agenda. Become as sexually detached
as you can and treat them like a buddy.

~~~
jlees
Of course being buddies with someone you're attracted to can also lead to
sticky situations, cf <http://xkcd.com/513/>

------
SleepHitter86
Any time spent reading hacker news or that article is not used approaching
attractive women.

Just saying, its purely a function of our own MOTIVATION, not necessarily our
self-image, which we can change.

------
chaostheory
The problem I find with this article and game theory in general is that it
assumes everyone acts rationally all the time, which is not the case.

I remember a research paper finding that the only people who consistently
acted rational in the game theory sense were economists and sociopaths.

------
mike463
I can explain it quite easily - "Nobody goes there anymore -- it's too
crowded"

------
srn
Seriously, where's the study? This is a nice example of game theory but let's
not call it truth without some backing research, and all the anecdotal
evidence in the world sounds nice but we are not exactly a representative
group are we?

~~~
benatkin
The illustrations are good. The article was intriguing at first, but the last
part of it was disappointing. It's a shame. It could have been a really good
article.

------
joechung
It never hurts to try. Oh wait, yes it does. A lot.

~~~
timr
The pain is completely in your head. And the more you do it, the less it
hurts.

~~~
josefresco
Unless of course your 'game' sucks and you get slapped/kneed-in-the-crotch or
her gaggle of un-hot friends assaults you.

I'll take physical pain over extreme social pain/embarrassment pretty much any
day of the week.

~~~
timr
Everyone's game sucks at first. You make it suck less by putting yourself out
there and practicing.

------
calcnerd256
Ah, so _there_ is a mechanism selecting against people who underestimate
themselves. I would prescribe she be less shy if she's so attractive. Make the
first move, Carol; chat a guy up.

~~~
sown
Shyness was conveniently part of the problem statement.

------
swolchok
A Beautiful Mind covers this issue from a slightly different angle. It's a
decent flick. I'm marginally surprised neither it nor Nash was mentioned in
the article.

~~~
sofal
The example of a Nash equilibrium in _A Beautiful Mind_ was completely wrong.
A real Nash equilibrium assumes that no player regrets their strategy given
the knowledge of everyone else's move.

In the case of the Carol Syndrome (or the "solution" from _A Beautiful Mind_
), the players will have plenty of reasons to want to change their initial
strategy.

------
biohacker42
Bullshit. While I'm sure that super attractive people can intimidate a
disproportionate share of the opposite (or same!) sex. The lack of romance
requires that in addition to being super attractive they _also_ refuse to be
the one who breaks the ice.

Proper headline should be attractiveness + refusal to take the first step
leads to fewer dating opportunities.

------
tel
_Any bundle in which both Guy and someone else approach Carol yields (c) and
has reward value 0._

Oh, so that's how it works? No wonder this situation seems out of balance.

Instead, I would suggest that in the p_star case, N is only the number of
other guys who (from Guy's perspective) are more interesting (attractive,
well-spoken, outgoing) which helps to keep N down for any suitably attractive,
confident Guy.

That changes Carol's p_none too. Now she's getting the product across some
distribution of p_stars from guys around her, each of which is related to the
apparent value of the dating pool and individual confidence.

I haven't worked the math, but it definitely seems like p_none < 1/2 only when
none of the guys are very confident in their worth. I don't really think you
needed to use game theory to get that result.

------
dschoon
As many people have already observed, ideal rationality and reality are very
different. This is one of the reasons why assertiveness and risk-seeking
behavior is rewarded in {dating,business}. The game theoretic calculus might
not provide the optimal course of action, because its assumptions might not
sufficiently model reality.

I'd offer that we don't see many beautiful, single women because we irrational
agents take the risk to chat her up anyway. And HEYYO, turns out that,
empirically, maybe that's the right thing to do.

------
kingkawn
I think this probably has to do with attractive people thinking that they
should be approached. If you're beautiful, especially for women, you're asked
to do less for attention and reward. So you get used to doing little, and
expect others to come to you.

------
doki_pen
I think most men wait for a social cue from the woman before approaching her.
Maybe this woman needs to throw out some signals to some men that she is
attracted to. Most men only need the slightest encouragement to feel safe from
bad rejection.

~~~
adrianwaj
It's called an Approach Invitation to some. There also a pre-AI, where you can
signal to her, so that she can then signal back.

~~~
doki_pen
I think men are much more in tune. So much so, that we pick up signals that
aren't really there.

~~~
adrianwaj
I've had Male Pattern Blindness ruin my game a number of times: part of the
reason I stopped drinking: I was unresponsive to signals coming my way.

------
gtzi
In practice, N=1 (just you), a>>b,c, so it is p->1 and you have to go for it
:)

------
fatdog789
Bullshit. A repellant to a certain type of guys, maybe. But the hotter a chick
is, the more dates she goes out on _unless she chooses to be picky_.

From the article: 1\. He talks to Carol and she responds in a friendly manner.
He gets her phone number and a proper date next week. 2\. He does not approach
Carol. He can enjoy another rewarding task (like reading the last issue of
Plus). 3\. He talks to Carol and she proves uninterested. He will feel
miserable for a week.

No guy who is actually interested in a woman will pick option 2. In fact, it's
a non-option.

No guy who will "feel miserable for a week" over some random chick turning him
down for a date. If he does feel miserable for a week, he's got serious
emotional problems or instability issues. A few minutes, maybe. A hours,
possibly. if he has a really sensitive ego.

Finally, as to the anecdotal evidence at the bottom of the article which
inspired the article, I call bullshit again. Uma Thurman and Jessica Simpson
were both referring to boyfriends, not dates, and discussing how their
_careers_ and _financial success_ was scaring off men who were intimidated by
the spectre of being in a relationship with a more successful woman. (I watch
Extra, so sue me.)

~~~
sofal
It doesn't seem to me like you're familiar with any reserved, risk-averse
people.

 _No guy who is actually interested in a woman will pick option 2. In fact,
it's a non-option._

Picking option 2 is a "bah, she's out of my league" decision. It may not be a
smart choice, but it's a choice that a whole lot of men make.

 _No guy who will "feel miserable for a week" over some random chick turning
him down for a date._

A lot of men have a fear of failure in this game, however irrational it may
seem. Being rejected by a woman can make a man self-conscious about his own
attractiveness. A typical pessimistic guy would not take it very well and will
try to avoid a situation like that. This is probably why the author uses 0 as
the reward for outcome 3.

~~~
khafra
"Fear of failure" oversimplifies it, I think. As an anecdotal example, the
other day, I was at a rock climbing gym and saw an extremely attractive girl
climbing. I didn't approach her, because

1) I was new there, unfamiliar with the social mores, and didn't want to earn
an undesirable reputation

2) She was with a group of friends, any one of which she could've been
involved with--and, indeed, did embrace one of the guys about an hour later

3) She was intent on what she was doing; I wasn't at my most impressive; I'd
likely have a repeated chance, and a failed intial approach would negatively
bias later chances

4) Likely other more or less subconscious, more or less rational reasons as
well.

