OT: Natural beauty & evolutionary advantage

[Berkeley Brett]

I hope you are all well & in good spirits.

Colorful sunsets, birds singing wildly in the morning, the moon on a misty night, a field of many kinds of flowers, the fragrance of those flowers, magnificent mountains, flowing rivers & the sounds of flowing rivers -- most of us have some kind of aesthetic (or even mystical) experience when contemplate some of these things.

Though not all things in nature are beautiful, a great many things are.

Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty (perhaps I should say "natural beauties") though the process of evolution? If so, what kind of survival advantages have these responses given us?

Or, do you suppose this sense of the beautiful is a simple grace of Nature, exquisite but evolutionarily indifferent?

Thank you for any thoughts you may care to share....

--
Brett (in Berkeley, California, USA)
On Twitter at:
http://twitter.com/BerkeleyBrett
(You don't have to be a Twitter user to view this stream of ideas!)

[Reinhold {Rey} Aman]

Weird Berkeley Brett wrote:
>
[Snipped the usual off-topic goo.]

--
~~~ Reinhold {Rey} Aman ~~~

[Jerry Friedman]

On 5/7/14 11:23 AM, Berkeley Brett wrote:
> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>
> Colorful sunsets, birds singing wildly in the morning, the moon on a misty night, a field of many kinds of flowers, the fragrance of those flowers, magnificent mountains, flowing rivers & the sounds of flowing rivers -- most of us have some kind of aesthetic (or even mystical) experience when contemplate some of these things.
>
> Though not all things in nature are beautiful, a great many things are.
>
> Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty (perhaps I should say "natural beauties") though the process of evolution? If so, what kind of survival advantages have these responses given us?
>
> Or, do you suppose this sense of the beautiful is a simple grace of Nature, exquisite but evolutionarily indifferent?

...

One of the best poems I wrote in college was on this subject, and
plumped for the evolutionary answer. I've lost it, which allows me to
ignore the flaws it undoubtedly had.

Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong cultural component. I
believe that before the "sublime" was invented, mountains and deserts
were often considered horrible and ugly. Melville's /The Encantadas, or
Enchanted Isles/ describes the Galapagos that way.

http://books.google.com/books?id=pFB1UOHRlvYC&pg=PA202

--
Jerry Friedman

[Anton Shepelev]

Jerry Friedman:

> Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong
> cultural component.

Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
ery culture developed. For an examle, the thick
black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs
is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun. This
I learned from a tale by Ivan Efremov, of whose
views on the subject I shall write in more detail in
this very thread if time permits. He considers the
sense of beauty (aesthetics) a very practical one
and devotes many a page in his fiction to corrobo-
rating it.

Another example from the morality dimension is the
custom in northern regions to lend one's wife for a
night to male guests, which is necessary to reduce
interbreeding in a very loosely populated environ-
ment.

--
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html e-mail
/\ http://preview.tinyurl.com/qcy6mjc [archived]

[Anton Shepelev]

I wrote:

> Another example from the morality dimension is the

> custom in northern regions to [...]

ObAue: Surrond "from the morality dimention" with
commans and, please, tell me if the definite article
before "morality" is really needed.

[Peter Moylan]

On 08/05/14 18:33, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> I wrote:
>
>> Another example from the morality dimension is the
>> custom in northern regions to [...]
>
> ObAue: Surrond "from the morality dimention" with
> commans and, please, tell me if the definite article
> before "morality" is really needed.
>

An article is essential in this position. It could be omitted if you
changed "dimension" to "dimensions", but of course that would mess up
your meaning.

--
Peter Moylan, Newcastle, NSW, Australia. http://www.pmoylan.org
For an e-mail address, see my web page.

[Anton Shepelev]

Peter Moylan to Anton Shepelev:

> > I wrote:
> >
> > > Another example from the morality dimension is
> > > the custom in northern regions to [...]
> >
> > ObAue: Surrond "from the morality dimention"

> > with commans and, please, tell me if the defi-

> > nite article before "morality" is really needed.
>
> An article is essential in this position. It could

> be omitted if you changed "dimension" to "dimen-

> sions", but of course that would mess up your
> meaning.

Thanks for the reply and excuse me for the many ty-
pos, those children of haste.

[Anton Shepelev]

Peter Moylan to Anton Shepelev:

> > I wrote:
> >
> > > Another example from the morality dimension is
> > > the custom in northern regions to [...]
> >
> > ObAue: Surrond "from the morality dimention"

> > with commans and, please, tell me if the defi-

> > nite article before "morality" is really needed.
>
> An article is essential in this position. It could

> be omitted if you changed "dimension" to "dimen-

> sions", but of course that would mess up your
> meaning.

I wonder why the noun "mode" is so often used with-
out the definite article in similar contexts:

Set your camera to aperture priority mode.

In both cases, from a set of several elements (di-
mensions or modes) an applied adjective identifies
one (the dimension of morality, the mode of aperture
priority).

[Don Phillipson]

"Berkeley Brett" <roya...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:5b6a4572-6c8b-48e5...@googlegroups.com...

> Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty . . . though
> [through] the process of evolution? If so, what kind of survival

> advantages
> have these responses given us?

This seems to get Dawkins backwards. Survival (or numerical increase)
is the valued outcome i.e. is "the advantage." There may be no "kinds of
survival advantage" beyond the numbers of offspring in succeeding
generations.

We nowadays use "evolution" in two literal senses. Darwin's was principally
emergence in time of a new species that did not exist before year X or
generation N. Nowadays we use it both in this sense (e.g. evolution of
antibiotic-resistant organisms) and in another, to mean change caused
by differences in genes or genetic responses to an altered environment.

No direct link between beauty and species or genes has been measured.
Some famous examples (e.g. peacock eyes, bowers built by bower
birds) have for a century been suggested as evidence that beauty
influences evolution, but the gap remains.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

[Horace LaBadie]

In article <5b6a4572-6c8b-48e5...@googlegroups.com>,

Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>
> Colorful sunsets, birds singing wildly in the morning, the moon on a misty
> night, a field of many kinds of flowers, the fragrance of those flowers,
> magnificent mountains, flowing rivers & the sounds of flowing rivers -- most
> of us have some kind of aesthetic (or even mystical) experience when
> contemplate some of these things.
>
> Though not all things in nature are beautiful, a great many things are.
>
> Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty (perhaps I should
> say "natural beauties") though the process of evolution? If so, what kind of
> survival advantages have these responses given us?
>
> Or, do you suppose this sense of the beautiful is a simple grace of Nature,
> exquisite but evolutionarily indifferent?
>
> Thank you for any thoughts you may care to share....

Some people are totally lacking any sense of beauty, but they seem to
survive just fine.

Then there is the idea, put forward by Jakob Burckhardt, that Petrarch
invented the modern appreciation for natural beauty in his letter about
the ascent of Mt. Ventoux, ca. 1350. Of course, Petrarch cited a passage
from Augustine, making the point that men in Antiquity had also climbed
for the view.

[Jerry Friedman]

On Thursday, May 8, 2014 2:29:51 AM UTC-6, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Jerry Friedman:
>
> > Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong
> > cultural component.
>
> Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
> ery culture developed.

Only? Fashions in thinness and fatness for women and in facial hair for
men seem to change without much regard for conditions.

> For an examle, the thick
> black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs
> is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun.

...

Berkeley Brett was talking about the beauty of nature as distinct from
the beauty of human beings. It's obvious why we evolved a sense of
the latter. I'm sure much has been said, and something may be known,
about the interplay of innate qualities and culture in standars
of human physical attractiveness.

--
Jerry Friedman

[R H Draney]

Jerry Friedman filted:

What is oddest of all is that women have evolved a sense of "cute" in connection
with such things as shoes that is completely lacking in the male....r


--
Me? Sarcastic?
Yeah, right.

[Jerry Friedman]

On Thursday, May 8, 2014 2:35:09 PM UTC-6, R H Draney wrote:
> Jerry Friedman filted:
...

>
> >I'm sure much has been said, and something may be known,
> >about the interplay of innate qualities and culture in standars
> >of human physical attractiveness.
>
> What is oddest of all is that women have evolved a sense of "cute" in connection
> with such things as shoes that is completely lacking in the male....r

Compare the gene for the sense of "trick" (adjective).

--
Jerry Friedman

[David Kleinecke]

On Thursday, May 8, 2014 10:26:33 AM UTC-7, Jerry Friedman wrote:

> Berkeley Brett was talking about the beauty of nature as distinct from
> the beauty of human beings. It's obvious why we evolved a sense of
> the latter. I'm sure much has been said, and something may be known,
> about the interplay of innate qualities and culture in standars
> of human physical attractiveness.

The current favorite "beautiful scene" seems to be a tropical beach.
Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
thrill me. Of them my favorite is the one stretching south from
Pismo Beach. Mountains on the other hand thrill me. I have a nice
one - Mount Diablo practically in my backyard but they scale up to
Half Dome or Matterhorn. I mean looking at mountains - not climbing
them. But of places to be I think a trail through a California oak
forest in the spring is tops.

[Peter Moylan]

On 09/05/14 01:35, Don Phillipson wrote:

> We nowadays use "evolution" in two literal senses. Darwin's was principally
> emergence in time of a new species that did not exist before year X or
> generation N. Nowadays we use it both in this sense (e.g. evolution of
> antibiotic-resistant organisms) and in another, to mean change caused
> by differences in genes or genetic responses to an altered environment.

I don't see those as different senses. Darwin perceived a two-part
operation:
1. Variations appear, by random mutation or just in
the normal range of variation in that species.
2. Individuals with the more favourable characteristics
went on to have more offspring than those with the
less favourable characteristics.

He saw this, I think, as a more-or-less continuous process. What we've
discovered since Darwin's time is the importance of an altered
environment, which can often produce a punctuated equilibrium. Many of
the variations that a species exhibits are survival-neutral, providing
neither an advantage or a disadvantage in the existing environment.
Then, when the environment changes, it turns out that some things that
were previously neutral are suddenly important.

That's why climate change produces an effect that looks like rapid
evolution. It's also why antibiotic-resistant organisms seem to appear
when you expose them to antibiotics. They were already there, but their
relative numbers changed when you changed their environment by adding
the antibiotics.

[Robert Bannister]

On 9/05/2014 9:56 am, David Kleinecke wrote:
> On Thursday, May 8, 2014 10:26:33 AM UTC-7, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>
>> Berkeley Brett was talking about the beauty of nature as distinct from
>> the beauty of human beings. It's obvious why we evolved a sense of
>> the latter. I'm sure much has been said, and something may be known,
>> about the interplay of innate qualities and culture in standars
>> of human physical attractiveness.
>
> The current favorite "beautiful scene" seems to be a tropical beach.
> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
> thrill me.

It's the tropical part that puts me off. There is a reason I don't live
in Queensland, Singapore, Zanzibar or Miami - I don't like humidity. I
see pictures of some beautiful beaches, but then I think Thailand?
Malaysia? - hot and sticky. I prefer hot and dry.

--
Robert Bannister - 1940-71 SE England
1972-now W Australia

[R H Draney]

David Kleinecke filted:

Forests creep me out...full of bugs and nettles and other nasties...give me a
desert any time....

I'm reminded of a pair of online walkthroughs for the game Riven...one of the
five islands in the game is described as "a tableau of eerie beauty", while
another characterizes the same view as "a blasted-out wasteland"....r

[Mark Brader]

David Kleinecke:

> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much

> thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean

> looking at mountains - not climbing them.

What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)
--
Mark Brader "I wasn't the one who misplaced the entire
Toronto Deltivid asteroid belt!"
m...@vex.net "Deja Q", ST:TNG, Richard Danus

[bill van]

In article <UIudnRh6SroGt-zO...@vex.net>,

m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:

> David Kleinecke:
> > Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
> > thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
> > looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>
> What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)

Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves
breaking on rocky shores, that's something else entirely. This one I
have visited many times on the west coast of Vancouver Island:

http://www.longbeachmaps.com/images01/bad-move-wave.jpg

(It is advisable to stay a safe distance back, unlike the people on the
left-hand edge of this photograph. I don't think they were swept away,
but people sometimes are.)
--
bill

[Mark Brader]

David Kleinecke:
> > > Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
> > > thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
> > > looking at mountains - not climbing them.

Mark Brader:

> > What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)

"Bill":

> Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
> children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves
> breaking on rocky shores, that's something else entirely. This one I
> have visited many times on the west coast of Vancouver Island:
>
> http://www.longbeachmaps.com/images01/bad-move-wave.jpg

ObAUE: for me that's not a "beach" at all. It needs to have something
like sand, or at least pebbles, for that word to apply.

> (It is advisable to stay a safe distance back, unlike the people on the
> left-hand edge of this photograph. I don't think they were swept away,
> but people sometimes are.)

Well cautioned.

There are other ways for coastlines to be interesting too... I like
this one, for example.

http://www.fjordtours.com/sitefiles/site1/shop/geirangerfjord.jpg
--
Mark Brader "He'll spend at least part of his life
Toronto in prison, or parliament, or both."
m...@vex.net --Peter Moylan

My text in this article is in the public domain.

[Mike L]

On Mon, 12 May 2014 15:10:03 -0500, m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:

>David Kleinecke:
>> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
>> thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
>> looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>
>What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)

Mountains for me, too. I can find interest on a beach, and I love
rivers; but I don't really like the sea all that much. I think it
frightens me.

--
Mike.

[bill van]

In article <kOmdndBnQvb43OzO...@vex.net>,

m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:

> David Kleinecke:
> > > > Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
> > > > thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
> > > > looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>
> Mark Brader:
> > > What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)
>
> "Bill":
> > Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
> > children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves
> > breaking on rocky shores, that's something else entirely. This one I
> > have visited many times on the west coast of Vancouver Island:
> >
> > http://www.longbeachmaps.com/images01/bad-move-wave.jpg
>
> ObAUE: for me that's not a "beach" at all. It needs to have something
> like sand, or at least pebbles, for that word to apply.

Point taken. I'm so familiar with the place that it didn't register that
the picture doesn't show the beaches associated with those rocks, which
are part of Frank Island. There are two crescent-shaped beaches on
either side of a sand bridge that leads the rocks when it's bare at low
tide:

<http://www.chestermanbeach.com/chesterman_img/frankisl_chesterman_0021.j
pg>

> > (It is advisable to stay a safe distance back, unlike the people on the
> > left-hand edge of this photograph. I don't think they were swept away,
> > but people sometimes are.)
>
> Well cautioned.
>
> There are other ways for coastlines to be interesting too... I like
> this one, for example.
>
> http://www.fjordtours.com/sitefiles/site1/shop/geirangerfjord.jpg

Agreed. I'm not a cruise ship sort of person, but I've taken a ferry
once and an Alaska cruise once through the Inside Passage, a series of
passages and inlets between the B.C. mainland and various nearby
islands. Scenery is comparable, and marvellous when the weather
cooperates:

<http://travelbritishcolumbia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/inside-passa
ge-british-columbia-730x485.jpg>

http://tinyurl.com/lceuwlx
--
bill

[Mark Brader]

"Bill":

> Point taken. I'm so familiar with the place that it didn't register that
> the picture doesn't show the beaches associated with those rocks, which

> are part of Frank Island. There are...

Thanks. Well-chosen pictures.
--
Mark Brader | "If I quoted each [part] that had serious problems,
Toronto | [the author] could sue me for copyright infringement."
m...@vex.net | -- Steve Summit

[Snidely]

Remember when bill van bragged outrageously? That was Monday:

> In article <UIudnRh6SroGt-zO...@vex.net>,
> m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:
>
>> David Kleinecke:
>>> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
>>> thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
>>> looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>>
>> What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)
>
> Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
> children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves
> breaking on rocky shores, that's something else entirely.

I'll take mountains [1] , beaches, crashing waves, green-lit forests
[2], desert dunes, desert rocks, sandstone hills, gullies, .... I'm
not sure I've experience a corn- or wheat-field on an Iowa or Kansas
scale, so I'll withhold voting on that.

[1] Canadian Rockies preferred to Colorado, but I won't exclude any. I
won't exclude Yunque, for instance. [3]

[2] of douglas fir, cedar/spruce, pine, oak, maple. I still need to
investigate larch and poplar.

[3] You can skip your mental images of me doing technical climbs and
bagging summits, unless that summit is on an Interstate or a state
highway and technical means "stick shift or automatic".

[4] Just don't look for me to make a decision about it.

/dps


--
"That's a good sort of hectic, innit?"

" Very much so, and I'd recommend the haggis wontons."
-njm

[Snidely]

Remember Tuesday, when Snidely asked plainitively:

> Remember when bill van bragged outrageously? That was Monday:
>> In article <UIudnRh6SroGt-zO...@vex.net>,
>> m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:
>>
>>> David Kleinecke:
>>>> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't much
>>>> thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I mean
>>>> looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>>>
>>> What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)
>>
>> Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
>> children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves breaking
>> on rocky shores, that's something else entirely.
>
> I'll take mountains [1] , beaches

[5]

> , crashing waves, green-lit forests [2],
> desert dunes, desert rocks, sandstone hills, gullies, .... I'm not sure I've
> experience a corn- or wheat-field on an Iowa or Kansas scale, so I'll
> withhold voting on that.
>
> [1] Canadian Rockies preferred to Colorado, but I won't exclude any. I won't
> exclude Yunque, for instance. [3]
>
> [2] of douglas fir, cedar/spruce, pine, oak, maple. I still need to
> investigate larch and poplar.
>
> [3] You can skip your mental images of me doing technical climbs and bagging
> summits, unless that summit is on an Interstate or a state highway and
> technical means "stick shift or automatic".
>
> [4] Just don't look for me to make a decision about it.

[5] My archetypical beach is found in Lincoln County, Oregon. However,
I've splashed briefly on the shore of Puerto Rico and Puerto Vallarta,
and enjoyed both. I have not tried Miami or New Ahleens, and my one
trip to Houston was in November (early "winter").

/dps

--
"I am not given to exaggeration, and when I say a thing I mean it"
_Roughing It_, Mark Twain

[Snidely]

On Thursday, Don Phillipson stated:

> "Berkeley Brett" <roya...@gmail.com> wrote in message

> No direct link between beauty and species or genes has been measured.
> Some famous examples (e.g. peacock eyes, bowers built by bower
> birds) have for a century been suggested as evidence that beauty
> influences evolution, but the gap remains.

We are programmed to be attracted to a possible mate. Peacock "eyes"
(I take it you mean the image on the tail feathers) seem to be a result
of a cycle of enhancing a characteristic that attracts mates.

We are also programmed to be attracted to food sources and to shelter.

We are programmed to detect patterns.

I suspect that perceiving "natural beauty" is product of this
programming. It isn't of itself an evolutionary advantage, but rather
a benign side effecgt of [one or more] evolutionary advantages. The
details of what we find pleasing in nature is influenced by culture and
experience, but the mechanism is innate.

Observe that grooming (the verb, not the noun) is important to birds
and mammals for health (and proper functioning of layers that provide
insulation and that may also need to participate in fluid dynamics).
Is it surprising that simulated grooming elicits a positive response?

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

On 2014-05-08 10:29:51 +0200, Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@g{oogle}mail.com> said:

> Jerry Friedman:
>
>> Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong
>> cultural component.
>
> Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
> ery culture developed. For an examle, the thick
> black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs
> is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun.

Black? I would have thought that white would work better.

> This
> I learned from a tale by Ivan Efremov, of whose
> views on the subject I shall write in more detail in
> this very thread if time permits.

--
athel

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

Likewise. There is a reason why I live on the Mediterranean. Well,
there are several, but the climate is one of them. (I did meet someone
from Manchester once, however, who was puzzled that anyone would
abandon the sybaritic life of Birmingham in order to move to the South
of France.)


--
athel

[Anton Shepelev]

Athel Cornish-Bowden to Anton Shepelev:

> > For an examle, the thick black make-up on the
> > eyelids excercised by tuaregs is useful in
> > protecting the eyes from the sun.
>
> Black? I would have thought that white would work
> better.

Black transmits less light and produces less reflec-
tions. Yes, it does imbide more infrared heat, but
protection from the visible light seems to be the
priority for the eyes.

[Dr. HotSalt]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 1:40:41 AM UTC-7, Snidely wrote:
> On Thursday, Don Phillipson stated:
>
> > "Berkeley Brett" <roya...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> > No direct link between beauty and species or genes has been measured.
> > Some famous examples (e.g. peacock eyes, bowers built by bower
> > birds) have for a century been suggested as evidence that beauty
> > influences evolution, but the gap remains.
>
> We are programmed to be attracted to a possible mate. Peacock "eyes"
> (I take it you mean the image on the tail feathers) seem to be a result
> of a cycle of enhancing a characteristic that attracts mates.
>
> We are also programmed to be attracted to food sources and to shelter.
>
> We are programmed to detect patterns.
>
> I suspect that perceiving "natural beauty" is product of this
> programming. It isn't of itself an evolutionary advantage, but rather
> a benign side effecgt of [one or more] evolutionary advantages. The
> details of what we find pleasing in nature is influenced by culture and
> experience, but the mechanism is innate.

I think you have something here. I would add that tropisms to sensory data patterns can include as well tropism to a lack of pattern, or rather to irregularity as well as regularity (as in regularity of facial features). We find environmental features with no apparent symmetry, or more often fractal symmetry- shorelines, mountain ranges, forest plant distribution for instance- as attractive as symmetrical or other regularly patterned objects of our attention, like birdsong.

What makes us as individuals make us decide whether we like them or not is as others have said, most likely cultural/upbringing related.

> Observe that grooming (the verb, not the noun) is important to birds
> and mammals for health (and proper functioning of layers that provide
> insulation and that may also need to participate in fluid dynamics).
> Is it surprising that simulated grooming elicits a positive response?

In social species, of course not. Might help to explain mating rituals in self-grooming solitary species from spiders to tigers too- a suitor has to trigger a tropism in a prospective mate in order to not just avoid being attacked, but to subsequently take liberties not otherwise permitted. What makes the prospect decide to like the tropism-inducing ritual is not cultural by definition, yes? What might it be, then?


Dr. HotSalt

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

On Tue, 13 May 2014 11:43:29 +0200, Athel Cornish-Bowden
<athe...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

>On 2014-05-08 10:29:51 +0200, Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@g{oogle}mail.com> said:
>
>> Jerry Friedman:
>>
>>> Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong
>>> cultural component.
>>
>> Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
>> ery culture developed. For an examle, the thick
>> black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs
>> is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun.
>
>Black? I would have thought that white would work better.
>

The substance used is Kohl. It is used in many parts of the world as a
cosmetic and for various other reasons:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohl_%28cosmetics%29

India ... mothers would apply kohl to their infants' eyes soon
after birth. Some did this to "strengthen the child's eyes", and
others believed it could prevent the child from being cursed by the
evil eye.

Middle East and North Africa

Kohl was originally used as protection against eye
ailments.[citation needed] There was also a belief that darkening
around the eyes would protect one from the harsh rays of the
sun.[citation needed]

>> This
>> I learned from a tale by Ivan Efremov, of whose
>> views on the subject I shall write in more detail in
>> this very thread if time permits.

--

Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

[More}

Usage of kohl eye paint in the Horn of Africa dates to the ancient
kingdom of Punt.[4] Somali and Ethiopian women have long applied
kohl (kuul) for cosmetic purposes as well as to cleanse the eyes, to
ward off malevolent spirits, and to protect the eyes from the sun's
rays.
[etc.]

Kohl seems sometimes to have oil added. If the oil gives the mixture a
shininess the mixture might reflect sunlight regardless of its colour.

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 5:43:29 AM UTC-4, athel...@yahoo wrote:
> On 2014-05-08 10:29:51 +0200, Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@g{oogle}mail.com> said:

> > Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
> > ery culture developed. For an examle, the thick
> > black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs
> > is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun.
>
> Black? I would have thought that white would work better.

Do football players in your countries not smear black pigment
just below their eyes to lessen glare/reflection?

And kohl is hardly limited to Tuaregs.

[CDB]

It frightens me too (though on the basis of far less experience than
yours); that's what I like about it. What I like about beaches is not
the stretch of sand or shingle, but the water that dances with it:
moving, changing, dark and shining, full of sound and presence.

[LFS]

Poetic, that. I like it.

We've been on quite a few cruises: immense stretches of ocean where
there is nothing to see but the water and the sky are mesmerising and
quite terrifying, especially in contrast to what goes on on a cruise
ship, and that's one of the great attractions for me.

And I love looking at mountains. In a few weeks time, I shall be
drinking in the inspiring views in the Bernese Oberland.

Obaue: "drinking in" seems a very worn-out expression but I can't think
of anything that quite matches the exact feeling.


--
Laura (emulate St George for email)

[Mack A. Damia]

The Pacific Ocean is my next door neighbor about fifty feet away. I
go to sleep every night to the sound of the waves lapping the shore.

I have never thought of it as being frightening. Rather magnificent
and oh so soothing.

--

[Anton Shepelev]

Peter T. Daniels:
> Athel Cornish-Bowden:
> > Anton Shepelev:

> >
> > > Only because of the specific conditions in

> > > which every culture developed. For an examle,
> > > the thick black make-up on the eyelids excer-

> > > cised by tuaregs is useful in protecting the
> > > eyes from the sun.
> >
> > Black? I would have thought that white would
> > work better.
>
> Do football players in your countries not smear
> black pigment just below their eyes to lessen
> glare/reflection?

In my one country, footbal is what it is called -- a
game where the ball is handled by the feet, and
no -- our football players don't apply black makeup.

> And kohl is hardly limited to Tuaregs.

I didn't say it was, but thanks to Peter Duncanson
for the info on kohl!

[Anton Shepelev]

Peter Duncanson:
> Athel Cornish-Bowden:
> > Anton Shepelev:

> >
> > > Only because of the specific conditions in

> > > which every culture developed. For an examle,
> > > the thick black make-up on the eyelids excer-

> > > cised by tuaregs is useful in protecting the
> > > eyes from the sun.
> >
> > Black? I would have thought that white would
> > work better.
>
> The substance used is Kohl. It is used in many
> parts of the world as a cosmetic and for various
> other reasons:
>

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohl_(cosmetics)
>
> India ... mothers would apply kohl to their in-

> fants' eyes soon after birth. Some did this to

> "strengthen the child's eyes", and others be-

> lieved it could prevent the child from being
> cursed by the evil eye.
>
> Middle East and North Africa
>
> Kohl was originally used as protection against
> eye ailments.[citation needed] There was also a

> belief that darkening around the eyes would pro-
> tect one from the harsh rays of the sun.[cita-

> tion needed]
> [More}
> Usage of kohl eye paint in the Horn of Africa
> dates to the ancient kingdom of Punt.[4] Somali

> and Ethiopian women have long applied kohl (ku-

> ul) for cosmetic purposes as well as to cleanse

> the eyes, to ward off malevolent spirits[1], and

> to protect the eyes from the sun's rays.

It agrees well with Efremov's viewpoint. Eye dis-
eases were surely considered "cursed by the evil
eye", and kohl helps prevent them. The healthy
practice became the norm, and the norm became the
standard of beauty. According to Efremov, and I
agree with him in this point, beauty is the subcon-
scious feeling of perfection, and perfection is ut-
ter expediency (think optimization).

The Soviet theory of invention, based on Marxian di-
alectics, says roughly the same: an invention occurs
when a compromise is reconcilied (while engineering
is all about choosing an optimum within a compro-
mise: mass/cost, speed/armour, etc.). In order to
reconcile a compromise, new ways of interaction be-
tween the parts must be found and taken advantage
of, which is nothing but increasing the supremacy of
the whole over its parts. I am as brief here as I
can be, omitting even the example of my own inven-
tion...
____________________
1. In his seven-volume magnum opus "Christ"
(http://tinyurl.com/l8l4aoa), Russian ency-
clopaedist Nikolay Morozov remarks that sick peo-
ple were considered posessed by an evil 'spirit'
(the Russian 'dukh', of the same root as the Rus-
sian 'air', 'perfume', and 'soul'; or the English
for volatile, and consequently strong-smelling,
liquid), because they literally stunk, or
"smelled ill".

[bill van]

In article <mn.68567de559b45499.127094@snitoo>,

Snidely <snide...@gmail.com> wrote:

> [5] My archetypical beach is found in Lincoln County, Oregon. However,
> I've splashed briefly on the shore of Puerto Rico and Puerto Vallarta,
> and enjoyed both. I have not tried Miami or New Ahleens, and my one
> trip to Houston was in November (early "winter").
>

I've been on some of those Oregon beaches. Good variety: some light and
some dark sand, some pebbly. I particularly like the ones with bizarre
rock formations a little way offshore.
--
bill

[J. J. Lodder]

Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.

No, in real mean spirits, thank you.
So just a question to pester a simple evolutionst:

If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?

Jan

[J. J. Lodder]

Peter Moylan <pe...@pmoylan.org.invalid> wrote:

> On 09/05/14 01:35, Don Phillipson wrote:
>
> > We nowadays use "evolution" in two literal senses. Darwin's was principally
> > emergence in time of a new species that did not exist before year X or
> > generation N. Nowadays we use it both in this sense (e.g. evolution of
> > antibiotic-resistant organisms) and in another, to mean change caused
> > by differences in genes or genetic responses to an altered environment.
>
> I don't see those as different senses. Darwin perceived a two-part
> operation:
> 1. Variations appear, by random mutation or just in
> the normal range of variation in that species.
> 2. Individuals with the more favourable characteristics
> went on to have more offspring than those with the
> less favourable characteristics.
>
> He saw this, I think, as a more-or-less continuous process. What we've
> discovered since Darwin's time is the importance of an altered
> environment, which can often produce a punctuated equilibrium. Many of
> the variations that a species exhibits are survival-neutral, providing
> neither an advantage or a disadvantage in the existing environment.
> Then, when the environment changes, it turns out that some things that
> were previously neutral are suddenly important.

You shouldn't take Gould's propaganda to seriously.
Punctuated equilibrium is still a continuous process,

Jan

[Mack A. Damia]

Define "beautiful".

--

[Horace LaBadie]

In article <1lllf7m.1bo...@de-ster.xs4all.nl>,

nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J. Lodder) wrote:

Mankind evolved plastic surgery for that.

[J. J. Lodder]

Whatever is sexually selected for.
After a hundred thousand years of it
there should be results,

Jan

[J. J. Lodder]

So, a failure of evolution,

Jan

[J. J. Lodder]

Jerry Friedman <jerry_f...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> On Thursday, May 8, 2014 2:29:51 AM UTC-6, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> > Jerry Friedman:
> >
> > > Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong
> > > cultural component.
> >

> > Only because of the specific conditions in which ev-
> > ery culture developed.
>
> Only? Fashions in thinness and fatness for women and in facial hair for
> men seem to change without much regard for conditions.

>
> > For an examle, the thick

> > black make-up on the eyelids excercised by tuaregs

> > is useful in protecting the eyes from the sun.

> ...

>
> Berkeley Brett was talking about the beauty of nature as distinct from
> the beauty of human beings. It's obvious why we evolved a sense of
> the latter.

Yes, but is it nature or nurture?

Jan

[Arcadian Rises]

On Thursday, May 8, 2014 12:29:41 AM UTC-4, Jerry Friedman wrote:

> On 5/7/14 11:23 AM, Berkeley Brett wrote:
>
> > I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>
> >
>

> > Colorful sunsets, birds singing wildly in the morning, the moon on a misty night, a field of many kinds of flowers, the fragrance of those flowers, magnificent mountains, flowing rivers & the sounds of flowing rivers -- most of us have some kind of aesthetic (or even mystical) experience when contemplate some of these things.
>
> >
>
> > Though not all things in nature are beautiful, a great many things are.
>
> >
>
> > Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty (perhaps I should say "natural beauties") though the process of evolution? If so, what kind of survival advantages have these responses given us?
>
> >
>
> > Or, do you suppose this sense of the beautiful is a simple grace of Nature, exquisite but evolutionarily indifferent?
>
> ...
>
>
>
> One of the best poems I wrote in college was on this subject, and
>
> plumped for the evolutionary answer. I've lost it, which allows me to
>
> ignore the flaws it undoubtedly had.

>
>
>
> Taste in natural beauty seems to have a strong cultural component.

Absolutely!

I remember an old movie (Planet of the Apes?) where two apes were commenting about how ugly the humans were.

Also, a strong chronological component. Whatever our ancestors admired esthetically, we may find naive, or even kitschy. And vice-versa: remember the outrage brought about by the Eiffel Tower?



>
> believe that before the "sublime" was invented, mountains and deserts
>
> were often considered horrible and ugly. Melville's /The Encantadas, or
>
> Enchanted Isles/ describes the Galapagos that way.
>
>
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=pFB1UOHRlvYC&pg=PA202
>
>
>
> --
>
> Jerry Friedman

[Arcadian Rises]

On Wednesday, May 7, 2014 1:23:31 PM UTC-4, Berkeley Brett wrote:
> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>
>
>
> Colorful sunsets, birds singing wildly in the morning, the moon on a misty night, a field of many kinds of flowers, the fragrance of those flowers, magnificent mountains, flowing rivers & the sounds of flowing rivers -- most of us have some kind of aesthetic (or even mystical) experience when contemplate some of these things.
>
>
>
> Though not all things in nature are beautiful, a great many things are.
>
>
>
> Do you think we've developed the sense of natural beauty (perhaps I should say "natural beauties") though the process of evolution? If so, what kind of survival advantages have these responses given us?
>
>
>
> Or, do you suppose this sense of the beautiful is a simple grace of Nature, exquisite but evolutionarily indifferent?
>
>
>

> Thank you for any thoughts you may care to share....
>
>

I find the notion of "(a)esthetic progress" very intriguing. As a term of art (i.e. shop talk) I learned in a copyright class, it means quantity: more theaters, more paintings, more poems etc.

As for the quality (better poems, etc) ...de gustibus...nil nisi bene.

[Mack A. Damia]

On Tue, 13 May 2014 22:14:50 +0200, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.

Lodder) wrote:

>Mack A. Damia <mybaco...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 13 May 2014 20:12:44 +0200, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.
>> Lodder) wrote:
>>
>> >Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>> >
>> >No, in real mean spirits, thank you.
>> >So just a question to pester a simple evolutionst:
>> >
>> >If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?
>>
>> Define "beautiful".
>
>Whatever is sexually selected for.
>After a hundred thousand years of it
>there should be results,

It changes from culture to culture, but I have always said that there
are a great number of men who will bonk anything be it man, woman or
beast.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqNMjZpSbnU

"Just drop 'em, boy!"

--

[Peter Moylan]

On 13/05/14 07:38, bill van wrote:

> Ditto on the mountains, and on boring sand beaches with too many people,
> children and dogs on them. But a wild ocean beach with big waves

> breaking on rocky shores, that's something else entirely. This one I
> have visited many times on the west coast of Vancouver Island:
>
> http://www.longbeachmaps.com/images01/bad-move-wave.jpg
>
> (It is advisable to stay a safe distance back, unlike the people on the
> left-hand edge of this photograph. I don't think they were swept away,
> but people sometimes are.)

Drownings of people who are fishing from the rocks are a common
occurrence in these parts. Amazingly, people keep going back to the
places that are known to have a bad record.

In the most recent case, a woman was washed off the rocks and two men
dived in to save her. A wave washed her back to shore, so she survived,
but her two would-be rescuers drowned.

--
Peter Moylan, Newcastle, NSW, Australia. http://www.pmoylan.org
For an e-mail address, see my web page.

[Mike L]

On Tue, 13 May 2014 07:13:33 -0700, Mack A. Damia
<mybaco...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On Tue, 13 May 2014 08:33:34 -0400, CDB <belle...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On 12/05/2014 6:53 PM, Mike L wrote:
>>> m...@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote:
>>>> David Kleinecke:
>>
>>>>> Perhaps I have lived along coasts too long but beaches don't
>>>>> much thrill me.... Mountains on the other hand thrill me... I
>>>>> mean looking at mountains - not climbing them.
>>
>>>> What He Said. (Well, in my case excluding the first clause.)
>>
>>> Mountains for me, too. I can find interest on a beach, and I love
>>> rivers; but I don't really like the sea all that much. I think it
>>> frightens me.
>>
>>It frightens me too (though on the basis of far less experience than
>>yours); that's what I like about it. What I like about beaches is not
>>the stretch of sand or shingle, but the water that dances with it:
>>moving, changing, dark and shining, full of sound and presence.

Nice. See also the Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes.

>
>The Pacific Ocean is my next door neighbor about fifty feet away. I
>go to sleep every night to the sound of the waves lapping the shore.
>
>I have never thought of it as being frightening. Rather magnificent
>and oh so soothing.

I'm a child of the South Pacific: but I can only take so much.

--
Mike

[R H Draney]

Arcadian Rises filted:
>
>
>I remember an old movie (Planet of the Apes?) where two apes were commentin=

>g about how ugly the humans were.

Don't remember that specifically, but the simian aesthetic applied to humans had
at least two explicit references:

(1) When Taylor bids farewell to his ape friends, he asks Zira for a kiss for
luck...she concedes, but not without observing "but you're so damned ugly!"...

(2) A bit before, when he shaves off the beard he's acquired in captivity,
Cornelius says that "somehow it makes you look less intelligent"....r


--
Me? Sarcastic?
Yeah, right.

[Horace LaBadie]

In article <1lllutk.zse...@de-ster.xs4all.nl>,

nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J. Lodder) wrote:

> Horace LaBadie <hlab...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <1lllf7m.1bo...@de-ster.xs4all.nl>,
> > nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J. Lodder) wrote:
> >
> > > Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
> > >
> > > No, in real mean spirits, thank you.
> > > So just a question to pester a simple evolutionst:
> > >
> > > If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?
> > >
> > > Jan
> >
> > Mankind evolved plastic surgery for that.
>
> So, a failure of evolution,
>
> Jan

There are more plastic surgeons every year. So it must be an
evolutionary success.

[Mack A. Damia]

What? Not a fan of Charles Kingsley?

Report to Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid immediately!

--

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 10:25:33 AM UTC-4, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> Peter T. Daniels:
> > Athel Cornish-Bowden:
> > > Anton Shepelev:

> > > > Only because of the specific conditions in
> > > > which every culture developed. For an examle,
> > > > the thick black make-up on the eyelids excer-
> > > > cised by tuaregs is useful in protecting the
> > > > eyes from the sun.
> > > Black? I would have thought that white would
> > > work better.
>
> > Do football players in your countries not smear
> > black pigment just below their eyes to lessen
> > glare/reflection?
>
> In my one country,

Athel, to whom I was responding, is an Englishman living in France.

> footbal is what it is called -- a
> game where the ball is handled by the feet, and
> no -- our football players don't apply black makeup.

So seeing clearly isn't important in that game?

[Jack Campin]

>> If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?

> Mankind evolved plastic surgery for that.

Womankind evolved beer first, and once they persuaded mankind
to drink enough of it the plastic surgery was unnecessary.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
e m a i l : j a c k @ c a m p i n . m e . u k
Jack Campin, 11 Third Street, Newtongrange, Midlothian EH22 4PU, Scotland
mobile 07800 739 557 <http://www.campin.me.uk> Twitter: JackCampin

[Reinhold {Rey} Aman]

PeteY "AUE's Idiot #1" Daniels asked:

>
> Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>
>> our football players don't apply black makeup.
>>
> So seeing clearly isn't important in that game?
>

What an incredible asshole!

--
~~~ Reinhold {Rey} Aman ~~~

[Robert Bannister]

On 13/05/2014 7:57 am, bill van wrote:

> Agreed. I'm not a cruise ship sort of person, but I've taken a ferry
> once and an Alaska cruise once through the Inside Passage, a series of
> passages and inlets between the B.C. mainland and various nearby
> islands. Scenery is comparable, and marvellous when the weather
> cooperates:
>
> <http://travelbritishcolumbia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/inside-passa
> ge-british-columbia-730x485.jpg>
>
> http://tinyurl.com/lceuwlx
>

Your cruise ship must have been very high off the water for you to be
able to take that shot.
--
Robert Bannister - 1940-71 SE England
1972-now W Australia

[Robert Bannister]

On 13/05/2014 8:04 pm, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:

> Usage of kohl eye paint in the Horn of Africa dates to the ancient
> kingdom of Punt.

I knew that stuff about poling boats would leak into another thread
eventually.

[Robert Bannister]

It's the acting that's important since there is virtually no scoring.

[Robert Bannister]

And after kohl came the many-billion-dollar cosmetics industry. Even
women who don't use make-up spend more than they think on various
lotions, creams and potions for softening the skin or adding "bounce" to
their hair. In the meantime, men, who had been muscular and fit even
though short-lived, started getting fat and flabby and living longer.
Evolution had stopped.

[David Kleinecke]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 1:26:21 AM UTC-7, Snidely wrote:
>
> My archetypical beach is found in Lincoln County, Oregon. However,
> I've splashed briefly on the shore of Puerto Rico and Puerto Vallarta,
> and enjoyed both. I have not tried Miami or New Ahleens, and my one
> trip to Houston was in November (early "winter").

And you've never been to Pismo ?

[Mack A. Damia]

Some of the beaches in the Bahama islands are beautiful. I spent a
few days on Eleuthera. At the northern tip is Spanish Wells. About
1500 residents, descendants of the original Eleutheran adventurers
from Bermuda. They all make a living from the sea.

It is one of the few white settlements in the Bahamas, and you notice
right away that all the residents tend to resemble one another.

The sea is a gorgeous color of aquamarine. I have never seen anything
like it elsewhere.

--

[David Kleinecke]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 3:52:53 PM UTC-7, Mack A. Damia wrote:

> What? Not a fan of Charles Kingsley?
> Report to Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid immediately!

OT: One of peak experiences of my life happened with The Water
Babies. I read the sentences (quoted from memory) "A wiser man
than Mr. John Locke once lived. His name was Plato son of
Megacles." This was the first time in my life I ever heard of
John Locke or of Plato. But the notion of such wisdom boggled
my young mind.

Plato is still remembered and Locke is almost forgotten - so
in this, if nowhere else, Kingsley was right.

[Skitt]

The best beach I ever enjoyed was the White Beach in Boracay (in the
Philippines).
http://www.phil-ip-pines.com/image-files/boracay-beaches.jpg
--
Skitt (SF Bay Area)
http://home.comcast.net/~skitt99/main.html

[snide...@gmail.com]

101nce

/dps "at the posted speed"

[Jerry Friedman]

As I said above, nurture obviously has a lot to do with it. The
cross-cultural existence of the idea of sexual attractiveness seems to
suggest that the tendency to judge it is innate, even if the standards
are cultural and individual.

--
Jerry Friedman

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

It is, but there doesn't seem to be a problem with light reflection from
the skin below the eyes.

--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

In genetic/evolutionary terms nothing has changed. Men who have the
potential to be muscular and fit are just not realising that potential.
The potential is passed on to their offspring who can in turn choose to
be muscular and fit or fat and flabby. The increased length of life
comes from applied science: nutritional and medical.

Evolution hasn't stopped. We humans, like all other species, will at
some time be subject to a change in our environment in which people with
some genetic traits have a better survival and reproductive outcome than
others.

[CDB]

On 13/05/2014 2:12 PM, J. J. Lodder wrote:
> Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:

>> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.

> No, in real mean spirits, thank you. So just a question to pester a
> simple evolutionst:

> If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?

Sorry if this was sent unfinished by some unintended button.

Men are notoriously willing to evolute with many women; women invest so
much more in the reproductive process that they must be the ones who
choose. Why aren't all men beautiful? Could be the triumph of culture
over biology.

I suppose I should have said "males" and "females".

[Peter Moylan]

On 14/05/14 04:12, J. J. Lodder wrote:
> Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
>
> No, in real mean spirits, thank you.
> So just a question to pester a simple evolutionst:
>
> If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?

There was a girl in my class at school who was, I thought,
extraordinarily ugly. Then I discovered that a friend of mine was
attracted to her.

We learn things in school.

[J. J. Lodder]

Mack A. Damia <mybaco...@hotmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 13 May 2014 22:14:50 +0200, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.
> Lodder) wrote:
>
> >Mack A. Damia <mybaco...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Tue, 13 May 2014 20:12:44 +0200, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.
> >> Lodder) wrote:
> >>
> >> >Berkeley Brett <roya...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> >
> >> >> I hope you are all well & in good spirits.
> >> >
> >> >No, in real mean spirits, thank you.
> >> >So just a question to pester a simple evolutionst:
> >> >
> >> >If evolution is true, why aren't all women beautiful?
> >>
> >> Define "beautiful".
> >
> >Whatever is sexually selected for.
> >After a hundred thousand years of it
> >there should be results,
>
> It changes from culture to culture, but I have always said that there
> are a great number of men who will bonk anything be it man, woman or
> beast.

Doesn't matter, individuals don't count in evolution.
It is the statistical effect over many generations that matters.
Either beauty confers a selective advantage,
and then it should have worked by now,
or it doesn't, and then all those tales about sexual selection
that you find in evolution textbooks are bunk,

Jan

[Mack A. Damia]

On Wed, 14 May 2014 21:28:12 +0200, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.

But your defintion of "beauty" changes from culture to culture and
over thousands of years.

Used to be that the ability to bear children was desirable in all
cultures, not so much in some anymore (I think).

And "beauty" is in the eye of the beholder. When I was a young man, I
found the plain-jane virginal type to be attractive; I guess I still
do, but they don't get my juices flowing as they once did.

Others like the full, voluptuous babe who looks as if she hops from
one bed to the next. As far as breast implants are concerned, the
bigger the better. Same with lip collagen injections (if I have that
right) the fuller the better, but to me, many look hideous; however,
many many love that kind of look.

Sounds as if you are on a theoretical quest, though, if you say
"individuals don't count". Then whose beauty are we talking about?

And how do you know that beauty hasn't worked? The most successful
and handsome of men usually get the pick of the litter (no offense,
ladies). Usually if you find a handsome, successful man, you will
find a beautiful woman, and beauty does have some parameters - a
symmetrical face, certain eyes, nose, hair, ears and mouth. A well
proportioned body - but that is in our culture. Some cultures prize
certain aspects of physical features; hips and butts seem to capture
the focus in many.

--

[Mike L]

An interesting case, Chas was. One of the Christian Socialists,
pro-Darwin, idiotically anti-Catholic, etc. The final big scene of his
over-long but readable _Westward Ho!_ seems to have been written with
the cinema in mind -- although there was no cinema.

--
Mike.

[Mike L]

I thought that application of camouflage cream was simply a customary
ritual with no material function. In the few cases I've seen, they
didn't seem to put it round their eyes.

--
Mike.

[Skitt]

On 5/14/2014 3:33 PM, Mike L wrote:
> "Peter Duncanson [BrE]" <ma...@peterduncanson.net> wrote:
>> "Peter T. Daniels" <gram...@verizon.net> wrote:
>>> On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 10:25:33 AM UTC-4, Anton Shepelev wrote:
>>>> Peter T. Daniels:

>>>>> Do football players in your countries not smear
>>>>> black pigment just below their eyes to lessen
>>>>> glare/reflection?
>>>>
>>>> In my one country,
>>>
>>> Athel, to whom I was responding, is an Englishman living in France.
>>>
>>>> footbal is what it is called -- a
>>>> game where the ball is handled by the feet, and
>>>> no -- our football players don't apply black makeup.
>>>
>>> So seeing clearly isn't important in that game?
>>
>> It is, but there doesn't seem to be a problem with light reflection from
>> the skin below the eyes.
>
> I thought that application of camouflage cream was simply a customary
> ritual with no material function. In the few cases I've seen, they
> didn't seem to put it round their eyes.
>

For fat people with bulging cheeks the sun reflects off the top of those
cheeks into their eyes.

[Tony Cooper]

It's part of the "game face" ritual. Here's a grandson from last year
with war paint:

http://tonycooper.smugmug.com/BabeRuthBaseball2013/i-NNCGZm4/0/X2/2013-03-21-18-19-49-367-X2.jpg
--
Tony Cooper - Orlando FL

[David Kleinecke]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2014 9:47:28 PM UTC-7, Peter Moylan wrote:

> There was a girl in my class at school who was, I thought,
> extraordinarily ugly. Then I discovered that a friend of mine was
> attracted to her.
>
> We learn things in school.

I have known at least two different women in my life of whom I
would say "She is so homely she is beautiful.".

I have always been intrigued by the fact that it isn't so much
"looks" as mannerisms that makes one attractive to potential
partners.

[James Hogg]

Was the title chosen to misle today's Americans into thinking that the
novel is about a meretricious lady?

--
James

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

Ah. That might point to the reason. Fat people don't play soccer
professionally or as high-level amateurs. Being fat is a serious
disadvantage in soccer. The game requires continuous running around with
only brief gaps.

[John Ritson]

In article <pth6n9lcuvvq9onvb...@4ax.com>, Peter Duncanson
[BrE] <ma...@peterduncanson.net> writes

West Indian cricketer Shivnarine Chanderpaul is noted for wearing black
stickers just below his eyes to reduce light reflection.

--
John Ritson

[Mack A. Damia]

On Thu, 15 May 2014 07:55:07 +0200, James Hogg <Jas....@gOUTmail.com>
wrote:

You're confusing "Wayward Ho".

--

[Tony Cooper]

The black can be applied with a grease pencil or as stickers:

http://www.ebay.com/bhp/eye-black-baseball

[Mike L]

Those muchachos are not only lucky to be so apparently talented, but
also to have an expert photographer for a grandfather.

--
Mike.

[Mike L]

Could be. One wonders if Hereward was awake to such delights.

--
Mike.

[Jenn]

You aren't a proud grandpa, are you? :)

--
Jenn

[LFS]

<giggle>

--
Laura (emulate St George for email)