If you're not in the know, this is all you need to know about Ladder Theory, men have a metaphorical ladder for attraction, the more they want to have sex with someone, the higher up on the ladder they are. Women have two ladders, one for people they want to remain friends with, and one for actual sexual attraction. Also, men rate potentials by attraction and attainability, women rate potentials by a combination of attraction, (sub-divided into novelty, looks, and competition) money/power, and a small percentage is dedicated to things women say they want in men, but don't really: the usual sense of humor, sensitivity, intelligence, etc.
Of course when you hear a theory like this, most people's initial reactions would be to falsify it in favor of fleshing out the more complicated nature of human relationships, but I usually stop myself in these cases, and realize I don't have a better way of putting this subject into perspective, so who am I to destroy the pre-existing perspective?
I usually think this way, because I like to entertain people's ideas on things, see if they work at all, to see if I can gleam some sort of greater truth or insight on things. I have to do this, because if I actually maintain a paradigm, I find more often than not that I become less able to empathize with people's beliefs and thoughts that might oppose the viewpoint I hold. I usually associate this type of reaction as arrogance and ignorance, disconnection and generally becomes a problem, because even if you're right, it doesn't prove anything to anyone unless you have a clear agenda in mind.
So this intrigued me even more, because I just surrendered to the fact that more likely than not, the world will never agree on virtually anything, nor should they, lest they alienate everyone that ventures further outside the box. That is to say, forward thinking absolutely demands acceptance of all ideas, wrong or not, but truth isn't something that should be maintained, but rather recognized and appreciated. This viewpoint isn't all that negative actually, it actually lends itself to possibilities of more friendly intellectual adventures, suddenly ultimate truth isn't the aim, the objective rather is to push envelopes and expand the mind to encompass more and more, and that doesn't seem like such a bad thing, because in the end, the more a man expands his mind, the larger his capacity to understand the nature of truth anyway, but instead of becoming a fixated paradigm, it becomes a general intuitive understanding of how truth operates, and what we can learn from it.
So, my thoughts on ladder theory are playful, really, I can't say anything bad about it one way or the other. Sure, there may be more to human nature and relationships than perceived by ladder theory, but I couldn't honestly tell you, based on my experiences, that women care more about intelligence and personality than looks and power, just as I couldn't honestly say I would rather be in a relationship with a mentally stimulating and fun-loving woman than a drop-dead gorgeous chick. It hurts to say it, spite has a funny effect on people, and while mentally engaging myself is one of my life's ultimate pursuits, you simply can't deny human nature and take yourself seriously.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Chaos Theory Applied to Human Interaction
I came across a theory today that came to a dead-end, but I found the premise to be profoundly intriguing regardless, so I'm posting it here, just cuz, k?
The idea came to me while laying down on a couch and fantasizing about the idea of mind-control via suggestion. Don't ask me why I was thinking about that, just know that I was thinking about it in a philosophical sense because the concept came to me while I was writing a story. But then, out of the blue, the idea seemed plausible, in fact, not only did it seem plausible, it seemed obvious, obvious to the degree that everyone on this planet is already mind-controlling everybody else without ever even quite realizing it.
Not to discredit free will, that's not what I'm getting at here, the thing is, it's aaaalmost impossible to gauge people's reactions, let alone the outcome of social situations, but the power of suggestion could conceivably allow virtually anyone to get virtually anything they wanted should they play their cards right. Sure, this is common knowledge to some degree, but the process I stumbled upon intrigued me enough to write this down, so just hear me out, alright?
First, the world is a complicated place, and operates at a level of detail so miniscule and undetected that we as humans willingly give into the idea of chaos theory, that forces so small and seemingly random are at work that even the smallest details can escalate into something big and unforseeable. This happens all the time, at any given situation, at any given time, the game can change. So if you accept this and you react accordingly and remain on top of the changing circumstances, you should be ahead of the curve and be able to 'ride the wave' in a sense, and be able to shift any circumstance to your advantage. This too, is fairly common knowledge, many martial arts are based off this principle, and I'm sure the world of self-help books is familiar with it as well, but there's more.
Human intuition is a strong ability, a person can subconsciously do things that far exceeds his own personal expectations. It's not too outside the realm of feasability for the average man to completely recite word for word a book he just read. Not likely, but possible, the circumstances and neural chemistry required to make this occur is specific at best, but human intuition does take over from time to time and usually in moments where the human is relaxed and kind of 'unaware' of his situation, which basically means the less he allows his consciousness to fuck things up, the better his subconscious is at handling a task.
So the theory I came up with is this: If a man can mentally block out virtually everything except the task at hand, he could theoretically manipulate his environment, including the consciousness of others, to work with him. The idea seemed to lend to itself fairly well, it requires a certain calm attitude and meditation to be able to fixate on present changing circumstances anyway that the subconscious should be able to do it's thing uninterrupted.
Food for thought, these are shots in the dark, maybe this is nonsense, maybe it's common knowledge, I dunno, I just thought it was interesting. :)
The idea came to me while laying down on a couch and fantasizing about the idea of mind-control via suggestion. Don't ask me why I was thinking about that, just know that I was thinking about it in a philosophical sense because the concept came to me while I was writing a story. But then, out of the blue, the idea seemed plausible, in fact, not only did it seem plausible, it seemed obvious, obvious to the degree that everyone on this planet is already mind-controlling everybody else without ever even quite realizing it.
Not to discredit free will, that's not what I'm getting at here, the thing is, it's aaaalmost impossible to gauge people's reactions, let alone the outcome of social situations, but the power of suggestion could conceivably allow virtually anyone to get virtually anything they wanted should they play their cards right. Sure, this is common knowledge to some degree, but the process I stumbled upon intrigued me enough to write this down, so just hear me out, alright?
First, the world is a complicated place, and operates at a level of detail so miniscule and undetected that we as humans willingly give into the idea of chaos theory, that forces so small and seemingly random are at work that even the smallest details can escalate into something big and unforseeable. This happens all the time, at any given situation, at any given time, the game can change. So if you accept this and you react accordingly and remain on top of the changing circumstances, you should be ahead of the curve and be able to 'ride the wave' in a sense, and be able to shift any circumstance to your advantage. This too, is fairly common knowledge, many martial arts are based off this principle, and I'm sure the world of self-help books is familiar with it as well, but there's more.
Human intuition is a strong ability, a person can subconsciously do things that far exceeds his own personal expectations. It's not too outside the realm of feasability for the average man to completely recite word for word a book he just read. Not likely, but possible, the circumstances and neural chemistry required to make this occur is specific at best, but human intuition does take over from time to time and usually in moments where the human is relaxed and kind of 'unaware' of his situation, which basically means the less he allows his consciousness to fuck things up, the better his subconscious is at handling a task.
So the theory I came up with is this: If a man can mentally block out virtually everything except the task at hand, he could theoretically manipulate his environment, including the consciousness of others, to work with him. The idea seemed to lend to itself fairly well, it requires a certain calm attitude and meditation to be able to fixate on present changing circumstances anyway that the subconscious should be able to do it's thing uninterrupted.
Food for thought, these are shots in the dark, maybe this is nonsense, maybe it's common knowledge, I dunno, I just thought it was interesting. :)
Thursday, June 18, 2009
And now for something a little different
I've been working a little in private these past few months, so I gradually forgot about updating this blog, but I suppose I've been more engaged in other activities than sorting through scientific articles and such, which I think is a shame, I've been learning about a lot, and I genuinely want to share quite a few findings and theories, since I'm still holding out hope that one day some people might actually cross this blog and find some insights here, but... I want to start over here, some things have come to light to me, and I realize what I made this blog for in the first place, so I want to revisit that.
Before I go on, know that I was inspired by this video directly before writing this. I've always been a fan of Bill Hicks, and it's hard to explain why to people because people have a tendency to think these sort of things have short explanations. Case in point, he's not the funniest comedian I know, but it's precisely the skits that don't make me laugh at all that I like the most, because there's times when the man shows you something by telling you a story, that makes you realize that there is something wrong with the way we do things, it triggers a sort of inspiration in me that wants to do something greater, and this video in particular reminded me that I don't know why I keep pursuing mediocrity. I've said it myself, many times in fact, that I find nothing particularly wrong with mediocrity, but that doesn't mean there's anything right about it either, the best is yet to come, so to speak, so keep pushing yourself, scare yourself even, do things you wouldn't normally do, and for fuck's sake, think outside the box.
That's the thing I really wanted to do, discover things people don't initially take notice of, dig into it a little deeper until you find that something special, and then share it with others. That's my mission, I suppose, but over these past couple years, I start to feel something wear down on me, and I realize that a part of me believes that these feelings are just remains of a more passionate youth. I mean, hell, I'm young, I'm really young, but this is the type of thing you can feel fade away from you and you can wonder to yourself where it's going, and you can try to fight to retain it, but what are you trying to prove, and to whom? No, there's more at stake, and everybody knows it, but people accept it, because you can only fight it for so long before it literally becomes fatiguing. It's illogical in principle to fight against the tide especially if your only basis is a small amount of hope that something good will come out of it. And then what happens? The right side of your brain turns it into a game of probability, if the probability of nothing happening heavily outweighs the possibility of some sort of transcendent experience, then fuck it, right?
Instead, I turn my focus away from myself for a second, and I think about the other people around me. I can sense it, you know, that everybody is succumbing to these kinds of feelings, letting it go for one reason and another, and I myself feel very strongly a sense of isolation in pursuing these matters. (Forgive me if this is starting to sound abstract, I tend to do that as I generalize things) I guess what I mean to say is, it seems like it'd be nicer if people felt more strongly about things, if we were allowed or perhaps even encouraged to push ourselves and think in exciting and new ways, pushing boundaries left and right, and slowly dismantled society's perception of a 'comfort zone', because I'm no fan of being alienated anymore, nobody likes putting on masks just to feel like they aren't being targeted, and people are so apt to do that that it kind of bugs me, it seems that unless you're truly doing something, unless you're genuinely making a point, a statement, you're going to be alienated.
This post is a little out of the ordinary, I know, but it's what I needed to say before continuing this blog. :)
Before I go on, know that I was inspired by this video directly before writing this. I've always been a fan of Bill Hicks, and it's hard to explain why to people because people have a tendency to think these sort of things have short explanations. Case in point, he's not the funniest comedian I know, but it's precisely the skits that don't make me laugh at all that I like the most, because there's times when the man shows you something by telling you a story, that makes you realize that there is something wrong with the way we do things, it triggers a sort of inspiration in me that wants to do something greater, and this video in particular reminded me that I don't know why I keep pursuing mediocrity. I've said it myself, many times in fact, that I find nothing particularly wrong with mediocrity, but that doesn't mean there's anything right about it either, the best is yet to come, so to speak, so keep pushing yourself, scare yourself even, do things you wouldn't normally do, and for fuck's sake, think outside the box.
That's the thing I really wanted to do, discover things people don't initially take notice of, dig into it a little deeper until you find that something special, and then share it with others. That's my mission, I suppose, but over these past couple years, I start to feel something wear down on me, and I realize that a part of me believes that these feelings are just remains of a more passionate youth. I mean, hell, I'm young, I'm really young, but this is the type of thing you can feel fade away from you and you can wonder to yourself where it's going, and you can try to fight to retain it, but what are you trying to prove, and to whom? No, there's more at stake, and everybody knows it, but people accept it, because you can only fight it for so long before it literally becomes fatiguing. It's illogical in principle to fight against the tide especially if your only basis is a small amount of hope that something good will come out of it. And then what happens? The right side of your brain turns it into a game of probability, if the probability of nothing happening heavily outweighs the possibility of some sort of transcendent experience, then fuck it, right?
Instead, I turn my focus away from myself for a second, and I think about the other people around me. I can sense it, you know, that everybody is succumbing to these kinds of feelings, letting it go for one reason and another, and I myself feel very strongly a sense of isolation in pursuing these matters. (Forgive me if this is starting to sound abstract, I tend to do that as I generalize things) I guess what I mean to say is, it seems like it'd be nicer if people felt more strongly about things, if we were allowed or perhaps even encouraged to push ourselves and think in exciting and new ways, pushing boundaries left and right, and slowly dismantled society's perception of a 'comfort zone', because I'm no fan of being alienated anymore, nobody likes putting on masks just to feel like they aren't being targeted, and people are so apt to do that that it kind of bugs me, it seems that unless you're truly doing something, unless you're genuinely making a point, a statement, you're going to be alienated.
This post is a little out of the ordinary, I know, but it's what I needed to say before continuing this blog. :)
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