Most people aren't good-looking. Is that an analytical statement, like "most people aren't in the top ten percent?" Or is it possible in theory to have a world in which most people are perceived as good-looking? To put this another way: If someone looking exactly like, say, Virginie Ledoyen would have been born into a world in which everybody looked better than her, would she be considered ugly? That obviously depends on your model of beauty:
1. Beauty is strictly relative: If you're in the (say) top ten percent as far as looks are concerned, you're considered beautiful.
2. Beauty is absolute: Some looks are perceived as good, some are not. The comparison group of all people you get across plays no role.
3. It's somewhere in between.
(1) and (2) make different predictions about the effects of mass media on utility. If (2) were true, the fact that it is now easy to look at depictions of some of the world's best-looking people in the world would be strictly utility-increasing. If (1) were true, the same fact would be utility-decreasing because the people a person can realistically hope to mate with are perceived as less attractive (because one will hardly ever meet a member of the top ten percent). The fact that people seek out depictions of good-looking people suggests that either (2) is close to the truth or that people are ignorant of how close (1) is (or, again, a bit of both). I know what Milton Friedman would say; personally, I'm undecided. And good luck designing a test to distinguish between the two.
It's the good weather. The standard deviation of people's looks skyrockets. Quite irrespective of which model is correct.
Nothing as Useful as a Bad Theory
4 years ago
3 comments:
I think it's somewhere in the middle, but closer to "absolute" than "relative."
Of course, the very perception of beauty must be relative. If everyone had 2 noses, we could find a 2-nosed person beautiful. In the real world, we'd find it hideous, and that's purely because of the arbitrary fact that everyone has 1 nose.
But once you've established those basic boundaries, I think it's mainly absolute (if that's not an oxymoron).
I say this based on a couple examples: human attractiveness and music.
Human attractiveness -- I think the normal thing to do is to perceive most people as not very attractive. There's a Seinfeld episode where Jerry asks Elaine "what percent of people are good-looking?" Elaine says 25%, and Jerry says, "No, you're way off, it's like 4 to 6%!" Elaine says, "So 95% of the population is un-date-able? Then how are all these people getting together?" Jerry says, "Alcohol." I don't really know or care whether Jerry or Elaine was right about the percentage, but I think most people would (perhaps grudgingly) admit that there's at least a bit of truth to that interchange.
Now, let's say (for the sake of argument, just to have a specific number to refer to) that the correct figure is: only 10% of people can truly be considered "beautiful."
The problem I have with saying, "That's just relative!" is: how did 10% become the figure? Is there simply a human impulse to assume that only the top 10% of anything is very good?
I don't think so, because that's not how I see music. Admittedly, if I think about all music (or let's just say Western music of the last few centuries), sure, only 10% or less of it is stuff I like so much that I actively seek it out.
But does that mean that 90+% of music strikes me as bad-to-mediocre? I don't think so. I have to draw an arbitrary line, out of necessity, just to keep track of the music I find worth my finite time to listen to. But when I stop and think about it, I can get plenty of enjoyment from a good 50% or so of the music that's out there (assuming we're not considering things that aren't even serious attempts, like people practicing their instruments or singing in the shower). In fact, I almost feel like I have to actively restrain myself from actively enjoying music too much, or I'd be so be caught up in the modern soundtrack that I wouldn't be able to focus on other stuff.
I don't even know much of this makes sense, but those are my initial thoughts.
Those are your initial thoughts? If you're planning to expand on them, you might want to consider getting a book stipend first.
Of course, your argument hinges on the assumption that if these things were largely relative, then the percentage considered attractive should be the (more or less) the same in every domain.
Those are your initial thoughts? If you're planning to expand on them, you might want to consider getting a book stipend first.
Heh, I'll get to work on that...
Of course, your argument hinges on the assumption that if these things were largely relative, then the percentage considered attractive should be the (more or less) the same in every domain.
Good point. Of course, in theory, we could have higher or lower thresholds for different kinds of things. But the more disparate they are, the less plausible it seems to say "It's all relative."
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