Oct

21

A good friend of my daughter asked me for advice on the best way of winning a man's heart on a first or second date.

I told her to use the Jennifer Flowers Gambit (the surprise erotic interlude when stopped on a drawbridge) or the Lee Raziwell gambit (listen intently to everything he says and ask about his expansive greatness), or the Leona Helmseley Gambit (pretend that there is another suiter waiting for you that evening so you have to leave at 11 pm as nothing inflames a man more than competition) but I feel that others here are more sapient in this area and others and I  would appreciate your insights.

An Anonymous  writer comments: 

My conclusion is that the number one sign of a good long term relationship with a woman is based on the quality of her relationship with her father.

I am basically engaged to be engaged with a woman, and the emotional commitment on my end happened after a dinner where much of the conversation was her describing her relationship with her dad, and how he helped her with her math and physics homework, and then they would walk to the store for a treat, etc, and just the general way that her face lights up when talking about her dad.

So anyway, that's what worked on me. Perhaps she should try it.

/my 2 cents

 Gary Rogan responds: 

This sounds like good advice and the father thing is pretty well-known, but I'm just amazed that you have made some conclusions about long-term relationships after having dated women in around ten countries over two years. 

 Pitt T. Maner III comments:

Well then there are some who base decisions and strategies on a few minutes of observation. The HFT of the dating scene—your most important impression—the first 3 seconds!
 

 José Bonamigo shares:

From Forbes Magazine:

The mating practices of human beings offer a reason for thinking beauty and intelligence might come in the same package. The logic of this covariance was explained to me years ago by a Harvard psychologist who had been reading a history of the Rothschild family. His mischievous but astute observation: The family founders, in 18th-century Frankfurt, were supremely ugly, but several generations later, after successive marriages to supremely beautiful women, the men in the family were indistinguishable from movie stars. The Rothschild effect, as you could call it, is well established in sociology research: Men everywhere want to marry beautiful women, and women everywhere want socially dominant (i.e., intelligent) husbands. When competent men marry pretty women, the couple tends to have children above average in both competence and looks. Covariance is everywhere. At the other end of the scale, too, there is a connection between looks and smarts. According to Erdal Tekin, a research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, low attractiveness ratings predict lower test scores and a greater likelihood of criminal activity.

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2005/0815/096.html

Best regards from Brazil

JB

 Gary Rogan inquires:

 After a while this degenerates into just socially dominant and not necessarily intelligent men. This modified effect can be readily seen in the Charles/Diana coupling, at least in the older Prince William. Of course how did Charles come about if the theory is correct? 

 Stefan Jovanovich comments:

Trusting Forbes magazine on stories of family history is more than a bit like buying a Degas ballerina sculpture from Toby Esterhase's Soho gallery. The notion that the 5 founding brothers were "supremely ugly" is part of the standard viciousness of the portrait of the Jewish banker as Shylock that survives to this day. There is no evidence of any special ugliness in their portraits.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salomon_Mayer_von_Rothschild

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amschel_Mayer_Rothschild

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Mayer_Rothschild

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Mayer_von_Rothschild

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Mayer_de_Rothschild

The Rothschilds married money - the Ephrussis, the Guggenheims and the Oppenheims. One suspects that, as in most things, the question of beauty was left to the beholders.

In the 19th century the great minds were certain that criminal behavior could be predicted by examining the bumps on people's heads. It should hardly be surprising that we are back to estimating future viciousness by measuring the asymmetry of human features.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrenology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smiley's_People

 Jim Wildman comments:

I would say that she can't on the first or second date. Winning someone's heart in a deep, lasting way, takes time. Anyone can fake interest for a while. What about when she is sick? When he is grumpy? When life intrudes on the lovers? Are their hearts still connected?

Granted, I haven't dated anyone for over 3 decades, but I have watched 3 daughters struggle with guys..

 Marion Dreyfus questions:

My question:

And some may find this offensive–

Does the ubiquity of pornography, specifically for the ones who purvey it day and night (I understand that equals a LOT of the male population), make falling in love with and making love with real women –including the physical aspects of affection–much more difficult than it used to be before every late-night channel offered a raft of such virtual substitutes for real relationships?

Rocky Humbert comments: 

Choices:

(a) Korean BBQ. Nothing excites a man more than watching a lady handle chopsticks amidst an open flame. Alas, times change. Woo Lae Oak has gone out of business. http://nymag.com/listings/restaurant/woo-lae-oak/

(b) Take whatever advice a parent provides, and do exactly the opposite.

(c) Que Sera, Sera

(d) http://www.datingish.com/695368212/how-to-win-your-guys-heart/

Score 1 point for picking the right answer. Deduct 1/4 point for picking the wrong answer.

 Bill Rafter writes:

When you are fishing, you need to match the bait to the fish. Striped Bass like clams, but Bluefish and Flounder will eat anything, so you might as well use bunker. Think of it this way: a young lady would wear one kind of dress on a date and a different dress when meeting the young man’s mother.

If a man is 25 or younger he is probably only interested in one thing and he is not looking for lasting qualities. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. The interlude on the drawbridge is something he will never forget. A woman with an interesting job is attractive as long as it does not threaten him.

At some time the man starts to look for additional qualities in a mate. Maybe because of pressure from his parents he starts to think of having a family. Then he starts looking for someone who might be a good wife and mother. A schoolteacher is attractive in this case.

In foods, women are attracted to chocolate whereas men are attracted to cinnamon.

 Tim Melvin writes:

I told my daughter in response to a similar question that anything won so easily or quickly likely had little value in the long run. She should be herself at all times and the man who liked and fell for that woman was likely a better match. I taught all the tricks her old man had used over the years to win fair lady specifically so she could avoid them.

 Jose Bonamigo responds:

My intention with the Forbes extract was not to present solid evidence, just a likely explanation for couples like Charles and Diana (a common combination), as Gary pointed out.

Looking at the portraits it seemed to me they were "regular" uglies (just kidding)…

For a more scientific approach, at least in the physical part of dating:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17173598

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16318594

May

1

The swine flu is a powerful media event, and I will be very surprised if its lethality surpasses the last influenza pandemics. The case-fatality ratio is very similar to the usual flu. It is the same virus (influenza), with a different spreading capability and is possibly less susceptible to the previous flu antibodies that we all carry (there´s the potential danger).

I work on a large managed-care company in Brazil, and have reviewed thoroughly the literature for our response team. The population at risk for complications (need for hospitalization, death) is the same that for the usual flu, small children (<2 y. o.), the elderly (>65 y. o.) and people with chronic heart and lung conditions.

We probably won´t see a pandemic like the Spanish flu of 1918-9, ever. People have better nutritional and hygienic conditions and modern medicine is much better prepared to deal with the complications. I don´t mean antivirals here, save your dollars/euros/… . The evidence on the efficacy of antiviral use on influenza is doubtful to say the least.

Some history for the medical literature fans, from the best medical book on infectious diseases Mandell´s Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases:

Influenza virus has been causing recurrent epidemics of febrile respiratory disease every 1 to 3 years for at least the past 400 years. Although the disease is not associated with a characteristic manifestation such as rash, the high attack rate, the explosive nature of the epidemic, and the frequency of cough allow the identification of some past epidemics. For example, Sydenham’s account of an epidemic that occurred in 1679 is a clear description of influenza. Hirsch tabulated 299 outbreaks occurring at an average interval of 2.4 years between 1173 and 1875. As discussed later, severe epidemics of worldwide scope occur less often and are referred to as pandemics. The first recorded pandemic that clearly fits the description of influenza occurred in 1580, although others may have occurred earlier. Since then, 31 pandemics have been described. The greatest pandemic in recorded history occurred in 1918–1919 when, during three “waves” of influenza, 21 million deaths were recorded worldwide, among them 549,000 in the United States.

Nigel Davies adds:

I learned a lot about this virus over breakfast this morning — one of my chess team members is a doctor:

1) Although this is a new type of flu, there is little evidence to suggest it's any more deadly than any other kind of flu and in fact it seems rather average. The Mexican deaths have not been duplicated in cases outside of Mexico, which suggests that at some point the data is questionable. One possibility is that the victims may have also had tuberculosis but these questions don't seem to have been asked.

2) A face mask is of questionable value, firstly because this virus is now known not to travel via droplets of water in the breath. Secondly most of the commonly available masks just don't do the job, they're effective for about 30 minutes. A more effective defense is to wash your hands thoroughly, especially before eating.

The way the media have treated this thing is really amazing. I'm already free of television but I'm thinking about how to get free of news altogether. Unfortunately there are some headlines whenever I log into Yahoo to read my email.

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