why are there good looking people?

Question

research has shown that attractive faces do not correlate to health... so why did good looking people emerge in our genome? why don't we all just look different? why is there "hot" and "ugly" ? and why do people have a weakness for hot if it signals no health advantage? this is a highly theoretical evolutionary biology question so i don't expect simple answers.... just curious if anyone can think through this (as unlikely as it is on here...)

to lessen the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" argument... 1000s of people have been rated in psychology labs and there is consistency to how people rate faces... and it is statistically significant. yes, people have preferences (i certainly do) but across 100s of ratings, there is consistency. there are databases of faces which have been rated thousands of times and their means & standard deviations show they are significantly different from eachother (though there is variation due to personal preferences)

Answer 1

to make ugly people jealous.

Answer 2

What people consider 'attractive' is very confusing. I think that our personal 'tastes' in choosing a mate is a result of lots of things, but mostly media. Media obviously tells us that tall, thin, big busted women are 'hot' and the opposite is 'ugly'.

You have to take into consideration the few 'oddballs' who arent affected by this at all. People who have a thing for overweight women, or really really skinny guys, all the different types of fetishes one can have for the human body... These kinds of 'tastes' come from somewhere inside us. Everyone is different and unique underneath all this trying to be 'cool'... I wish I knew what made some people have foot fetishes and other people like to be cut while others just get off on normal regular stuff.

As for the evolutionary aspect of this all... I'm sure that the cave women were attracted to the strongest or best providing men... things like that... but, like our instincts, all of that faded away more and more with each "advance" in technology.

I can't really say that I am a big fan of technology.

Answer 3

Attractiveness is one way that any organism can improve its chances of mating and passing on its genes. Take for example the peacock. All those pretty feathers can't help it find food and probably are a disadvantage in avoiding predators. But somewhere along the line the hens started selecting their mates based on appearance and display and so the most spectacular males got to reproduce.

As for humans it has been shown that in some societies people do choose mates based on practical concerns. Men look for women that they think will be good child bearers. Women look for men that they think will be good providers. Whatever physical attributes they associate with those abilities will be desirable.

In societies that have achieved some distance from basic survival people start looking for attributes that set them apart from those basic needs. The elite don't have to do anything physical to survive so they adopt standards of beauty that set them apart. The lower classes imitate the elite.

In modern society we are bombarded from an early age with clues from the media as to what is or is not attractive. The heros and heroines in the movies are usually played by beautiful people. The villains are generally ugly or at least not so attractive. Advertisers use the most glamorous models to sell their products. Most kids exposed to TV probably have a firm opinion on what constitutes a pretty face early in life.

Answer 4

Well.... Primo certainly is doing his part to make sure that attractive people get labeled as being superficial, shallow, and arrogant. Thanks, Primo. Very mature.
Attractive faces do not correlate to health? Hmm. I think that maybe the real question is: What is a theory? A theory is a speculative plan. Basically, it's a guess. Until there is some concrete proof of this "theory"..... beauty is still in the eye of the beholder, and health, in the hands of the individual.

Answer 5

Let's not forget the social infleunces.
Many of our hot charecteristics are like fashions - they change and shift. Also there is timeless beauty similarities in eyes or hips or lips that remind us of patterns in nature.
We as humans do respond to certain visual stimuli the same as a bee may respond to certain flowers over others.
Built into our genetic code from generations of learned behaviors.

Here's another example - why does a baby's smile have such an emotional impact on most humans???
Instinctual response ingrained into us.
We recognize and associate that pattern with "cute".
Another example - draw a circle, put two dots next to one another in the top half, and a concave line on the bottom half.
What is it....?
It's a smiley face.
You instantly recognize the pattern and associate that with happy as opposed to sad.
It's the same theory in action that you see a shapely leg in a sheer stocking and think "Hot".

I am personally very hot by the way.

Answer 6

Beauty isn't about LOOKS, its about HEALTH. At least genetically in our evolution.

Symmetry (or both sides of the face having the same shape) is what is considered 'attractive.' Why? Because - it shows ONE THING - the person is healthy and able to feed and clothe themselves. Because they had both sides of the face the same, this showed that they 'had no wasting, illness, or disease.' This made them attractive as genetic material to mate with, if they can take care of themselve, they can take care of their young.

Here is an example of what is 'considered attractive' in todays world 'and why.' Its called the Marquardt Mask and its based on the number 1.16, also called The Golden Mean (or The Divine Number).

http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=the+marquardt+mask&sp=1&fr2=sp-top&fr=yfp-t-501&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&ei=UTF-8&SpellState=n-127846583_q-nK1LevUvG8ozbJmPuRW9IwAAAA%40%40

Of course, this is no longer necessary evolutionary wise. Anyone of us can make a great parent, make lots of money and do well, despite our looks or because of our looks, whichever we have. The reason people label hot or not is just superficiality and nothing less than sad. Why give people credit for nothing more than a random luck of the genetic dice? Its ridiculous.

Answer 7

First of all, we all look different. Everyones perception of ugly is different and it is the media that dictates/labels what is hot and what is not. The weakness of what a person perceives as hot has nothing to do with health it has more to do with lust. Hey you said that is is unlikely that you will receive a highly theoretical detailed answer so enjoy the responses you receive (lmao)

Answer 8

Truth is noone knows. There is a study with infant babies where they show the babies different pictures of peoples faces and the faces that have symetrical features and equal spacing with clear skin produce happiness with the infants while other pictures of people with poor skin, disfigured or exaggerated features actually made the infants upset and caused crying. It seems as if we are born with knowing what is "good looking" and what is not.

Answer 9

"good looking" is an opinion and dosen't have anything to do with survival of the fittest.There are a lot more ugly people in the world than good looking.This would suggest that ugly people have made the most kids.Therefore they have propagated the species more than so-called good looking people.***Real world studies have also shown that people don't usually get their visually ideal mate ,they settle .They have to because most don't look good.So there goes the rating faces in a laboratory experiment.

Answer 10

I think that "good-looking" means different things to different people. In other words, what might be good-looking to one woman may not appeal as much to another. Isn't it just human nature (and evolutionary biology) for people to seek out the strong and good-looking because they want to carry on those same traits and propagate the species with only the "best" specimens?

Answer 11

It is about prestige, men their position in live. If you have the most beautiful woman, people think you must have done something right. It is shallow,but that is the human mind or simply the male ego. When you first meet someone you see only their skin, you don't meet their character.So until you do you see them as ugly or beautiful.