© 2008 and 2011, the Institute for Applied Common Sense
The Logistician, previously with the Institute and now on sabbatical in Brazil, was effectively run out of the country because of his generation of the following article in 2008. Consequently, we do not frequently make reference to its subject matter.
However, as we have often said, if there are any “common sense” principles to be derived from our posts, they ought to have continuing relevance, no matter how applied. This week, the application applies to former California governor, and soon to be actor again, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who admitted to fathering a child with a household employee years ago. Fear of unpopularity should not dictate our delving into controversial issues.
However, keep in mind that the Logistician generated this, and not anyone currently affiliated with the Institute.
As a general proposition, we are not in the business of justifying or condemning any type of human behavior. More particularly, we are not apologists for philandering men. We are more focused on the avoidance of destructive and detrimental conduct in relationships by better understanding the dynamics in operation.
There are four significant factors that come into play when a man cheats sexually on his female significant other, those being:
(1) opportunity;
(2) physical proximity and juxtaposition;
(3) physiological “blood flow;” and
(4) relative absence of significant offending characteristics and presence.
We shall address each one separately. Later in this piece, we will also discuss:
(5) the basic underlying problems with heterosexual relationships in modern, post-industrial societies; and
(6) what responsible couples can do to minimize the probability of being traumatized by a sexual affair hiccup.
Opportunity: There are some simple mathematical and probabilistic principles in operation here. The more access to and contact with other people one has, the more opportunities for straying there will be. The larger the town or community, the higher the probability that the man will meet women to whom he will be attracted in some form or fashion.
Locking him up in a cage and smothering him is not the answer. Understanding what is at play is. One needs to understand the “inner game of relationships.”
There is a long time friend of ours who used to say, upon hearing initial news reports, that to determine whether a public figure actually strayed, all one had to do was to “look at the babe.” From his perspective, he simply needed to see a picture or video of the alleged co-conspirator.
Many of us have had the experience of meeting what might be termed as “professional babes,” capable of accomplishing anything to which they put their minds. In big cities like Los Angeles, New York, Paris, Rome, Rio, Hong Kong, and Tokyo, they are found in abundance. However, the probability of finding them next door in a town of 5,000 residents is very low. Anyone fitting that bill has already found their way to Los Angeles, New York, or some other big city where opportunities abound.
You see them on television and the big screen every day. (We acknowledge that Sen. Edwards’ co-conspirator was not exactly Hollywood talent, but it's not all about talent.)
Some of their detractors will refer to them as “gold diggers.” They are a force with which to be reckoned. There is nothing of the female persuasion more potentially seductive than a bright, beautiful, and physically attractive woman who leaves her native country, starts traveling around the world alone during her teens, learns to speak different tongues as she progresses, and who then educates herself and gains a patina of sophistication and a sharp wit.
What she puts out is no different that the venom that many an animal secretes to paralyze its prey. This is not to say that women are predators who pursue men; however, there is interplay at work here folks. Many a woman has communicated a message in a non-verbal fashion to the effect, “Hey, check out some of this,” and many a man has responded upon being wounded, “She ought to be illegal.”
This is not to suggest that every woman has similar motivations; it is just to explain that such a turbo-charged force operating on all 24 cylinders can generally win the race, especially against tortoises. In a heterosexual context, you juxtapose one of these women beside a mere mortal man, and you’ve got a problem, especially if the man has money, power, or worse yet, both.
By the way, a woman with lots of talent in other areas, and who may not be particularly beautiful, can compensate for the alleged deficiencies in the beauty arena. As one of our friends once said, “You’ve got to see the ‘show’ before you are truly able to criticize the ‘cost’ and risks associated with the transaction.”
There are other circumstantial factors that come into play, such as the probability of getting noticed, the number of other co-workers in the vicinity, the attention being paid to the potentially wayward couple by others in the vicinity, the opportunity to sneak away from the crowd unnoticed, and on and on.
One must also consider the fact that powerful men, once they become powerful and especially when they become rich, attract and draw an exponentially expanding crowd of female admirers. As they begin to appreciate their newfound power, more opportunities are realized. Former President William Jefferson Clinton was once asked why he did what he did with Monica Lewinsky. His answer was about as honest as they come, “Because I could.”
Proximity: All other forces being equal, the closer, and closer, and closer an attractive, appealing woman gets to a man, the higher the probability of straying. A man needs to take responsibility and learn how to avoid looking at an attractive woman, avoid traveling through her department, avoid going out to lunch with her alone, avoid having her in his office alone, and most importantly, avoid closing the door once she enters his office or work place alone.
Have you ever noticed how when two people gradually start closing the spatial gap between them, the sexual tension level rises and they stop talking coherently and logically?
It’s about proximity. You place the right dress, hair style, attitude, perfume, and such together, and things start happening. Milan Kundera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milan_Kundera), the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unbearable_Lightness_of_Being) might refer to it as “serendipity,” whereas Jung (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung) might refer to it as “synchronicity.” The suggestion that one woman is able to access and enhance her resources in terms of drawing a man to her, and that no other woman can accomplish a similar feat, is sheer science fiction.
Proximity also explains why a seemingly unattractive woman can end up in sexual relationship with a man who seemingly “could do better.” Once again, proximity rules, as does our next factor.
Blood Flow: There is another item of science fiction, or what might be more appropriately termed “sheer folly,” which often comes into play when people misunderstand and underestimate this sex thing. It’s called Nature. Nature rules, and ultimately over the long haul.
Predicting or stopping a tsunami or earthquake? Yeah…. We as humans believe that we can conquer Nature, and on occasion we manage to do so - temporarily. However, at the end of the day, Nature rules. It is fair wiser for us as humans to figure out how to step aside and avoid Nature’s wrath, or simply avoid being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
For men, sex is about blood flow. No blood flow, no sex. That’s what all of this prescription male enhancement junk is about. Quite frankly, any man being straight with you will tell you that having an erection longer than seven minutes is problematic, and presents all sorts of potentially negative ramifications.
Men are hard wired to be aroused, and momentarily distracted by women. Every aspect of our physical being is determined by hard-wiring, accompanied by some electro-chemical impulse. Everything. We often advise our female friends who are mothers of teenage boys that it is all about “blood flow.”
Women can not imagine how a man can have an instantaneous erection due to blood flow, upon observing a desirable woman. You can’t explain this to someone who is not similarly physically hard-wired. Men also can not explain the indiscriminate nature of that force upon being stimulated.
It has nothing to do with logic. It has nothing to do with religion. It has nothing to do with character. It’s bigger than men are.
That does not mean that there are no ways to prevent a distraction. It just means that once all of the forces are in operation, and the circumstances are “conducive,” there is a very high probability that the event will occur. We can virtually guarantee that, given the proper circumstances, any of the “professional, gold digging babes,” to whom we previously referred, could sway the vast majority of bright, successful, responsible, and even religious men to stray.
References to the little brain taking over from the big brain are a little off base. What takes over is that portion of the big brain that drives the little brain below. Take the time to look at any of the science or nature programs dealing with the human brain, and the portions of the brain which come into play during certain activity, especially when survival is necessary.
Sex is about survival of the species. Sex is about procreation. Sex is about perpetuation of the species. It’s not about “I love you, and you love me.” That’s just pure hogwash, and if you believe that, you’re playing a game with yourself. Sex and the sex drive existed long before religion and moral authority decided to categorize it and define it.
(By the way, penetration is highly overrated. In theory, what a man is biologically hard-wired to do is to find a female to allow him to transmit his sperm, deliver that sperm effectively and efficiently, and then back off and move on to more important and logical pursuits. It’s the nature of the beast.)
When a man is one nanosecond away from insertion, he’s not thinking about his wife, loved one, or significant other. He may have been fifteen or twenty minutes prior thereto. But if all of the intervening hurdles have been negotiated, the probability of distraction increases exponentially. (By the way, the Discovery Channel periodically airs a beautiful piece on the Biology of Sex. It is well worth viewing.)
Have you ever noticed the absence of any academicians and scientists discussing marital infidelity on the news shows? Sure, you might occasionally see one dealing with the aftermath, and the negative ramifications, of which there are many. However, how can one solve or address a problem without fully recognizing the underlying causes?
One can not deny the influence of the human brain on human conduct. Check out history and see what happens to humans when they get desperate and are trying to survive. The portion of the brain that makes them behave like animals kicks in. Laura Schaefer is the author of Man with Farm Seeks Woman with Tractor: The Best and the Worst of Personal Ads of All Time(http://books.google.com/books?id=lKd34O9ZBCoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22Man+with+Farm+Seeks+Woman+with+Tractor%22&ei=k7K1SPKOF6fujAHasP07&sig=ACfU3U0Evxd0pKpZjdXduXX0VrtlsiDj5A#PPP7,M1). Although a comedic look at relationships, she does include some scientific evidence in her work to support her position that the male brain is a man’s largest sex organ:
“In males of several species, including humans, the preoptic area hypothalamus is greater in volume, in cross-sectional area and in the number of cells. In men, this area is more than two times larger than in women, and it contains twice as many cells. And what, say you, does this have to do with the horizontal mambo? Plenty. This area of the hypothalamus is in charge of mating behavior….This small structure connects to the pituitary gland, which releases sex hormones. So if your [boyfriend] wants to get intimate all the time and you feel like Ms. Low Desire, remember: You’re just experiencing normal, brain-based differences.”
Relative Absence of Offending Characteristics, and Presence: This too is all about hard-wiring. Every single human sense comes into play in the sexual act. It’s visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory, and on and on. It’s everything at play all at the same time. That’s why no one factor necessarily cuts the event short, unless it is overwhelming or acting in concert with another offensive factor. It’s like a coalition breakdown in the Israeli Knesset (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knesset).
The human body, controlled by the brain, is an amazing mechanism. We are hard-wired to avoid things that are dangerous, whether it be the heat of a fire, or the incredible stench of rotting tissue. The body naturally reacts. As a woman approaches, if the man continues to engage her in the approach, and if no offending characteristic or characteristics are so significant to make him come to his senses quickly, he is done for. If she repulses him, and even a beautiful woman can do this, the event is short-circuited, and the man shakes his head and returns to his senses.
As a general proposition, what men want in life is peace and comfort from a partner, not physical stimulation and intensity. They want to be backed up, not worked up. Support and team work are the keys.
A wise man once said that a man should never marry the woman with whom he has the best sex, or who he thinks is the most beautiful. Simply put, he won’t get anything done in life. He won’t be able to get out of the bed and go to work the next day. Come Monday morning, he’ll show up late and all sorts of negative crap will flow therefrom.
(By the way, this is barbershop confession material. Barbershops did a disservice to men when they started allowing female barbers to practice their trade in the same space. In the interest of equal treatment, perhaps there should be two sections in barbershops, one co-educational, and the other just for men.)
Basic Underlying Problems with Heterosexual Relationships in Modern Post-Industrial Societies
For a broader discussion of the how men and women fail to note the ways in which hard-wiring affects their interaction with one another, you are invited to re-examine an earlier article, Post No. 11 entitled, “The Human Hard Wiring Conundrum (Are We Truly a Higher Form of Animal)” (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008_05_01_archive.html ). The bottom line is that modern day men and women hook up for too many selfish and personal reasons, and forget the evolutionary and historical issues centered on survival. Heterosexual relationships are supposed to be about teamwork, and the exponential matrix of capabilities flowing from the pairing of two beings with different skills and ways of viewing the world to enhance the probability of survival, not dancing through the clouds in pretty clothes to pretty music.
That’s not to say that we haven’t done our fair share of dancing…. However, it’s a little difficult to bitch about one’s current state of affairs, if one does not take responsibility for one’s choices in life.
Probably the best line about love which we have heard is that “love is not two people staring into the eyes of one another, but rather both of them staring in the same direction together at the same time focused on the same goal.” To further complicate matters, if a relationship is primarily sexually based, the decrease in the stimulation and intensity will occur about as quickly as the increase, if not faster.
When men and women in modern post-industrial society finally realize that there are issues in society larger and more significant than themselves, their children, and the physical structures in which they live (and of relevance to the subject of this article, where a man places his weenie), then we will have made some progress as a society.
When couples feel that their relationship is about to disintegrate, they should consider jointly volunteering their time to an organization such as the AIDS Foundation, or a non-profit searching for the cure for Alzheimer’s disease. That’ll place things into perspective.
What Responsible Couples Can Do to Minimize the Probability of Being Traumatized by a Sexual Affair Hiccup
A man is not a dog, or a creep, or a jerk at the point of penetration alone. The disappointment felt by the woman, and the negative ramifications associated with the conduct are the result of a totality of conduct, each upon being viewed separately, might be considered small and perhaps even benign, but potentially problematic when taken together, especially in rapid succession.
So how does the Institute for Applied Common Sense, a body which advocates taking full and complete responsibility for one’s conduct, suggest that couple approach this potentially debilitating event? There’s a story which we often tell during our seminars which sets up the stage.
It’s Riverside, California several years ago. The clubs are closed and two teenage girls have been out partying. One of the girls has difficulty raising her cousin, and consequently calls 911. The authorities arrive to find the other teenager slumped in a stupor behind the wheel of the car after 2 am, but with a weapon in her lap.
At some point, there is some movement which suggests to the officers that their lives might be threatened. Shortly thereafter, in excess of 42 bullets have been spent shooting at the little girl. Of course, all of the civil rights advocates immediately starting yelling excessive force and police brutality.
However, we viewed the situation differently. We asked, “What were you doing there in that condition in the first place.” One committing an irresponsible act can’t exactly control the response of his loved ones, or expect the response to be one acceptable to the actor. So what you do, as Barney Fife would say, is to “nip it in the bud” early on in the sequence of events. Here’s what we suggest.
1. Do some reading in scientific and biological journals about human conduct and the brain. Watch the Discovery Channel, or National Geographic, or the Learning Channel for shows which explore such subject matter. Read some books discussing the latest research on the brain garnered from recent advances in brain scan research.
2. Recognize and respect Nature for what it is.
3. Immediately after you have that intense, passionate, out of control sexual experience early on in your relationship, have a conversation with your partner about the realm of possibilities as reflected in this article. Although we seriously doubt the conversation will take place prior to rolling on the kitchen floor, freaking out after the man has had the affair with the other woman is a tad bit untimely. So this is a compromise.
4. Perhaps most significantly, center your lives and the relationship, before kids are conceived or at least born, on something or some purpose that is bigger than you, your children, the physical home in which you live, and your personal possessions. When we discussed the generation of this article, The Laughingman responded as follows:
“While I admit that his wife’s cancer status is a complicating factor, on the larger issue, Mr. Edwards did nothing more than what Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Martin Luther King did some years ago, and I suspect for the same reason. What’s interesting is how so many people denigrate their wives for doing the Tammy Wynette, and standing by their men. There is actually something to admire about these heroic women who share the ideals of their spouses, and put aside their natural inclination to seek revenge, which would amount to throwing the babies out with the bath water. Here, here to those who can endure personal disappointment and embarrassment in the public eye, in the pursuit of bigger goals.”
5. Women should recognize that men primarily want peace. Men should recognize that women primarily want a sense of security, including knowing that they are special and number one.
6. Women should recognize that there is always another woman out there with comparable, even though qualitatively different, sexual and physical “talent.” In the same way that a woman manages to attract her husband, another woman can do the same. Consequently, there needs to be something unique and which makes a woman a keeper other than pure sex, as great as that may be perceived in the short term.
7. Continue to engage and stimulate each other intellectually - every single day. (There is perhaps nothing more depressing than to see a couple sitting at a table and not engaging in any type of conversation. We take that back, there is: when the non-communication is taking place in front of their children.)
8. Reduce sex, and particularly penetration, to the lowest point possible on your relationship priority scale. (Well, maybe during the week on school nights.)
We hope this helps. We realize that there is a lot of thinking required to absorb this. However, we can guarantee that there is very little thinking going on when the man is about to betray his woman’s trust and enter the twilight zone.
© 2008 and 2011, the Institute for Applied Common Sense
P.S. For those of you who managed to read this far, you may be interested in the follow-up posts to the original article, which were necessary to calm the storm which developed. The first is entitled, Addendum to Why Men Cheat, and the second is I Can’t Believe You Did That; Now That You Have….
Showing posts with label sex. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sex. Show all posts
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Post No. 162a: Article of Interest: Do You Have Free Will? Yes, It's the Only Choice
The following article is taken from the electronic edition of the New York Times:
By JOHN TIERNEY
Published: March 21, 2011
"Suppose that Mark and Bill live in a deterministic universe. Everything that happens this morning — like Mark’s decision to wear a blue shirt, or Bill’s latest attempt to comb over his bald spot — is completely caused by whatever happened before it.
"If you recreated this universe starting with the Big Bang and let all events proceed exactly the same way until this same morning, then the blue shirt is as inevitable as the comb-over.
"Now for questions from experimental philosophers:
"1) In this deterministic universe, is it possible for a person to be fully morally responsible for his actions?
"2) This year, as he has often done in the past, Mark arranges to cheat on his taxes. Is he fully morally responsible for his actions?
"3) Bill falls in love with his secretary, and he decides that the only way to be with her is to murder his wife and three children. Before leaving on a trip, he arranges for them to be killed while he is away. Is Bill fully morally responsible for his actions?
"To a classic philosopher, these are just three versions of the same question about free will. But to the new breed of philosophers who test people’s responses to concepts like determinism, there are crucial differences, as Shaun Nichols explains in the current issue of Science....
To view the remainder of the article, click here.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Post No. 158a: Re-posting of "There Has to be Something More"
© 2009 and 2011, the Institute for Applied Common Sense
This post was originally published in 2009. Since today is Valentine's Day, we thought that we should re-visit some relationship issues.
Today, we have some Common Sense thoughts about choosing a spouse - the first, and hopefully only, time.
When we sit down at the keyboard, we’ve often just watched a series of movies on TCM, some cartoons, C-Span, and the news.
John Edwards, the Democratic presidential contender who cheated on his wife, is back in the news, due to the recent death of his wife, from cancer. So are the timeless issues of sex, power, and breach of trust.
As we watched the Edwardses, we asked, “What are people thinking when they pair up?”
Some suggest that very little thinking goes on, at least north of the equator, and that’s where the cartoons come in. We’ve long argued that transient, hard-wired blood flow and chemical (whether hormonal or self-administered) factors play far too large a role.
We're not being prudish; we've just been there; and, on far too frequent an occasion.
It’s not difficult to find some element of errant temptation in most Hollywood products. Some even suggest that Tinseltown bears some responsibility.
But history is replete with evidence that hanky-panky predated Hollywood. A recent History Channel program discussed the long trips between American colonial farms where brief “stops” were made (by members of both sexes) to, let’s say, regain one’s energy.
Modern couples are often shocked to find that sex is a reoccurring complicating factor. Last evening, we watched a program on the mythological god Zeus. It was noted that all of the ancient gods, in addition to their immense power, had human frailties.
Zeus’ flaw? An insatiable sexual appetite. (Even without Viagra.)
While we’ve never quite figured out why the male member (or even the female member) of a couple might have an interest in prolonging the event (particularly those otherwise incompatible), we do find the spate of competing commercials entertaining.
The description of the potential side effects is almost as humorous as the cartoons we watch. “Anyone experiencing an erection longer than 4 hours should consult a physician.” Add to that the warning that someone experiencing a decrease in hearing or sight should discontinue using the product, and we’re really confused. Aren’t those parts of the deal?
In an earlier piece, we suggested that people considering, or stumbling toward, infidelity recognize the early warning signs. We proposed nipping the impulse in the bud while they still had some degree of control, before “Nature” took over.
That didn’t go over very well. Many apparently feel that Nature has no role, and it is all about pure selfishness, and a lack of Personal Responsibility. When we tried to clarify our position, we made little progress, even with the assistance of another Institute Fellow.
However, let's face it: the real issue is how one wants to occupy one's time.
We saw the movie Outbreak for the first time last week. In it, members of a divorced couple, both of whom are infectious disease doctors, join forces to fight a deadly virus. Watching them place their personal differences aside, and focus on their mutual goals, prompted us to write this piece.
TCM recently aired a collection of Andy Hardy movies starring Mickey Rooney. As Rooney got older, he began to take an interest in members of the opposite sex. In some of his other movies, he was paired with Liz Taylor. In real life, Rooney and Taylor married 8 times each, and to them we dedicate this piece.
From what we’ve seen, young people considering hooking up long-term might look for something else apart from the transient. (Children are obviously not a very strong motivation to stay together these days.)
We’re neither apologizing for, nor condoning cheating. Nor are we suggesting that cheating is a minor issue to be glanced over. We’re just suggesting that marriage might have a better chance of survival, whatever the problems encountered, if there is something else going on apart from physical attraction.
The following appeared in our earlier, controversial piece:
“Probably the best line about love... is..., ‘Love is not two people staring into the eyes of one another, but rather both of them staring in the same direction together at the same time focused on the same goal.’ [I]f a relationship is primarily [physical] attraction... based, the decrease in the stimulation and intensity will occur about as quickly as the increase, if not faster.
“When men and women... realize there are issues in society larger and more significant than themselves, their children, and the physical structures in which they live (and where one places his appendage), then we will have made some progress as a society. When couples feel that their relationship is about to disintegrate, they might consider jointly volunteering their time to the AIDS Foundation, the Alzheimer’s Foundation, or a similar organization. That’ll place things into perspective.”
Earlier this week, we saw another couple in the news – the Clintons. The former Prez brought home two detained American journalists who made missteps in North Korea. His previously humiliated wife, now Secretary of State, beamed with pride. Moving on beyond his peccadilloes, they, together, pulled something off which they felt mattered.
For all the criticism their relationship received in the past, perhaps they have figured out the formula to a long-term marriage, or another type of "Stay Pow'R." (It remains to be seen whether the marriages of Gov. Mark Sanford and Sen. John Ensign will survive.)
We strongly suspect that at some point during or following the Lewinsky scandal, at least one of them said, “There’s still work to be done, which best be done by the two of us.”
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Post No. 146f: Article of Interest re Possible Government Interference with Free Market Capitalism at Work?
The following article is taken from the August 31, 2010 electronic edition of the Detroit News.
GROWING STRIP CLUB CHAIN STIRS PASSIONS
by Christine MacDonald and Santiago Esparza
Detroit - It's tough to miss Starvin Marvin's strip clubs. They're huge, flashy and as over the top as their manager, whose lawyer dubs him the "P.T. Barnum" of topless entertainment.
To view the remainder of the article, click here.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Post No. 131: There Has to be Something More
© 2009, the Institute for Applied Common Sense
Today, we have some Common Sense thoughts about choosing a spouse - the first, and hopefully only, time.
When we sit down at the keyboard, we’ve often just watched a series of movies on TCM, some cartoons, and the news.
John Edwards, the Democratic presidential contender who cheated on his wife, is back in the news. So are the timeless issues of sex, power, and breach of trust.
As we watched the Edwardses, we asked, “What are people thinking when they pair up?”
Some suggest that very little thinking goes on, at least north of the equator, and that’s where the cartoons come in. We’ve long argued that transient, hard-wired blood flow and chemical (whether hormonal or self-administered) factors play far too large a role.
We're not being prudish; we've just been there; and, on far too frequent an occasion.
It’s not difficult to find some element of errant temptation in most Hollywood products. Some even suggest that Tinseltown bears some responsibility.
But history is replete with evidence that hanky-panky predated Hollywood. A recent History Channel program discussed the long trips between American colonial farms where brief “stops” were made (by members of both sexes) to, let’s say, regain one’s energy.
Modern couples are often shocked to find that sex is a reoccurring complicating factor. Last evening, we watched a program on the mythological god Zeus. It was noted that all of the ancient gods, in addition to their immense power, had human frailties.
Zeus’ flaw? An insatiable sexual appetite. (Even without Viagra.)
While we’ve never quite figured out why the male member (or even the female member) of a couple might have an interest in prolonging the event (particularly those otherwise incompatible), we do find the spate of competing commercials entertaining.
The description of the potential side effects is almost as humorous as the cartoons we watch. “Anyone experiencing an erection longer than 4 hours should consult a physician.” Add to that the warning that someone experiencing a decrease in hearing or sight should discontinue using the product, and we’re really confused. Aren’t those parts of the deal?
In an earlier piece, we suggested that people considering, or stumbling toward, infidelity recognize the early warning signs. We proposed nipping the impulse in the bud while they still had some degree of control, before “Nature” took over.
That didn’t go over very well. Many apparently feel that Nature has no role, and it is all about pure selfishness, and a lack of Personal Responsibility. However, let's face it: the real issue is how one wants to occupy one's time.
We saw the movie Outbreak for the first time last week. In it, members of a divorced couple, both of whom are infectious disease doctors, join forces to fight a deadly virus. Watching them place their personal differences aside, and focus on their mutual goals, prompted us to write this piece.
TCM recently aired a collection of Andy Hardy movies starring Mickey Rooney. As Rooney got older, he began to take an interest in members of the opposite sex. In some of his other movies, he was paired with Liz Taylor. In real life, Rooney and Taylor married 8 times each, and to them we dedicate this piece.
From what we’ve seen, young people considering hooking up long-term might look for something else apart from the transient. (Children are obviously not a very strong motivation to stay together these days.)
We’re neither apologizing for, nor condoning cheating. Nor are we suggesting that cheating is a minor issue to be glanced over. We’re just suggesting that marriage might have a better chance of survival, whatever the problems encountered, if there is something else going on apart from physical attraction.
The following appeared in our earlier, controversial piece:
“Probably the best line about love... is..., ‘Love is not two people staring into the eyes of one another, but rather both of them staring in the same direction together at the same time focused on the same goal.’ [I]f a relationship is primarily [physical] attraction... based, the decrease in the stimulation and intensity will occur about as quickly as the increase, if not faster.
“When men and women... realize there are issues in society larger and more significant than themselves, their children, and the physical structures in which they live (and where one places his appendage), then we will have made some progress as a society. When couples feel that their relationship is about to disintegrate, they might consider jointly volunteering their time to the AIDS Foundation, the Alzheimer’s Foundation, or a similar organization. That’ll place things into perspective.”
Earlier this week, we saw another couple in the news – the Clintons. The former Prez brought home two detained American journalists who made missteps in North Korea. His previously humiliated wife, now Secretary of State, beamed with pride. Moving on beyond his peccadilloes, they, together, pulled something off which they felt mattered.
For all the criticism their relationship received in the past, perhaps they have figured out the formula to a long-term marriage, or another type of "Stay Pow'R." (It remains to be seen whether the marriages of Gov. Mark Sanford and Sen. John Ensign will survive.)
We strongly suspect that at some point during or following the Lewinsky scandal, at least one of them said, “There’s still work to be done, which best be done by the two of us.”
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Post 41g: A Little Humor to Soothe the Savage Beast
A couple of weeks again, we ventured into some dangerous territory when we posted our article “Why Men Cheat.” The responses of our readers were, let us say, “intense.” The “spirited” discourse even lead the administrators over at blogcatalog.com to cancel our discussion of the subject, citing that it had become too “inflammatory.” Fortunately, the publication of a recent scientific study on the subject, along with the appearance on Oprah of an author who has written more extensively about the subject, took some of the heat off of us.
Just to show that we here at the Institute of Applied Common Sense do not take ourselves too seriously, and that we are willing to consider the views of others on issues of importance to our readers, we contacted a number of authorities on the subject of human propagation and asked them for their views on the subject of our article.
“I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy.” – Tom Clancy
“You know ‘that look’ women get when they want sex? Me neither.” – Steve Martin
“Having sex is like playing bridge. If you don’t have a good partner, you’d better have a good hand.” – Woody Allen
“Bisexuality immediately doubles your chances for a date on Saturday night.” – Rodney Dangerfield
“Sex at age 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.” – George Burns
“Women might be able to fake orgasms. But men can fake whole relationships.” – Sharon Stone
“My girlfriend always laughs during sex – no matter what’s she’s reading.” – Steve Jobs (Founder, Apple Computers)
“My Mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch.” – Jack Nicholson
“Clinton lied. A man might forget where he parks or where he lives, but he never forgets oral sex, no matter how bad it is.” – Barbara Bush (Former First Lady)
“Ah yes, divorce, from the Latin word meaning to rip out a man’s genitals through his wallet.” – Robin Williams
“Women complain about premenstrual syndrome, but I think of it as the only time of the month that I can be myself.” – Roseanne Barr Arnold
“Women need a reason to have sex. Men just need a place.” – Billy Crystal
“According to a new survey, women say that feel more comfortable undressing in front of men than they do undressing in front of other women. They say that women are too judgmental, where, of course, men are just grateful.” – Robert De Niro
“Instead of getting married again, I’m going to find a woman I don’t like and just give her a house.” – Rod Stewart
FINALLY, on a serious note, we contacted the ultimate authority on this subject, Robin Williams, whose research, expressed in one sentence, summarizes what we spent eight pages trying to say:
“See, the problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to run one at a time.”
Just to show that we here at the Institute of Applied Common Sense do not take ourselves too seriously, and that we are willing to consider the views of others on issues of importance to our readers, we contacted a number of authorities on the subject of human propagation and asked them for their views on the subject of our article.
“I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy.” – Tom Clancy
“You know ‘that look’ women get when they want sex? Me neither.” – Steve Martin
“Having sex is like playing bridge. If you don’t have a good partner, you’d better have a good hand.” – Woody Allen
“Bisexuality immediately doubles your chances for a date on Saturday night.” – Rodney Dangerfield
“Sex at age 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.” – George Burns
“Women might be able to fake orgasms. But men can fake whole relationships.” – Sharon Stone
“My girlfriend always laughs during sex – no matter what’s she’s reading.” – Steve Jobs (Founder, Apple Computers)
“My Mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch.” – Jack Nicholson
“Clinton lied. A man might forget where he parks or where he lives, but he never forgets oral sex, no matter how bad it is.” – Barbara Bush (Former First Lady)
“Ah yes, divorce, from the Latin word meaning to rip out a man’s genitals through his wallet.” – Robin Williams
“Women complain about premenstrual syndrome, but I think of it as the only time of the month that I can be myself.” – Roseanne Barr Arnold
“Women need a reason to have sex. Men just need a place.” – Billy Crystal
“According to a new survey, women say that feel more comfortable undressing in front of men than they do undressing in front of other women. They say that women are too judgmental, where, of course, men are just grateful.” – Robert De Niro
“Instead of getting married again, I’m going to find a woman I don’t like and just give her a house.” – Rod Stewart
FINALLY, on a serious note, we contacted the ultimate authority on this subject, Robin Williams, whose research, expressed in one sentence, summarizes what we spent eight pages trying to say:
“See, the problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to run one at a time.”
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Post No. 39: I Can't Believe You Did That - Now That You Have
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
By Guest Author, The Laughingman
To my colleague, The Logistician, in response to your earlier post about “Why Men Cheat” (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008/08/post-no-37-why-men-cheat-definitive.html), and the much needed Addendum (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008/08/post-no-37a-addendum-to-why-men-cheat.html), both of which were generated in the wake of the John Edwards scandal:
You are either a very brave man, or a man full of that substance that makes us all better drivers, to take this subject on. Blissful monogamy is a man-made myth, based on an economic system idea that went comatose just about the time we started fighting "World Wars."
When I first read your piece, the first thing that came to mind was that “everybody does everything with somebody sometime.” How we respond to questions in the public arena is a different thing. We are animals, and genetically hard wired to respond, sexually, to some pretty strange stuff. Promiscuity protects our gene pool from annihilation from any particularly pesky, gene targeted bug. Sex itself evolved as a defense against such nasty little beasties.
With the boy and the girl of our species now approaching parity in their ability to provide for their off spring, and with the help of a plethora of misanthropic government programs, the male is fast being relegated to freelancer status.
Remember Murphy Brown?
Unfortunately, public policy having now nearly eliminated the demand for cheap menial labor, we are stuck with a welfare system that fosters the increased production of such, and comes close to prohibiting the creation of low income, two parent, households.
Don't take my word for it...spend a couple of afternoons watching the pathetic representatives of our "lower middle class," taking each other to court over cell phone bills and utility sharing agreements, in order to reap their revenge publicly, and simultaneously collect their 15 minutes of fame on day-time TV.
Even worse, many of the participants see this public pageant of promiscuity as a modern day dating game.
I include Donald and Ivana Trump as examples of all the above.
And all of these people vote...although I'm not sure about Ivana.
Monogamy is no God given right. It is the product of a functional partnership, which can only exist in an atmosphere of genuine trust...the popularity of same being inversely proportional to the demand for lawyers.
Oddly enough, in this era of damn near universal visual surveillance, most of us still think we can get away with damn near anything, without getting caught.
Not. That a show such as “Cheaters” exists, and these purported “partners” continue to frolic and cavort, tells you something.
And when the bell tolls, men honestly defend all this as a harmless following of preternatural instincts.
Women see it as a betrayal of a basic (and financial) trust.
But on day-time TV, roughly half the woman can't accurately identify the father of their children.
And it is nobody's fault - but our own.
Since very few readers of your tome appeared to get your point, I’ll make it for you, my friend. If we spent a little more time talking to our partners about what we considered a partnership; if we better appreciated the breadth of the dynamics involved; if we were just a little more honest while talking; or even considered inviting one's spouse along, when an extramarital sexual opportunity presents itself, we could cut the divorce rate in half.
(Not likely to happen...we are also genetically hard wired to keep our own genes safe...and well fed...which is why Bears and Lions kill the cubs in their proximity they know are not their own.)
Unfortunately, we might also cut the marriage (and the progeny production rate as well) in half...too.
But, we are going to have to change something, and the genetic drive that spurs us on to survive as a species may not be the best place to start.Your piece certainly got the conversation going.
Thanks...
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
By Guest Author, The Laughingman
To my colleague, The Logistician, in response to your earlier post about “Why Men Cheat” (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008/08/post-no-37-why-men-cheat-definitive.html), and the much needed Addendum (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008/08/post-no-37a-addendum-to-why-men-cheat.html), both of which were generated in the wake of the John Edwards scandal:
You are either a very brave man, or a man full of that substance that makes us all better drivers, to take this subject on. Blissful monogamy is a man-made myth, based on an economic system idea that went comatose just about the time we started fighting "World Wars."
When I first read your piece, the first thing that came to mind was that “everybody does everything with somebody sometime.” How we respond to questions in the public arena is a different thing. We are animals, and genetically hard wired to respond, sexually, to some pretty strange stuff. Promiscuity protects our gene pool from annihilation from any particularly pesky, gene targeted bug. Sex itself evolved as a defense against such nasty little beasties.
With the boy and the girl of our species now approaching parity in their ability to provide for their off spring, and with the help of a plethora of misanthropic government programs, the male is fast being relegated to freelancer status.
Remember Murphy Brown?
Unfortunately, public policy having now nearly eliminated the demand for cheap menial labor, we are stuck with a welfare system that fosters the increased production of such, and comes close to prohibiting the creation of low income, two parent, households.
Don't take my word for it...spend a couple of afternoons watching the pathetic representatives of our "lower middle class," taking each other to court over cell phone bills and utility sharing agreements, in order to reap their revenge publicly, and simultaneously collect their 15 minutes of fame on day-time TV.
Even worse, many of the participants see this public pageant of promiscuity as a modern day dating game.
I include Donald and Ivana Trump as examples of all the above.
And all of these people vote...although I'm not sure about Ivana.
Monogamy is no God given right. It is the product of a functional partnership, which can only exist in an atmosphere of genuine trust...the popularity of same being inversely proportional to the demand for lawyers.
Oddly enough, in this era of damn near universal visual surveillance, most of us still think we can get away with damn near anything, without getting caught.
Not. That a show such as “Cheaters” exists, and these purported “partners” continue to frolic and cavort, tells you something.
And when the bell tolls, men honestly defend all this as a harmless following of preternatural instincts.
Women see it as a betrayal of a basic (and financial) trust.
But on day-time TV, roughly half the woman can't accurately identify the father of their children.
And it is nobody's fault - but our own.
Since very few readers of your tome appeared to get your point, I’ll make it for you, my friend. If we spent a little more time talking to our partners about what we considered a partnership; if we better appreciated the breadth of the dynamics involved; if we were just a little more honest while talking; or even considered inviting one's spouse along, when an extramarital sexual opportunity presents itself, we could cut the divorce rate in half.
(Not likely to happen...we are also genetically hard wired to keep our own genes safe...and well fed...which is why Bears and Lions kill the cubs in their proximity they know are not their own.)
Unfortunately, we might also cut the marriage (and the progeny production rate as well) in half...too.
But, we are going to have to change something, and the genetic drive that spurs us on to survive as a species may not be the best place to start.Your piece certainly got the conversation going.
Thanks...
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Post No. 37a: Addendum to "Why Men Cheat"
Many of you interpreted our analysis in “Why Men Cheat,” to suggest that a man can simply blame his behavior on biology. That is far, far, far from what we hoped to accomplish. The goal of our blog is to encourage personal responsibility by encouraging people to take 100% responsibility for all of their actions. To the extent that we poorly communicated our message, please accept our apologies. We realized that it was lengthy; however, we also consider infidelity to be a complex issues with many components.
Our point is simply this. Cheating is not as simple as someone saying, “I want to be selfish and cheat.” All decisions and everything processed through the brain is electrochemical in nature and there biological. However, there are lots of events that occur prior to the actual cheating event. Our goal was to identify and discuss those earlier events, and help folk recognize them, so that decisions and actions to avoid infidelity could take place at an earlier stage in the process, before the strong biological urge is at its peak. Our basic point is that all people, regardless of their sex, should take responsibility, at Stage 1, before finding themselves in a compromising situation at Stage 10.
Additionally, we were trying to develop a new construct by which couples might have conversations about things in the Universe far more important than sex, which we consider to be of very little significance in the grand scheme of our potential positive influence on the planet. There is no real reason to have sex at all, if people choose not to do so. If there is no biological component to the choice to have sex, then all of us can simply stop doing so. However, once we choose to do so, or are biologically driven to do so, depending on your view, there are potential negative and positive consequences. We were simply trying to reduce the negative ones by encouraging a dialogue before any sex occurs. Additionally, society makes no progress by simply doing the same thing, the same way, over and over.
To simply label the conduct as “selfish” does not advance any societal interests, if our conduct and the response thereto simply continue. How about having couples focus their energy and efforts on something beyond themselves and beyond their personal, selfish needs, so that the time spent on the sex issue is reduced, and the time spent on advancing larger more significant interests, like finding a cure for cancer, reducing violence, inventing a process for the inexpensive purification of water, etc. are increased. We apologize for so poorly stating our goal. How about one of you coming up with a suggestion or construct for reducing the incidence of marital infidelity other than simply calling it “selfishness.” Even assuming that it is simply “selfishness,” how do we reduce that, whatever it’s source. So many out there obviously think that there is no biological component. Contribute something affirmatively positive to this discussion, other than simply attack a suggested approach.
Our point is simply this. Cheating is not as simple as someone saying, “I want to be selfish and cheat.” All decisions and everything processed through the brain is electrochemical in nature and there biological. However, there are lots of events that occur prior to the actual cheating event. Our goal was to identify and discuss those earlier events, and help folk recognize them, so that decisions and actions to avoid infidelity could take place at an earlier stage in the process, before the strong biological urge is at its peak. Our basic point is that all people, regardless of their sex, should take responsibility, at Stage 1, before finding themselves in a compromising situation at Stage 10.
Additionally, we were trying to develop a new construct by which couples might have conversations about things in the Universe far more important than sex, which we consider to be of very little significance in the grand scheme of our potential positive influence on the planet. There is no real reason to have sex at all, if people choose not to do so. If there is no biological component to the choice to have sex, then all of us can simply stop doing so. However, once we choose to do so, or are biologically driven to do so, depending on your view, there are potential negative and positive consequences. We were simply trying to reduce the negative ones by encouraging a dialogue before any sex occurs. Additionally, society makes no progress by simply doing the same thing, the same way, over and over.
To simply label the conduct as “selfish” does not advance any societal interests, if our conduct and the response thereto simply continue. How about having couples focus their energy and efforts on something beyond themselves and beyond their personal, selfish needs, so that the time spent on the sex issue is reduced, and the time spent on advancing larger more significant interests, like finding a cure for cancer, reducing violence, inventing a process for the inexpensive purification of water, etc. are increased. We apologize for so poorly stating our goal. How about one of you coming up with a suggestion or construct for reducing the incidence of marital infidelity other than simply calling it “selfishness.” Even assuming that it is simply “selfishness,” how do we reduce that, whatever it’s source. So many out there obviously think that there is no biological component. Contribute something affirmatively positive to this discussion, other than simply attack a suggested approach.
Post No. 37: Why Men Cheat – The Definitive Explanation (or At Least One Man’s Explanation)
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
As a general proposition, we are not in the business of justifying or condemning any type of human behavior. More particularly, we are not apologists for philandering men. We are more focused on the avoidance of destructive and detrimental conduct in relationships by better understanding the dynamics in operation.
There are four significant factors that come into play when a man cheats sexually on his female significant other, those being:
(1) opportunity;
(2) physical proximity and juxtaposition;
(3) physiological “blood flow;” and
(4) relative absence of significant offending characteristics and presence.
We shall address each one separately. Later in this piece, we will also discuss:
(5) the basic underlying problems with heterosexual relationships in modern, post-industrial societies; and
(6) what responsible couples can do to minimize the probability of being traumatized by a sexual affair hiccup.
Opportunity: There are some simple mathematical and probabilistic principles in operation here. The more access to and contact with other people one has, the more opportunities for straying there will be. The larger the town or community, the higher the probability that the man will meet women to whom he will be attracted in some form or fashion.
Locking him up in a cage and smothering him is not the answer. Understanding what is at play is. One needs to understand the “inner game of relationships.”
There is a long time friend of ours who used to say, upon hearing initial news reports, that to determine whether a public figure actually strayed, all one had to do was to “look at the babe.” From his perspective, he simply needed to see a picture or video of the alleged co-conspirator.
Many of us have had the experience of meeting what might be termed as “professional babes,” capable of accomplishing anything to which they put their minds. In big cities like Los Angeles, New York, Paris, Rome, Rio, Hong Kong, and Tokyo, they are found in abundance. However, the probability of finding them next door in a town of 5,000 residents is very low. Anyone fitting that bill has already found their way to Los Angeles, New York, or some other big city where opportunities abound.
You see them on television and the big screen every day. (We acknowledge that Sen. Edwards’ co-conspirator was not exactly Hollywood talent, but it's not all about talent.)
Some of their detractors will refer to them as “gold diggers.” They are a force with which to be reckoned. There is nothing of the female persuasion more potentially seductive than a bright, beautiful, and physically attractive woman who leaves her native country, starts traveling around the world alone during her teens, learns to speak different tongues as she progresses, and who then educates herself and gains a patina of sophistication and a sharp wit.
What she puts out is no different that the venom that many an animal secretes to paralyze its prey. This is not to say that women are predators who pursue men; however, there is interplay at work here folks. Many a woman has communicated a message in a non-verbal fashion to the effect, “Hey, check out some of this,” and many a man has responded upon being wounded, “She ought to be illegal.”
This is not to suggest that every woman has similar motivations; it is just to explain that such a turbo-charged force operating on all 24 cylinders can generally win the race, especially against tortoises. In a heterosexual context, you juxtapose one of these women beside a mere mortal man, and you’ve got a problem, especially if the man has money, power, or worse yet, both.
By the way, a woman with lots of talent in other areas, and who may not be particularly beautiful, can compensate for the alleged deficiencies in the beauty arena. As one of our friends once said, “You’ve got to see the ‘show’ before you are truly able to criticize the ‘cost’ and risks associated with the transaction.”
There are other circumstantial factors that come into play, such as the probability of getting noticed, the number of other co-workers in the vicinity, the attention being paid to the potentially wayward couple by others in the vicinity, the opportunity to sneak away from the crowd unnoticed, and on and on.
One must also consider the fact that powerful men, once they become powerful and especially when they become rich, attract and draw an exponentially expanding crowd of female admirers. As they begin to appreciate their newfound power, more opportunities are realized. Former President William Jefferson Clinton was once asked why he did what he did with Monica Lewinsky. His answer was about as honest as they come, “Because I could.”
Proximity: All other forces being equal, the closer, and closer, and closer an attractive, appealing woman gets to a man, the higher the probability of straying. A man needs to take responsibility and learn how to avoid looking at an attractive woman, avoid traveling through her department, avoid going out to lunch with her alone, avoid having her in his office alone, and most importantly, avoid closing the door once she enters his office or work place alone.
Have you ever noticed how when two people gradually start closing the spatial gap between them, the sexual tension level rises and they stop talking coherently and logically?
It’s about proximity. You place the right dress, hair style, attitude, perfume, and such together, and things start happening. Milan Kundera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milan_Kundera), the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unbearable_Lightness_of_Being) might refer to it as “serendipity,” whereas Jung (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung) might refer to it as “synchronicity.” The suggestion that one woman is able to access and enhance her resources in terms of drawing a man to her, and that no other woman can accomplish a similar feat, is sheer science fiction.
Proximity also explains why a seemingly unattractive woman can end up in sexual relationship with a man who seemingly “could do better.” Once again, proximity rules, as does our next factor.
Blood Flow: There is another item of science fiction, or what might be more appropriately termed “sheer folly,” which often comes into play when people misunderstand and underestimate this sex thing. It’s called Nature. Nature rules, and ultimately over the long haul.
Predicting or stopping a tsunami or earthquake? Yeah…. We as humans believe that we can conquer Nature, and on occasion we manage to do so - temporarily. However, at the end of the day, Nature rules. It is fair wiser for us as humans to figure out how to step aside and avoid Nature’s wrath, or simply avoid being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
For men, sex is about blood flow. No blood flow, no sex. That’s what all of this prescription male enhancement junk is about. Quite frankly, any man being straight with you will tell you that having an erection longer than seven minutes is problematic, and presents all sorts of potentially negative ramifications.
Men are hard wired to be aroused, and momentarily distracted by women. Every aspect of our physical being is determined by hard-wiring, accompanied by some electro-chemical impulse. Everything. We often advise her female friends who are mothers of teenage boys that it is all about “blood flow.”
Women can not imagine how a man can have an instantaneous erection due to blood flow, upon observing a desirable woman. You can’t explain this to someone who is not similarly physically hard-wired. Men also can not explain the indiscriminate nature of that force upon being stimulated.
It has nothing to do with logic. It has nothing to do with religion. It has nothing to do with character. It’s bigger than men are.
That does not mean that there are no ways to prevent a distraction. It just means that once all of the forces are in operation, and the circumstances are “conducive,” there is a very high probability that the event will occur. We can virtually guarantee that, given the proper circumstances, any of the “professional, gold digging babes,” to whom we previously referred, could sway the vast majority of bright, successful, responsible, and even religious men to stray.
References to the little brain taking over from the big brain are a little off base. What takes over is that portion of the big brain that drives the little brain below. Take the time to look at any of the science or nature programs dealing with the human brain, and the portions of the brain which come into play during certain activity, especially when survival is necessary.
Sex is about survival of the species. Sex is about procreation. Sex is about perpetuation of the species. It’s not about “I love you, and you love me.” That’s just pure hogwash, and if you believe that, you’re playing a game with yourself. Sex and the sex drive existed long before religion and moral authority decided to categorize it and define it.
(By the way, penetration is highly overrated. In theory, what a man is biologically hard-wired to do is to find a female to allow him to transmit his sperm, deliver that sperm effectively and efficiently, and then back off and move on to more important and logical pursuits. It’s the nature of the beast.)
When a man is one nanosecond away from insertion, he’s not thinking about his wife, loved one, or significant other. He may have been fifteen or twenty minutes prior thereto. But if all of the intervening hurdles have been negotiated, the probability of distraction increases exponentially. (By the way, the Discovery Channel periodically airs a beautiful piece on the Biology of Sex. It is well worth viewing.)
Have you ever noticed the absence of any academicians and scientists discussing marital infidelity on the news shows? Sure, you might occasionally see one dealing with the aftermath, and the negative ramifications, of which there are many. However, how can one solve or address a problem without fully recognizing the underlying causes?
One can not deny the influence of the human brain on human conduct. Check out history and see what happens to humans when they get desperate and are trying to survive. The portion of the brain that makes them behave like animals kicks in. Laura Schaefer is the author of Man with Farm Seeks Woman with Tractor: The Best and the Worst of Personal Ads of All Time(http://books.google.com/books?id=lKd34O9ZBCoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22Man+with+Farm+Seeks+Woman+with+Tractor%22&ei=k7K1SPKOF6fujAHasP07&sig=ACfU3U0Evxd0pKpZjdXduXX0VrtlsiDj5A#PPP7,M1). Although a comedic look at relationships, she does include some scientific evidence in her work to support her position that the male brain is a man’s largest sex organ:
“In males of several species, including humans, the preoptic area hypothalamus is greater in volume, in cross-sectional area and in the number of cells. In men, this area is more than two times larger than in women, and it contains twice as many cells. And what, say you, does this have to do with the horizontal mambo? Plenty. This area of the hypothalamus is in charge of mating behavior….This small structure connects to the pituitary gland, which releases sex hormones. So if your [boyfriend] wants to get intimate all the time and you feel like Ms. Low Desire, remember: You’re just experiencing normal, brain-based differences.”
Relative Absence of Offending Characteristics, and Presence: This too is all about hard-wiring. Every single human sense comes into play in the sexual act. It’s visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory, and on and on. It’s everything at play all at the same time. That’s why no one factor necessarily cuts the event short, unless it is overwhelming or acting in concert with another offensive factor. It’s like a coalition breakdown in the Israeli Knesset (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knesset).
The human body, controlled by the brain, is an amazing mechanism. We are hard-wired to avoid things that are dangerous, whether it be the heat of a fire, or the incredible stench of rotting tissue. The body naturally reacts. As a woman approaches, if the man continues to engage her in the approach, and if no offending characteristic or characteristics are so significant to make him come to his senses quickly, he is done for. If she repulses him, and even a beautiful woman can do this, the event is short-circuited, and the man shakes his head and returns to his senses.
As a general proposition, what men want in life is peace and comfort from a partner, not physical stimulation and intensity. They want to be backed up, not worked up. Support and team work are the keys.
A wise man once said that a man should never marry the woman with whom he has the best sex, or who he thinks is the most beautiful. Simply put, he won’t get anything done in life. He won’t be able to get out of the bed and go to work the next day. Come Monday morning, he’ll show up late and all sorts of negative crap will flow therefrom.
(By the way, this is barbershop confession material. Barbershops did a disservice to men when they started allowing female barbers to practice their trade in the same space. In the interest of equal treatment, perhaps there should be two sections in barbershops, one co-educational, and the other just for men.)
Basic Underlying Problems with Heterosexual Relationships in Modern Post-Industrial Societies
For a broader discussion of the how men and women fail to note the ways in which hard-wiring affects their interaction with one another, you are invited to re-examine an earlier article, Post No. 11 entitled, “The Human Hard Wiring Conundrum (Are We Truly a Higher Form of Animal)” (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008_05_01_archive.html ). The bottom line is that modern day men and women hook up for too many selfish and personal reasons, and forget the evolutionary and historical issues centered on survival. Heterosexual relationships are supposed to be about teamwork, and the exponential matrix of capabilities flowing from the pairing of two beings with different skills and ways of viewing the world to enhance the probability of survival, not dancing through the clouds in pretty clothes to pretty music.
That’s not to say that we haven’t done our fair share of dancing…. However, it’s a little difficult to bitch about one’s current state of affairs, if one does not take responsibility for one’s choices in life.
Probably the best line about love which we have heard is that “love is not two people staring into the eyes of one another, but rather both of them staring in the same direction together at the same time focused on the same goal.” To further complicate matters, if a relationship is primarily sexually based, the decrease in the stimulation and intensity will occur about as quickly as the increase, if not faster.
When men and women in modern post-industrial society finally realize that there are issues in society larger and more significant than themselves, their children, and the physical structures in which they live (and of relevance to the subject of this article, where a man places his weenie), then we will have made some progress as a society.
When couples feel that their relationship is about to disintegrate, they should consider jointly volunteering their time to an organization such as the AIDS Foundation, or a non-profit searching for the cure for Alzheimer’s disease. That’ll place things into perspective.
What Responsible Couples Can Do to Minimize the Probability of Being Traumatized by a Sexual Affair Hiccup
A man is not a dog, or a creep, or a jerk at the point of penetration alone. The disappointment felt by the woman, and the negative ramifications associated with the conduct are the result of a totality of conduct, each upon being viewed separately, might be considered small and perhaps even benign, but potentially problematic when taken together, especially in rapid succession.
So how does the Institute for Applied Common Sense, a body which advocates taking full and complete responsibility for one’s conduct, suggest that couple approach this potentially debilitating event? There’s a story which we often tell during our seminars which sets up the stage.
It’s Riverside, California several years ago. The clubs are closed and two teenage girls have been out partying. One of the girls has difficulty raising her cousin, and consequently calls 911. The authorities arrive to find the other teenager slumped in a stupor behind the wheel of the car after 2 am, but with a weapon in her lap.
At some point, there is some movement which suggests to the officers that their lives might be threatened. Shortly thereafter, in excess of 42 bullets have been spent shooting at the little girl. Of course, all of the civil rights advocates immediately starting yelling excessive force and police brutality.
However, we viewed the situation differently. We asked, “What were you doing there in that condition in the first place.” One committing an irresponsible act can’t exactly control the response of his loved ones, or expect the response to be one acceptable to the actor. So what you do, as Barney Fife would say, is to “nip it in the bud” early on in the sequence of events. Here’s what we suggest.
1. Do some reading in scientific and biological journals about human conduct and the brain. Watch the Discovery Channel, or National Geographic, or the Learning Channel for shows which explore such subject matter. Read some books discussing the latest research on the brain garnered from recent advances in brain scan research.
2. Recognize and respect Nature for what it is.
3. Immediately after you have that intense, passionate, out of control sexual experience early on in your relationship, have a conversation with your partner about the realm of possibilities as reflected in this article. Although we seriously doubt the conversation will take place prior to rolling on the kitchen floor, freaking out after the man has had the affair with the other woman is a tad bit untimely. So this is a compromise.
4. Perhaps most significantly, center your lives and the relationship, before kids are conceived or at least born, on something or some purpose that is bigger than you, your children, the physical home in which you live, and your personal possessions. When we discussed the generation of this article, The Laughingman responded as follows:
“While I admit that his wife’s cancer status is a complicating factor, on the larger issue, Mr. Edwards did nothing more than what Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Martin Luther King did some years ago, and I suspect for the same reason. What’s interesting is how so many people denigrate their wives for doing the Tammy Wynette, and standing by their men. There is actually something to admire about these heroic women who share the ideals of their spouses, and put aside their natural inclination to seek revenge, which would amount to throwing the babies out with the bath water. Here, here to those who can endure personal disappointment and embarrassment in the public eye, in the pursuit of bigger goals.”
5. Women should recognize that men primarily want peace. Men should recognize that women primarily want a sense of security, including knowing that they are special and number one.
6. Women should recognize that there is always another woman out there with comparable, even though qualitatively different, sexual and physical “talent.” In the same way that a woman manages to attract her husband, another woman can do the same. Consequently, there needs to be something unique and which makes a woman a keeper other than pure sex, as great as that may be perceived in the short term.
7. Continue to engage and stimulate each other intellectually - every single day. (There is perhaps nothing more depressing than to see a couple sitting at a table and not engaging in any type of conversation. We take that back, there is: when the non-communication is taking place in front of their children.)
8. Reduce sex, and particularly penetration, to the lowest point possible on your relationship priority scale. (Well, maybe during the week on school nights.)
We hope this helps. We realize that there is a lot of thinking required to absorb this. However, we can guarantee that there is very little thinking going on when the man is about to betray his woman’s trust and enter the twilight zone.
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
As a general proposition, we are not in the business of justifying or condemning any type of human behavior. More particularly, we are not apologists for philandering men. We are more focused on the avoidance of destructive and detrimental conduct in relationships by better understanding the dynamics in operation.
There are four significant factors that come into play when a man cheats sexually on his female significant other, those being:
(1) opportunity;
(2) physical proximity and juxtaposition;
(3) physiological “blood flow;” and
(4) relative absence of significant offending characteristics and presence.
We shall address each one separately. Later in this piece, we will also discuss:
(5) the basic underlying problems with heterosexual relationships in modern, post-industrial societies; and
(6) what responsible couples can do to minimize the probability of being traumatized by a sexual affair hiccup.
Opportunity: There are some simple mathematical and probabilistic principles in operation here. The more access to and contact with other people one has, the more opportunities for straying there will be. The larger the town or community, the higher the probability that the man will meet women to whom he will be attracted in some form or fashion.
Locking him up in a cage and smothering him is not the answer. Understanding what is at play is. One needs to understand the “inner game of relationships.”
There is a long time friend of ours who used to say, upon hearing initial news reports, that to determine whether a public figure actually strayed, all one had to do was to “look at the babe.” From his perspective, he simply needed to see a picture or video of the alleged co-conspirator.
Many of us have had the experience of meeting what might be termed as “professional babes,” capable of accomplishing anything to which they put their minds. In big cities like Los Angeles, New York, Paris, Rome, Rio, Hong Kong, and Tokyo, they are found in abundance. However, the probability of finding them next door in a town of 5,000 residents is very low. Anyone fitting that bill has already found their way to Los Angeles, New York, or some other big city where opportunities abound.
You see them on television and the big screen every day. (We acknowledge that Sen. Edwards’ co-conspirator was not exactly Hollywood talent, but it's not all about talent.)
Some of their detractors will refer to them as “gold diggers.” They are a force with which to be reckoned. There is nothing of the female persuasion more potentially seductive than a bright, beautiful, and physically attractive woman who leaves her native country, starts traveling around the world alone during her teens, learns to speak different tongues as she progresses, and who then educates herself and gains a patina of sophistication and a sharp wit.
What she puts out is no different that the venom that many an animal secretes to paralyze its prey. This is not to say that women are predators who pursue men; however, there is interplay at work here folks. Many a woman has communicated a message in a non-verbal fashion to the effect, “Hey, check out some of this,” and many a man has responded upon being wounded, “She ought to be illegal.”
This is not to suggest that every woman has similar motivations; it is just to explain that such a turbo-charged force operating on all 24 cylinders can generally win the race, especially against tortoises. In a heterosexual context, you juxtapose one of these women beside a mere mortal man, and you’ve got a problem, especially if the man has money, power, or worse yet, both.
By the way, a woman with lots of talent in other areas, and who may not be particularly beautiful, can compensate for the alleged deficiencies in the beauty arena. As one of our friends once said, “You’ve got to see the ‘show’ before you are truly able to criticize the ‘cost’ and risks associated with the transaction.”
There are other circumstantial factors that come into play, such as the probability of getting noticed, the number of other co-workers in the vicinity, the attention being paid to the potentially wayward couple by others in the vicinity, the opportunity to sneak away from the crowd unnoticed, and on and on.
One must also consider the fact that powerful men, once they become powerful and especially when they become rich, attract and draw an exponentially expanding crowd of female admirers. As they begin to appreciate their newfound power, more opportunities are realized. Former President William Jefferson Clinton was once asked why he did what he did with Monica Lewinsky. His answer was about as honest as they come, “Because I could.”
Proximity: All other forces being equal, the closer, and closer, and closer an attractive, appealing woman gets to a man, the higher the probability of straying. A man needs to take responsibility and learn how to avoid looking at an attractive woman, avoid traveling through her department, avoid going out to lunch with her alone, avoid having her in his office alone, and most importantly, avoid closing the door once she enters his office or work place alone.
Have you ever noticed how when two people gradually start closing the spatial gap between them, the sexual tension level rises and they stop talking coherently and logically?
It’s about proximity. You place the right dress, hair style, attitude, perfume, and such together, and things start happening. Milan Kundera (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milan_Kundera), the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unbearable_Lightness_of_Being) might refer to it as “serendipity,” whereas Jung (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung) might refer to it as “synchronicity.” The suggestion that one woman is able to access and enhance her resources in terms of drawing a man to her, and that no other woman can accomplish a similar feat, is sheer science fiction.
Proximity also explains why a seemingly unattractive woman can end up in sexual relationship with a man who seemingly “could do better.” Once again, proximity rules, as does our next factor.
Blood Flow: There is another item of science fiction, or what might be more appropriately termed “sheer folly,” which often comes into play when people misunderstand and underestimate this sex thing. It’s called Nature. Nature rules, and ultimately over the long haul.
Predicting or stopping a tsunami or earthquake? Yeah…. We as humans believe that we can conquer Nature, and on occasion we manage to do so - temporarily. However, at the end of the day, Nature rules. It is fair wiser for us as humans to figure out how to step aside and avoid Nature’s wrath, or simply avoid being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
For men, sex is about blood flow. No blood flow, no sex. That’s what all of this prescription male enhancement junk is about. Quite frankly, any man being straight with you will tell you that having an erection longer than seven minutes is problematic, and presents all sorts of potentially negative ramifications.
Men are hard wired to be aroused, and momentarily distracted by women. Every aspect of our physical being is determined by hard-wiring, accompanied by some electro-chemical impulse. Everything. We often advise her female friends who are mothers of teenage boys that it is all about “blood flow.”
Women can not imagine how a man can have an instantaneous erection due to blood flow, upon observing a desirable woman. You can’t explain this to someone who is not similarly physically hard-wired. Men also can not explain the indiscriminate nature of that force upon being stimulated.
It has nothing to do with logic. It has nothing to do with religion. It has nothing to do with character. It’s bigger than men are.
That does not mean that there are no ways to prevent a distraction. It just means that once all of the forces are in operation, and the circumstances are “conducive,” there is a very high probability that the event will occur. We can virtually guarantee that, given the proper circumstances, any of the “professional, gold digging babes,” to whom we previously referred, could sway the vast majority of bright, successful, responsible, and even religious men to stray.
References to the little brain taking over from the big brain are a little off base. What takes over is that portion of the big brain that drives the little brain below. Take the time to look at any of the science or nature programs dealing with the human brain, and the portions of the brain which come into play during certain activity, especially when survival is necessary.
Sex is about survival of the species. Sex is about procreation. Sex is about perpetuation of the species. It’s not about “I love you, and you love me.” That’s just pure hogwash, and if you believe that, you’re playing a game with yourself. Sex and the sex drive existed long before religion and moral authority decided to categorize it and define it.
(By the way, penetration is highly overrated. In theory, what a man is biologically hard-wired to do is to find a female to allow him to transmit his sperm, deliver that sperm effectively and efficiently, and then back off and move on to more important and logical pursuits. It’s the nature of the beast.)
When a man is one nanosecond away from insertion, he’s not thinking about his wife, loved one, or significant other. He may have been fifteen or twenty minutes prior thereto. But if all of the intervening hurdles have been negotiated, the probability of distraction increases exponentially. (By the way, the Discovery Channel periodically airs a beautiful piece on the Biology of Sex. It is well worth viewing.)
Have you ever noticed the absence of any academicians and scientists discussing marital infidelity on the news shows? Sure, you might occasionally see one dealing with the aftermath, and the negative ramifications, of which there are many. However, how can one solve or address a problem without fully recognizing the underlying causes?
One can not deny the influence of the human brain on human conduct. Check out history and see what happens to humans when they get desperate and are trying to survive. The portion of the brain that makes them behave like animals kicks in. Laura Schaefer is the author of Man with Farm Seeks Woman with Tractor: The Best and the Worst of Personal Ads of All Time(http://books.google.com/books?id=lKd34O9ZBCoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22Man+with+Farm+Seeks+Woman+with+Tractor%22&ei=k7K1SPKOF6fujAHasP07&sig=ACfU3U0Evxd0pKpZjdXduXX0VrtlsiDj5A#PPP7,M1). Although a comedic look at relationships, she does include some scientific evidence in her work to support her position that the male brain is a man’s largest sex organ:
“In males of several species, including humans, the preoptic area hypothalamus is greater in volume, in cross-sectional area and in the number of cells. In men, this area is more than two times larger than in women, and it contains twice as many cells. And what, say you, does this have to do with the horizontal mambo? Plenty. This area of the hypothalamus is in charge of mating behavior….This small structure connects to the pituitary gland, which releases sex hormones. So if your [boyfriend] wants to get intimate all the time and you feel like Ms. Low Desire, remember: You’re just experiencing normal, brain-based differences.”
Relative Absence of Offending Characteristics, and Presence: This too is all about hard-wiring. Every single human sense comes into play in the sexual act. It’s visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory, and on and on. It’s everything at play all at the same time. That’s why no one factor necessarily cuts the event short, unless it is overwhelming or acting in concert with another offensive factor. It’s like a coalition breakdown in the Israeli Knesset (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knesset).
The human body, controlled by the brain, is an amazing mechanism. We are hard-wired to avoid things that are dangerous, whether it be the heat of a fire, or the incredible stench of rotting tissue. The body naturally reacts. As a woman approaches, if the man continues to engage her in the approach, and if no offending characteristic or characteristics are so significant to make him come to his senses quickly, he is done for. If she repulses him, and even a beautiful woman can do this, the event is short-circuited, and the man shakes his head and returns to his senses.
As a general proposition, what men want in life is peace and comfort from a partner, not physical stimulation and intensity. They want to be backed up, not worked up. Support and team work are the keys.
A wise man once said that a man should never marry the woman with whom he has the best sex, or who he thinks is the most beautiful. Simply put, he won’t get anything done in life. He won’t be able to get out of the bed and go to work the next day. Come Monday morning, he’ll show up late and all sorts of negative crap will flow therefrom.
(By the way, this is barbershop confession material. Barbershops did a disservice to men when they started allowing female barbers to practice their trade in the same space. In the interest of equal treatment, perhaps there should be two sections in barbershops, one co-educational, and the other just for men.)
Basic Underlying Problems with Heterosexual Relationships in Modern Post-Industrial Societies
For a broader discussion of the how men and women fail to note the ways in which hard-wiring affects their interaction with one another, you are invited to re-examine an earlier article, Post No. 11 entitled, “The Human Hard Wiring Conundrum (Are We Truly a Higher Form of Animal)” (http://theviewfromoutsidemytinywindow.blogspot.com/2008_05_01_archive.html ). The bottom line is that modern day men and women hook up for too many selfish and personal reasons, and forget the evolutionary and historical issues centered on survival. Heterosexual relationships are supposed to be about teamwork, and the exponential matrix of capabilities flowing from the pairing of two beings with different skills and ways of viewing the world to enhance the probability of survival, not dancing through the clouds in pretty clothes to pretty music.
That’s not to say that we haven’t done our fair share of dancing…. However, it’s a little difficult to bitch about one’s current state of affairs, if one does not take responsibility for one’s choices in life.
Probably the best line about love which we have heard is that “love is not two people staring into the eyes of one another, but rather both of them staring in the same direction together at the same time focused on the same goal.” To further complicate matters, if a relationship is primarily sexually based, the decrease in the stimulation and intensity will occur about as quickly as the increase, if not faster.
When men and women in modern post-industrial society finally realize that there are issues in society larger and more significant than themselves, their children, and the physical structures in which they live (and of relevance to the subject of this article, where a man places his weenie), then we will have made some progress as a society.
When couples feel that their relationship is about to disintegrate, they should consider jointly volunteering their time to an organization such as the AIDS Foundation, or a non-profit searching for the cure for Alzheimer’s disease. That’ll place things into perspective.
What Responsible Couples Can Do to Minimize the Probability of Being Traumatized by a Sexual Affair Hiccup
A man is not a dog, or a creep, or a jerk at the point of penetration alone. The disappointment felt by the woman, and the negative ramifications associated with the conduct are the result of a totality of conduct, each upon being viewed separately, might be considered small and perhaps even benign, but potentially problematic when taken together, especially in rapid succession.
So how does the Institute for Applied Common Sense, a body which advocates taking full and complete responsibility for one’s conduct, suggest that couple approach this potentially debilitating event? There’s a story which we often tell during our seminars which sets up the stage.
It’s Riverside, California several years ago. The clubs are closed and two teenage girls have been out partying. One of the girls has difficulty raising her cousin, and consequently calls 911. The authorities arrive to find the other teenager slumped in a stupor behind the wheel of the car after 2 am, but with a weapon in her lap.
At some point, there is some movement which suggests to the officers that their lives might be threatened. Shortly thereafter, in excess of 42 bullets have been spent shooting at the little girl. Of course, all of the civil rights advocates immediately starting yelling excessive force and police brutality.
However, we viewed the situation differently. We asked, “What were you doing there in that condition in the first place.” One committing an irresponsible act can’t exactly control the response of his loved ones, or expect the response to be one acceptable to the actor. So what you do, as Barney Fife would say, is to “nip it in the bud” early on in the sequence of events. Here’s what we suggest.
1. Do some reading in scientific and biological journals about human conduct and the brain. Watch the Discovery Channel, or National Geographic, or the Learning Channel for shows which explore such subject matter. Read some books discussing the latest research on the brain garnered from recent advances in brain scan research.
2. Recognize and respect Nature for what it is.
3. Immediately after you have that intense, passionate, out of control sexual experience early on in your relationship, have a conversation with your partner about the realm of possibilities as reflected in this article. Although we seriously doubt the conversation will take place prior to rolling on the kitchen floor, freaking out after the man has had the affair with the other woman is a tad bit untimely. So this is a compromise.
4. Perhaps most significantly, center your lives and the relationship, before kids are conceived or at least born, on something or some purpose that is bigger than you, your children, the physical home in which you live, and your personal possessions. When we discussed the generation of this article, The Laughingman responded as follows:
“While I admit that his wife’s cancer status is a complicating factor, on the larger issue, Mr. Edwards did nothing more than what Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Martin Luther King did some years ago, and I suspect for the same reason. What’s interesting is how so many people denigrate their wives for doing the Tammy Wynette, and standing by their men. There is actually something to admire about these heroic women who share the ideals of their spouses, and put aside their natural inclination to seek revenge, which would amount to throwing the babies out with the bath water. Here, here to those who can endure personal disappointment and embarrassment in the public eye, in the pursuit of bigger goals.”
5. Women should recognize that men primarily want peace. Men should recognize that women primarily want a sense of security, including knowing that they are special and number one.
6. Women should recognize that there is always another woman out there with comparable, even though qualitatively different, sexual and physical “talent.” In the same way that a woman manages to attract her husband, another woman can do the same. Consequently, there needs to be something unique and which makes a woman a keeper other than pure sex, as great as that may be perceived in the short term.
7. Continue to engage and stimulate each other intellectually - every single day. (There is perhaps nothing more depressing than to see a couple sitting at a table and not engaging in any type of conversation. We take that back, there is: when the non-communication is taking place in front of their children.)
8. Reduce sex, and particularly penetration, to the lowest point possible on your relationship priority scale. (Well, maybe during the week on school nights.)
We hope this helps. We realize that there is a lot of thinking required to absorb this. However, we can guarantee that there is very little thinking going on when the man is about to betray his woman’s trust and enter the twilight zone.
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
Monday, August 11, 2008
Post 35a: ADULT CONTENT WARNING - Upcoming Article re John Edwards
Within the next 12 to 24 hours, we will provide a very simplistic and realistic explanation of why men have extramarital affairs, no matter what the profession or status of the purported offenders. We are advising you ahead of time to carefully consider whether you want to read Post No. 36, which shall be posted shortly. You may choose to deny access to our site to anyone under 21. Additionally, we are deleting the e-mail addresses of those of you whose work addresses appear on our distribution list. We do not want you to suffer any negative employment law ramifications.
We’re simply sick and tired of everyone talking about this subject year, after year, after year, when they don’t have a clue about which they speak. Even Masters and Johnson knew not about which they spoke. Look for the definitive discussion on the subject. Someone has to have the guts to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Shhhhhhhhooooo… Extramarital sex, get real!
We’re simply sick and tired of everyone talking about this subject year, after year, after year, when they don’t have a clue about which they speak. Even Masters and Johnson knew not about which they spoke. Look for the definitive discussion on the subject. Someone has to have the guts to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Shhhhhhhhooooo… Extramarital sex, get real!
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Post No. 11: The Human Hard Wiring Conundrum (Are We Truly a Higher Form of Animal?)
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
Roughly six years ago, I began to ask a different set of questions about human existence. I started looking for patterns in behavior, and I attempted to identify what might be termed as the “internal consistency.”
With respect to virtually all human conduct, instead of responding or interpreting it from a personal, emotional, or experiential perspective, I tried to first pose other questions, which would bear on my ultimate conclusion, if any, as to the observed conduct.
Although you wouldn’t know it from my articles published thus far, I tried to become cognizant of each time that I used the word, “I,” and I also challenged myself by questioning whether my preconceptions were affecting my ability to fully observe and appreciate all that appeared before me.
I remember thinking that it would be just great to find one book that explained everything. Interestingly enough, I found such a book (or at least its title so indicated), by pure happenstance, on either a table or a park bench, where it had been left in the rain. The book was Ken Wilbur’s A Theory of Everything: An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science, and Spirituality. (http://books.google.com/books?id=PYBKcyEBEZQC&q=%22a+theory+of+everything%22&dq=%22a+theory+of+everything%22&ei=Kh87SIDvNaDsygSy8qHqDw&pgis=1.) Unfortunately, as soon as I came into possession of it, I loaned it to someone and it was never returned. However, it did help to know that others had actually done some work along this line.
Upon returning to my home town in 2002, I managed to re-read another book that helped formulate some of my thoughts in this regard, Vere Gordon Childe’s What Happened in History. (http://books.google.com/books?id=JWsYAAAAMAAJ&q=%22what+happened+in+history%22&dq=%22what+happened+in+history%22&ei=0SU7SJTdEo-KzQSjnoDMCA&pgis=1.) It was a small, Penguin (http://books.google.com/books?q=inpublisher:%22Penguin+books%22&source=gbs_summary_r&cad=0) paperback, with torn and yellow pages, which I had obviously acquired between 1969 and 1971, while I was in college. (The book was originally published in 1950, with a second edition released in 1964. I read the 1964 edition.)
It was so thin that I could not imagine it providing any real insight into the human condition, but I was still fascinated by its ambitious goal, as reflected in its title. I also questioned whether the material in the book was still relevant in 2002, given its 1964 publication date. I quickly established that it was. After all, having covered human conduct for a period spanning thousands of years, the passage of a mere thirty years should not have made that much of a difference. Here was someone trying to explain what had occurred since the beginning of humankind, in a few, short pages. It was after reading this piece that I started truly looking for the “internal consistency” with respect to all human conduct and activity.
After completing Childe’s book, I moved to another textbook from my college days, the two volume set of Technology in Western Civilization. (http://books.google.com/books?id=05IFAAAAMAAJ&q=%22technology+in+western+civilization%22&dq=%22technology+in+western+civilization%22&ei=tDo7SNjhBKDsygSy8qHqDw&pgis=1.) When I was an undergraduate engineering student, my school brought in Harvard educated Dr. Melvin Kranzberg to start teaching several courses. Dr. Kranzberg, who was known as the “Father of the History of Technology,” and edited the work, became one of my mentors. The pages of Technology were also yellow and worn, although in hardback form. Additionally, quite frankly, although it contained lots of yellow highlighting on the pages, suggesting that I read it during the early 1970s, I did not recall much of substance from my first reading. However, on the second reading, it made far more sense, and provided me with a more comprehensive appreciation of the technological forces operating on humankind. It was, as a practical matter, What Happened in History, annotated.
There was one, perhaps less serious volume, which also made an impression on me, provided by my friend Annie, who found it in her storage locker. I had casually mentioned to her that I had been reading a number of books on the theory of everything, and she presented this piece to me as a gift. It was The Straight Dope: A Compendium of Human Knowledge by Cecil Adams. (http://books.google.com/books?id=WpYYAAAAIAAJ&q=%22the+straight+dope%22&dq=%22the+straight+dope%22&ei=5D87SJOyCoe0yQTN75jMDw&pgis=1.)
For years, Adams wrote a newspaper column for the Chicago Reader, a weekly alternative newspaper. On the cover, it revealed that it contained “answers to the questions that torment everyone!” Although I initially thought that it was not something that would aid me in my quest for the grail of internal consistency, not only did I find the sarcastic wit of Adams to be thoroughly entertaining, but it contributed to my theory that to truly understand anything, one must always “dig deeper.” It is at the deeper levels that one begins to observe certain long term patterns. Additionally, unless we’re careful, we can become distracted by symptoms, which can impede our efforts to craft solutions.
The Straight Dope contained the answers to such significant life questions as, “Is it true what they say about Catherine the Great and the horses?” “How do they measure snow?” “Whatever happened to Channel One?” “Why does hair turn gray?” “How do they get the get the stripes into toothpaste?” It also provided further insight into my belief that virtually everything ever done by humans has been done for reasons deemed logical and appropriate at the time, but which may not have involved a lot of research, investigation, or objectivity for that matter.
There is another area of human conduct which I have always found baffling, that being interpersonal relations between males and females. Over the years, I frequently joked with friends that I would ultimately write a book about male – female relations, and that one chapter of the book would be entitled, “Lions, Tigers, and Bears.” During the last twenty years or so of my life, I developed this sense that differences between men and women were more a result of hard wiring of their brains, and that cultural and environmental factors had less influence than perhaps we previously thought. I recall hearing the results of a study in roughly 1993, to the effect that the pattern of brain wave activity was different for men and women when presented with the same mathematical problem, and that this at least partly explained the differences between the two in terms of interest in math and science. The electrochemical paths were along totally different routes.
Frequently in life, one comes up with his or own theories based on their observations, and later determines that there is some element of scientific evidence to support their suspicions. I recall being on a floor in my office building at least thirty-three stories high. I looked out of my window and down the street a couple of blocks, and I was surprised at the sharp detail with which I could see a female figure approaching. I then switched my sight to a male nearby, and the level of detail was not nearly as good. I questioned whether this was a result of evolutionary survival hard wiring.
I had often heard people remark about the frequency with which men “think about sex” and because my personal thoughts did not even nearly approach the suggested level of frequency, I simply thought the comment to be untrue. However, I later began to appreciate that for a man, sex and thoughts of sex, are essentially momentary distractions, and that man’s focus is primarily on “taking care of stuff.” As I walked down the street one day, I came upon a bus stop shelter, which had full length movie posters on each side. As a result, my view of bus riders sitting on the bench was obscured. However, I recall being surprised when I passed the panel, and my “attention” was instantaneously drawn to an attractive, young woman sitting on the bench, to a far greater extent that I would have expected. I was fully distracted. In subsequent conversations with female friends of mine about dealing with their seventeen and eighteen year old sons, I would simply advise them to learn to appreciate the concept of “involuntary blood flow.”
At this point, all of my experiences were personal and anecdotal in nature, without any scientific corroboration. Getting back to the chapter to be entitled, “Lions, Tigers, and Bears,” it just seemed to me that the primary roles and functions of male and female humans were determined by environmental forces that existed for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of years. I always said that the skills and capabilities of men and women were designed evolutionarily to complement one another, not to be in conflict with each other. If we were to have a nuclear holocaust on earth, and there were only two people left, we would want neither two men, nor two women, but rather one man and one woman, and not necessarily just for purposes of propagation. I began to suspect that men and women had different capabilities for a reason – survival. The combination of their skills and capabilities, in my view, achieved exponential gain, not arithmetic. Living in such harsh, hostile environments as jungles, deserts, and mountains for thousands of years without modern conveniences, I suspected that men and women had to divide up their various survival responsibilities based on what they were both best suited to perform with less strain and adaptation. Thus, given a jungle, and a man, woman, and children, and adding approaching or roaming lions, tigers, and bears, you can envision how various tasks may have been divided.
There’s something additional that accompanies the environmental situation. I suspect that most of us would agree that the most important things in life are food, clothing, shelter, and health, and after that perhaps education. One of the most important things that I learned in What Happened in History was significance of the mass cultivation of food. If you were an ancient human and spent all day, and perhaps some portion of the night either picking or hunting food, it probably would not have allowed for much time for a wife to complain about her husband looking at another woman, because he probably would not have had very many opportunities or much energy. If everyone in your tribe was either gathering or hunting for food, that activity minimized the prospect of other activities. It was only after tribes began to join forces, cooperate, and find conditions where food could be cultivated on a much larger scale, could ten people generate food for one hundred, thus allowing the other ninety to pursue other pursuits. This, out of necessity, required collaboration. I would also imagine that if a drought or other calamity came along, the members would resort to hoarding, and more selfish, less collaborative conduct to survive.
Now, as I’ve told you before, I’ve never been married. (Quite frankly, many consider it to be an outdated anthropological institution, with limited societal functions at this in point in the evolution of modern, technological society. However, that is a subject for another day.) I’ve never considered myself qualified for marriage, because my views as to the roles of men and women in society are so radically different from those typically held by others. I believe that the pairing is primarily about function and survival, and not about love and who has a great bod. Some would even argue that it's not even currently about comfort and security, since those features can be provided through other means, if one has sufficient financial resources.
Each time that one of my friends indicated that they had separated from their spouse, I would make the same suggestion. I would suggest that the underlying purpose of their pairing was no longer based on anything of importance or primary significance, or that they had lost sight of it. I would follow by suggesting that if they had to survive in the jungle, they would have a very different view of the importance of their pairing. I frequently suggested that they both volunteer their services to the AIDS Foundation or the American Cancer Society, and after doing so, they would better appreciate how relatively insignificant their personal differences were. (I am sure that no one ever followed my advice.) After all, having had sex with someone else may be a serious violation and breach of trust, but it does not rank up there with the other survival factors. Additionally, I strongly suspect that if an earthquake or tornado struck your home immediately after you found out about your spouse’s indiscretion, the two of you would work your butts off, in a collaborative fashion, to survive, and chat about the infidelity later, if at all. It’s the nature of the beast.
Today, there is quite a bit of research on the differences between the brains of men and women. We now have the capability to conduct brain scans and compare the different ways in which male and female brains function. If we know that so much about our behavior is hard wired, why do men and women continually waste their time arguing about biological determinant issues? It’s because we as humans have the ability to think in ways far differently from animals, which is both good and bad. Very few of us, despite having the capacity, stop to think about the scientific or biological explanations for human conduct. We have the capability to sit back and think through events, and conduct our own research and investigation, before responding. In many instances, we are just lazy. In other instances we are unsophisticated. In still others, we proceed with emotional responses, because it “works” and it is efficient.
Yesterday, I had an extensive conversation with a very good friend of mine, who has one child who is a senior in high school, and another who is a senior in college. I explained that I was part of a team of motivational speakers, and that we would soon embark on a nationwide tour of colleges and universities to engage students in a discussion about personal responsibility. I further informed her that we planned to utilize adults, like me, who had encountered and recovered from various difficulties in life, as teaching vehicles, in conjunction with the latest research on the brain and decision theory. Our primary goal is to provoke thought, encourage students to consider their choices in life, analyze the decisions that they make along with the consequences, and have them recognize the importance of taking personal responsibility for their choices. Our secondary goal is to come up with some fresh, new approaches to addressing their personal and societal problems.
During the course of our discussion, my friend inquired as to whether the students would even be interested in the latest research and science regarding the brain and decision theory. Although I did not provide this response, I feel that they should be interested because it matters. The brain is a significant factor in our human activity. To exclude its role in our conduct, and to fail to factor it in the equation, results in only a partial ability to address aberrant or inappropriate human conduct. We might as well use all of our information and available resources to address problems. It also requires “digging deeper” than the apparent symptoms. Digging only one level to address a problem, frequently results in not addressing it at all, or applying a short term band-aid.
Prior to the generation of this article, I asked a large number of you what the following things had in common:
Your most recent argument or disagreement with your spouse, significant other, or friend;
Your view as to whether America is still the greatest nation on earth;
Your view of the propriety of the criminal jury verdict in the OJ case; and
Your view as to whether we should be in Iraq?
They are all issues about which we had preconceived notions prior to the issue developing or occurring. They are also all issues about which you could feel and respond differently, provided that you received additional information, which might contribute to a better understanding of the issue, prior to passing judgment or criticizing others.
The purpose of all of my articles is to provoke thought. I do not have a position about many things in life. In many ways, that is problematic. I‘ve never had the rigid, dogmatic views which serve as stabilizing forces and parameters in many lives. I wish that I were so cock sure about as many things that others are. I am continually amazed at how readers of my articles respond, either telephonically, via e-mail, or in the form of a comment, and I ask, “Did they read my article?” I posed this question to a friend about the response of a mutual friend, and he indicated that the mutual friend had responded based on the mutual friend’s view of the issue, not what I had actually written. He also suggested that the mutual friend may have made some assumptions about the views and values typically associated with someone fitting my profile.
One of the goals which we will achieve, during my discussion of issues and during our college tour in discussing personal responsibility with students, will be the de-personalization of the analysis, by avoiding subjective and partisan approaches. We believe that the analysis will improve through objectivity (if that can really be achieved) and creativity, and that we can thereafter craft better solutions. The articles appearing on our site below reflect the type of thought process and critical thinking through which we will navigate students in our sessions.
The following is taken from an earlier article, Recognizing the Potential of the Innovative Thought Process:
“Jeffrey Sachs is generally recognized as one of the most influential thinkers of our time. He is the Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. (http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/sections/view/9). He recently published a new book, Common Wealth (http://books.google.com/books?id=t6HDAAAACAAJ&dq=%22Jeffrey+sachs%22&ei=HAU2SLzXDYu4yQTxm8zLDw). During a recent presentation, Sachs argued that we the people of the world are biologically hard-wired and poorly led to always think in terms of us versus them. He advocates a paradigm shift consisting of intellectual collaboration. Simply put, we are capable of thinking our way out of the problems which we are surely about to face, be they global warming or food scarcities. According to Sachs, if we propose a potential solution to a problem, there will always be negative ramifications associated with that solution. However, we as humans have to capability to address those problems and try to minimize the negative impact through thinking. We can not risk being paralyzed by failing to utilize our problem solving capabilities and continuing to conduct business as usual.”
In Henry Hobhouse’s Forces of Change – An Unorthodox View of History (http://books.google.com/books?id=7Bd61vvaI7MC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22forces+of+change%22&ei=ZZY9SPyPE6SMygTPiLXzAg&sig=CVGKHVm_gASmSdzXCT_N8csMPLE), he submits that modern history has been shaped, not so much by human conduct, but rather natural forces consisting of disease, population growth, and food supply. Hobhouse argues that they form a triangle which balances itself. As one changes or alters the dimension on one side of the triangle, there must be commensurate in one or both of the other two sides. To address these natural forces also requires a different type of thinking, more collaborative in nature.
We, as individuals and institutions should be constantly re-examining our conduct and assumptions in a never-ending quest to improve on what we’ve done in the past. Isn’t that, theoretically, one of the things that separates humans from animals – our ability to consciously improve our status and the things around us? So why rely on old methods? Why maintain the status quo? Does the fact that some advocate change in a society mean that they want to destroy it? Isn’t any organization or entity interested in maintaining a high standard, and avoiding complacency, constantly reinventing itself by changing those things that don’t work well, and continuing those practices that do? The mere mention that we can do better does not necessarily imply that where we are is a bad place.
We, as a society, have to do a better job of focusing on shared interests, and collaborating with one another. How about a little more energy on the front end taking the time to listen, conduct research, consider the historical and scientific explanations for events and positions, and other explanations, before instituting responsive conduct. To listen to, or view, someone only through your worldview lens and filter, may mean that you’ve never really listened to or seen them at all. Remember that line from the old song from the 1970s? “Expand your mind, you might be surprised at what you might find.”
I’m done - way done. This one required way too much work.
Roughly six years ago, I began to ask a different set of questions about human existence. I started looking for patterns in behavior, and I attempted to identify what might be termed as the “internal consistency.”
With respect to virtually all human conduct, instead of responding or interpreting it from a personal, emotional, or experiential perspective, I tried to first pose other questions, which would bear on my ultimate conclusion, if any, as to the observed conduct.
Although you wouldn’t know it from my articles published thus far, I tried to become cognizant of each time that I used the word, “I,” and I also challenged myself by questioning whether my preconceptions were affecting my ability to fully observe and appreciate all that appeared before me.
I remember thinking that it would be just great to find one book that explained everything. Interestingly enough, I found such a book (or at least its title so indicated), by pure happenstance, on either a table or a park bench, where it had been left in the rain. The book was Ken Wilbur’s A Theory of Everything: An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science, and Spirituality. (http://books.google.com/books?id=PYBKcyEBEZQC&q=%22a+theory+of+everything%22&dq=%22a+theory+of+everything%22&ei=Kh87SIDvNaDsygSy8qHqDw&pgis=1.) Unfortunately, as soon as I came into possession of it, I loaned it to someone and it was never returned. However, it did help to know that others had actually done some work along this line.
Upon returning to my home town in 2002, I managed to re-read another book that helped formulate some of my thoughts in this regard, Vere Gordon Childe’s What Happened in History. (http://books.google.com/books?id=JWsYAAAAMAAJ&q=%22what+happened+in+history%22&dq=%22what+happened+in+history%22&ei=0SU7SJTdEo-KzQSjnoDMCA&pgis=1.) It was a small, Penguin (http://books.google.com/books?q=inpublisher:%22Penguin+books%22&source=gbs_summary_r&cad=0) paperback, with torn and yellow pages, which I had obviously acquired between 1969 and 1971, while I was in college. (The book was originally published in 1950, with a second edition released in 1964. I read the 1964 edition.)
It was so thin that I could not imagine it providing any real insight into the human condition, but I was still fascinated by its ambitious goal, as reflected in its title. I also questioned whether the material in the book was still relevant in 2002, given its 1964 publication date. I quickly established that it was. After all, having covered human conduct for a period spanning thousands of years, the passage of a mere thirty years should not have made that much of a difference. Here was someone trying to explain what had occurred since the beginning of humankind, in a few, short pages. It was after reading this piece that I started truly looking for the “internal consistency” with respect to all human conduct and activity.
After completing Childe’s book, I moved to another textbook from my college days, the two volume set of Technology in Western Civilization. (http://books.google.com/books?id=05IFAAAAMAAJ&q=%22technology+in+western+civilization%22&dq=%22technology+in+western+civilization%22&ei=tDo7SNjhBKDsygSy8qHqDw&pgis=1.) When I was an undergraduate engineering student, my school brought in Harvard educated Dr. Melvin Kranzberg to start teaching several courses. Dr. Kranzberg, who was known as the “Father of the History of Technology,” and edited the work, became one of my mentors. The pages of Technology were also yellow and worn, although in hardback form. Additionally, quite frankly, although it contained lots of yellow highlighting on the pages, suggesting that I read it during the early 1970s, I did not recall much of substance from my first reading. However, on the second reading, it made far more sense, and provided me with a more comprehensive appreciation of the technological forces operating on humankind. It was, as a practical matter, What Happened in History, annotated.
There was one, perhaps less serious volume, which also made an impression on me, provided by my friend Annie, who found it in her storage locker. I had casually mentioned to her that I had been reading a number of books on the theory of everything, and she presented this piece to me as a gift. It was The Straight Dope: A Compendium of Human Knowledge by Cecil Adams. (http://books.google.com/books?id=WpYYAAAAIAAJ&q=%22the+straight+dope%22&dq=%22the+straight+dope%22&ei=5D87SJOyCoe0yQTN75jMDw&pgis=1.)
For years, Adams wrote a newspaper column for the Chicago Reader, a weekly alternative newspaper. On the cover, it revealed that it contained “answers to the questions that torment everyone!” Although I initially thought that it was not something that would aid me in my quest for the grail of internal consistency, not only did I find the sarcastic wit of Adams to be thoroughly entertaining, but it contributed to my theory that to truly understand anything, one must always “dig deeper.” It is at the deeper levels that one begins to observe certain long term patterns. Additionally, unless we’re careful, we can become distracted by symptoms, which can impede our efforts to craft solutions.
The Straight Dope contained the answers to such significant life questions as, “Is it true what they say about Catherine the Great and the horses?” “How do they measure snow?” “Whatever happened to Channel One?” “Why does hair turn gray?” “How do they get the get the stripes into toothpaste?” It also provided further insight into my belief that virtually everything ever done by humans has been done for reasons deemed logical and appropriate at the time, but which may not have involved a lot of research, investigation, or objectivity for that matter.
There is another area of human conduct which I have always found baffling, that being interpersonal relations between males and females. Over the years, I frequently joked with friends that I would ultimately write a book about male – female relations, and that one chapter of the book would be entitled, “Lions, Tigers, and Bears.” During the last twenty years or so of my life, I developed this sense that differences between men and women were more a result of hard wiring of their brains, and that cultural and environmental factors had less influence than perhaps we previously thought. I recall hearing the results of a study in roughly 1993, to the effect that the pattern of brain wave activity was different for men and women when presented with the same mathematical problem, and that this at least partly explained the differences between the two in terms of interest in math and science. The electrochemical paths were along totally different routes.
Frequently in life, one comes up with his or own theories based on their observations, and later determines that there is some element of scientific evidence to support their suspicions. I recall being on a floor in my office building at least thirty-three stories high. I looked out of my window and down the street a couple of blocks, and I was surprised at the sharp detail with which I could see a female figure approaching. I then switched my sight to a male nearby, and the level of detail was not nearly as good. I questioned whether this was a result of evolutionary survival hard wiring.
I had often heard people remark about the frequency with which men “think about sex” and because my personal thoughts did not even nearly approach the suggested level of frequency, I simply thought the comment to be untrue. However, I later began to appreciate that for a man, sex and thoughts of sex, are essentially momentary distractions, and that man’s focus is primarily on “taking care of stuff.” As I walked down the street one day, I came upon a bus stop shelter, which had full length movie posters on each side. As a result, my view of bus riders sitting on the bench was obscured. However, I recall being surprised when I passed the panel, and my “attention” was instantaneously drawn to an attractive, young woman sitting on the bench, to a far greater extent that I would have expected. I was fully distracted. In subsequent conversations with female friends of mine about dealing with their seventeen and eighteen year old sons, I would simply advise them to learn to appreciate the concept of “involuntary blood flow.”
At this point, all of my experiences were personal and anecdotal in nature, without any scientific corroboration. Getting back to the chapter to be entitled, “Lions, Tigers, and Bears,” it just seemed to me that the primary roles and functions of male and female humans were determined by environmental forces that existed for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of years. I always said that the skills and capabilities of men and women were designed evolutionarily to complement one another, not to be in conflict with each other. If we were to have a nuclear holocaust on earth, and there were only two people left, we would want neither two men, nor two women, but rather one man and one woman, and not necessarily just for purposes of propagation. I began to suspect that men and women had different capabilities for a reason – survival. The combination of their skills and capabilities, in my view, achieved exponential gain, not arithmetic. Living in such harsh, hostile environments as jungles, deserts, and mountains for thousands of years without modern conveniences, I suspected that men and women had to divide up their various survival responsibilities based on what they were both best suited to perform with less strain and adaptation. Thus, given a jungle, and a man, woman, and children, and adding approaching or roaming lions, tigers, and bears, you can envision how various tasks may have been divided.
There’s something additional that accompanies the environmental situation. I suspect that most of us would agree that the most important things in life are food, clothing, shelter, and health, and after that perhaps education. One of the most important things that I learned in What Happened in History was significance of the mass cultivation of food. If you were an ancient human and spent all day, and perhaps some portion of the night either picking or hunting food, it probably would not have allowed for much time for a wife to complain about her husband looking at another woman, because he probably would not have had very many opportunities or much energy. If everyone in your tribe was either gathering or hunting for food, that activity minimized the prospect of other activities. It was only after tribes began to join forces, cooperate, and find conditions where food could be cultivated on a much larger scale, could ten people generate food for one hundred, thus allowing the other ninety to pursue other pursuits. This, out of necessity, required collaboration. I would also imagine that if a drought or other calamity came along, the members would resort to hoarding, and more selfish, less collaborative conduct to survive.
Now, as I’ve told you before, I’ve never been married. (Quite frankly, many consider it to be an outdated anthropological institution, with limited societal functions at this in point in the evolution of modern, technological society. However, that is a subject for another day.) I’ve never considered myself qualified for marriage, because my views as to the roles of men and women in society are so radically different from those typically held by others. I believe that the pairing is primarily about function and survival, and not about love and who has a great bod. Some would even argue that it's not even currently about comfort and security, since those features can be provided through other means, if one has sufficient financial resources.
Each time that one of my friends indicated that they had separated from their spouse, I would make the same suggestion. I would suggest that the underlying purpose of their pairing was no longer based on anything of importance or primary significance, or that they had lost sight of it. I would follow by suggesting that if they had to survive in the jungle, they would have a very different view of the importance of their pairing. I frequently suggested that they both volunteer their services to the AIDS Foundation or the American Cancer Society, and after doing so, they would better appreciate how relatively insignificant their personal differences were. (I am sure that no one ever followed my advice.) After all, having had sex with someone else may be a serious violation and breach of trust, but it does not rank up there with the other survival factors. Additionally, I strongly suspect that if an earthquake or tornado struck your home immediately after you found out about your spouse’s indiscretion, the two of you would work your butts off, in a collaborative fashion, to survive, and chat about the infidelity later, if at all. It’s the nature of the beast.
Today, there is quite a bit of research on the differences between the brains of men and women. We now have the capability to conduct brain scans and compare the different ways in which male and female brains function. If we know that so much about our behavior is hard wired, why do men and women continually waste their time arguing about biological determinant issues? It’s because we as humans have the ability to think in ways far differently from animals, which is both good and bad. Very few of us, despite having the capacity, stop to think about the scientific or biological explanations for human conduct. We have the capability to sit back and think through events, and conduct our own research and investigation, before responding. In many instances, we are just lazy. In other instances we are unsophisticated. In still others, we proceed with emotional responses, because it “works” and it is efficient.
Yesterday, I had an extensive conversation with a very good friend of mine, who has one child who is a senior in high school, and another who is a senior in college. I explained that I was part of a team of motivational speakers, and that we would soon embark on a nationwide tour of colleges and universities to engage students in a discussion about personal responsibility. I further informed her that we planned to utilize adults, like me, who had encountered and recovered from various difficulties in life, as teaching vehicles, in conjunction with the latest research on the brain and decision theory. Our primary goal is to provoke thought, encourage students to consider their choices in life, analyze the decisions that they make along with the consequences, and have them recognize the importance of taking personal responsibility for their choices. Our secondary goal is to come up with some fresh, new approaches to addressing their personal and societal problems.
During the course of our discussion, my friend inquired as to whether the students would even be interested in the latest research and science regarding the brain and decision theory. Although I did not provide this response, I feel that they should be interested because it matters. The brain is a significant factor in our human activity. To exclude its role in our conduct, and to fail to factor it in the equation, results in only a partial ability to address aberrant or inappropriate human conduct. We might as well use all of our information and available resources to address problems. It also requires “digging deeper” than the apparent symptoms. Digging only one level to address a problem, frequently results in not addressing it at all, or applying a short term band-aid.
Prior to the generation of this article, I asked a large number of you what the following things had in common:
Your most recent argument or disagreement with your spouse, significant other, or friend;
Your view as to whether America is still the greatest nation on earth;
Your view of the propriety of the criminal jury verdict in the OJ case; and
Your view as to whether we should be in Iraq?
They are all issues about which we had preconceived notions prior to the issue developing or occurring. They are also all issues about which you could feel and respond differently, provided that you received additional information, which might contribute to a better understanding of the issue, prior to passing judgment or criticizing others.
The purpose of all of my articles is to provoke thought. I do not have a position about many things in life. In many ways, that is problematic. I‘ve never had the rigid, dogmatic views which serve as stabilizing forces and parameters in many lives. I wish that I were so cock sure about as many things that others are. I am continually amazed at how readers of my articles respond, either telephonically, via e-mail, or in the form of a comment, and I ask, “Did they read my article?” I posed this question to a friend about the response of a mutual friend, and he indicated that the mutual friend had responded based on the mutual friend’s view of the issue, not what I had actually written. He also suggested that the mutual friend may have made some assumptions about the views and values typically associated with someone fitting my profile.
One of the goals which we will achieve, during my discussion of issues and during our college tour in discussing personal responsibility with students, will be the de-personalization of the analysis, by avoiding subjective and partisan approaches. We believe that the analysis will improve through objectivity (if that can really be achieved) and creativity, and that we can thereafter craft better solutions. The articles appearing on our site below reflect the type of thought process and critical thinking through which we will navigate students in our sessions.
The following is taken from an earlier article, Recognizing the Potential of the Innovative Thought Process:
“Jeffrey Sachs is generally recognized as one of the most influential thinkers of our time. He is the Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. (http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/sections/view/9). He recently published a new book, Common Wealth (http://books.google.com/books?id=t6HDAAAACAAJ&dq=%22Jeffrey+sachs%22&ei=HAU2SLzXDYu4yQTxm8zLDw). During a recent presentation, Sachs argued that we the people of the world are biologically hard-wired and poorly led to always think in terms of us versus them. He advocates a paradigm shift consisting of intellectual collaboration. Simply put, we are capable of thinking our way out of the problems which we are surely about to face, be they global warming or food scarcities. According to Sachs, if we propose a potential solution to a problem, there will always be negative ramifications associated with that solution. However, we as humans have to capability to address those problems and try to minimize the negative impact through thinking. We can not risk being paralyzed by failing to utilize our problem solving capabilities and continuing to conduct business as usual.”
In Henry Hobhouse’s Forces of Change – An Unorthodox View of History (http://books.google.com/books?id=7Bd61vvaI7MC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22forces+of+change%22&ei=ZZY9SPyPE6SMygTPiLXzAg&sig=CVGKHVm_gASmSdzXCT_N8csMPLE), he submits that modern history has been shaped, not so much by human conduct, but rather natural forces consisting of disease, population growth, and food supply. Hobhouse argues that they form a triangle which balances itself. As one changes or alters the dimension on one side of the triangle, there must be commensurate in one or both of the other two sides. To address these natural forces also requires a different type of thinking, more collaborative in nature.
We, as individuals and institutions should be constantly re-examining our conduct and assumptions in a never-ending quest to improve on what we’ve done in the past. Isn’t that, theoretically, one of the things that separates humans from animals – our ability to consciously improve our status and the things around us? So why rely on old methods? Why maintain the status quo? Does the fact that some advocate change in a society mean that they want to destroy it? Isn’t any organization or entity interested in maintaining a high standard, and avoiding complacency, constantly reinventing itself by changing those things that don’t work well, and continuing those practices that do? The mere mention that we can do better does not necessarily imply that where we are is a bad place.
We, as a society, have to do a better job of focusing on shared interests, and collaborating with one another. How about a little more energy on the front end taking the time to listen, conduct research, consider the historical and scientific explanations for events and positions, and other explanations, before instituting responsive conduct. To listen to, or view, someone only through your worldview lens and filter, may mean that you’ve never really listened to or seen them at all. Remember that line from the old song from the 1970s? “Expand your mind, you might be surprised at what you might find.”
I’m done - way done. This one required way too much work.
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