Anti-pua attitude - good or bad?

[dr. love]

I read the other topic about the dark side of pua and even though I agree with a lot that's been said, I think the common anti-pua attitude isn't actually a good thing.

A lot of guys who get good at pick up start to resent everything that's related to pua. Two years ago many advanced guys left the biggest pua-forum in my country and started some hidden discussion board for men, where they only talk about non-pick up stuff like fishing, yoga, cars etc. Maybe it's good for their lives to focus on living like a man instead of reading overcomplicated pua-advice on the internet, but the problem is that the old forum is now filled with bad advice and it's pretty much a situation where the blind are leading the blind.

The question is, where do guys go for advice when people abandon pua? There's not that many good alternatives and sites like puahate (which will only make people think it's impossible for an average guy to get laid) will get even more recognition. I agree that the pua-stuff is creating some negative things, but many men would be much much worse off without it (including me). And it seems like the pua guys who actually start to internalize all the good advice that's out there (products of Carlos Xuma for example) do get their lives together and get really good at seducing women and they don't really need a huge pua-detox at all.

And another thing is, if you read a book that's clearly a market product and you take everything religiously, is it the fault of the industry or is it actually your fault? I mean, do you trust all the products that promise you'll get a six pack in four weeks? I think a lot of the pua hate actually comes from a very immature place.

If you can't offer anything better instead, do you really have a right to say "fuck all pua shit"? Without the pua community, guys would be on average worse off than they are right now. Many of the guys would end up in poor marriages, being cheated on and lose their children (and perhaps their money) in the divorce. But hey, at least they never became pua-weirdos, right? I think everyone has a responsibility when they ditch the community and tell people to stay away from it. Are you really helping people or are you just keeping them away from something that could maybe even save their lives?

[Halo Effect]

Quote:The question is, where do guys go for advice when people abandon pua?

They can come to this site. This website is not pua but a much healthier and more mature place where men can improve their dating lives, as well as their emotional well-being and overall lifestyle.

You are looking at the answer to your questions.

[dr. love]

(03-09-2012 11:46 AM)Halo Effect Wrote:  

Quote:The question is, where do guys go for advice when people abandon pua?

They can come to this site. This website is not pua but a much healthier and more mature place where men can improve their dating lives, as well as their emotional well-being and overall lifestyle.

You are looking at the answer to your questions.

You're right, this is the site. But my concern was the "fuck pua"-attitude in general, outside of postmasculine. Because it seems to me like a lot of the good stuff of the pua-community will go down the drain, because people have started to despise pua-stuff but the non-advanced guys won't find boards like this either. I mean, most of my pua-friends who have been in the community for ages haven't heard about Mark or this site, so how soon are the newbies going to end up here? I'm not saying postmasculine users can do much about it, I'm just trying to arouse discussion about the current state of the community.

[Peanut]

(03-09-2012 12:25 PM)dr. love Wrote:  Because it seems to me like a lot of the good stuff of the pua-community will go down the drain

Like what? :/ Using any kind of "tricks" works way less good than being normal.

[Chaos]

Actually is not such and overcomlicated subject. I'm not a fun of anti PUA stuff nor against the general teachings, the problem comes when people see it as a way to make easy money. Basically it becomes another form of scum... A very powerful one.

Fact is men are incredibly susceptible to some specific topics, the same way women are about others and pickup is among them. In addition a good amount of guys who arrive to the pickup community have low self esteem in that specific aspect of their lifes so they're even more malleable than usual. We all know the urge of bragging in front of other men, we are competitive by nature and, being as it is a topic related to "manhood", the ability with women is a subject prone to raise all kind of over exaggeration.

Now, there're people who will read pickup stuff, extract the interesting advice that applies for them and have enough common sense to leave the rest out... Other will get suck into it and deify a couple of guys. The pattern is similar to a cult, sad as it may be, and has similar consequences.

To answer your question about, where to go to learn PUA stuff... The answer is OUT, you just gotta go out, that's all. Seriously, there aren't that many things that you need to know theoretically, a couple of things shall suffice: how to approach, how to engage in conversation, how to go for the kiss. Seriously, that's all it takes, then practice makes the master. Different PUAs have different methods, some will try to get a lot of money from you, some will give it for free but if you read enough you'll discover the basics are always the same, very little change in what's actually needed, a lot of different ways todo the same thing and a couple of techniques that may or may to help you, but in the end, luckily, we human are intelligent (so they say) so the fastest way to improve is by practicing. I'm really sure that all you REALLY need is the general direction and the will to continue walking the road... Anything else are just aids or intellectually interesting but not essential to reach the destination.

For example, MM for me was a way to encourage me, "it can be done"... While models was a way to ease my mind, "it can be done congruently with who you are" and an interesting read... But what has made me better picking up girls (and I do not consider myself a "master" in any possible way) is going out and trying things. And it has been painful and frustrating (already is). I could talk about numbers, which have improved a lot since two years ago, but really, the MAJOR change I've experienced is that every rejection for me use to lead to the feeling: "there must be something wrong with me", later, "there's must be something wrong with her" and NOW: "doesn't matter, we must not be compatible or something".

So just pickup the basics and go out and try by yourself.

[dr. love]

(03-09-2012 01:24 PM)Peanut Wrote:  

(03-09-2012 12:25 PM)dr. love Wrote:  Because it seems to me like a lot of the good stuff of the pua-community will go down the drain

Like what? :/ Using any kind of "tricks" works way less good than being normal.

There's good stuff in a lot of products. There's really useful non-manipulative information even in Revelations by Mystery (even though there's a lot of bad stuff too). But I could see especially books like Secrets of the Alpha Man by Carlos Xuma and On Being a Man by David DeAngelo being very useful to pretty much any guy out there. I still think On Being a Man is one of the best products out there.

@ Chaos
I've seen a few guys who have "done it" without any pua-stuff. Some of them end up fucking a lot of at least semi-beautiful chicks, some of them end up going home with only fat chicks. Yeah, I can see the learning by doing being the best solution for some guys, but I know guys with no AA at all who have such difficulties with their inner game that they always end up fucking fat girls. They have a lot of reference experiences, but they never really realize what their real issues are. Or even if they do, they don't know how to solve them.

[Mark]

I agree with you in general dr. love. PUA has a lot of toxic aspects to it, but a lot of people throw the baby out with the bath water. There are a lot of things to be gained from that movement... it's just hard for guys with no experience or self-confidence to distinguish what is good, helpful advice, and what is toxic, unhealthy advice.

http://postmasculine.com/15-things
http://postmasculine.com/pickup-artist

If you haven't read them. Both kind of cover my love/hate feelings towards it.

And also, Carlos doesn't self-identify as a PUA. Nor do I. Nor does Paul Janka. Nor does David DeAngelo. Nor does Christian Hudson. A lot of people mistake products that PUA's buy, to be PUA products. PUA's buy my stuff, but I am not a PUA.

[Peanut]

Um. In terms of giving advice on how to get women, science says there are two things which women find attractive: looks and resources (weight of importance varies on relationship intent from long-term to short-term). You can disagree with me all you want, but I'd rather believe what science says than some PUA wannabe-womanizer who writes articles on the internet to make money. I've never read a study which said that women are attracted to personality or confidence. And from an evo psych perspective, this makes sense. After all, for the most part, personalities are not genetically defined (whereas looks are and resources to some extent as well through inherited intelligence/resourcefulness). Proneness to personality disorders is heritable to some extent (depression, narcisism, autism and so forth). So these things may kill attraction because women will feel there is something not right about you (this is just me speculating there is no evidence for this). PUA causes men without personality disorders to come across as if they do have them in terms of "trying to be dominant (AMOG'ing)" or following defined routines without regard for real human interaction.

You have to realize women have evolved for millions of years to respond to looks and resources. Confidence (or behaving like an alpha male) at best is a byproduct of looks and resources and not a trigger that creates sexual attraction.

So any book for men who suck with women is to address only (and nothing other than) this:
1) Work on your looks
2) Acquire resources
3) Approach

The only useful advice out there is the advice that pertains directly to accomplishing these goals. Workout schedules, actual degrees and exercises to overcome AA are useful. "How to become an alpha male" will maybe give you temporary (false) confidence and aid you in approaching women, but it does so in a roundabout way which will fill your head with a lot of useless crap and the women will probably reject you because, again, confidence in itself does not create sexual attraction.

Maybe you can explain to me why I've never met a deeply confident bad-looking poor guy (confident right, not arrogant/cocky) and why I've never met a deeply insecure attractive (rich) guy (over 21...has to be said teenagers are almost all insecure) who didn't have a clinical personality disorder either.

What self-help for men should strive to do is to focus on self-acceptance and the search for a meaningful purpose in life. It's these things tend to lead to attractive people with matching behaviour. That's why I'm still reading this site, it has lots of information on how to achieve just that.

By the way, I don't actually believe you can "learn confidence" but for the sake of argument this post pretends that it might be possible.

Edit: By the way, I am not saying that learned confidence is totally useless (if it exists at all). It could (maybe) be useful when dealing with other males who are high confidence (and thus usually high-value) and making friends with them because from males you want respect as opposed to sexual attraction. It would not surprise me if confidence was a respect-trigger. It still doesn't make you any more attractive, though.

[Tim]

How do you 'unlike' a post? I definitely did not mean to like that post.

(03-09-2012 07:18 PM)Peanut Wrote:  Um. In terms of giving advice on how to get women, science says

Well this is a bad start; anytime I see the words 'science says' a huge red flag is raised in my mind. And when it comes to advice on dating or women, well...

(03-09-2012 07:18 PM)Peanut Wrote:  You can disagree with me all you want

And I do, but it's not worth my time explaining why.

Dude, you need to go out and approach some women without these insanely limiting lenses on. If you can look honestly at things for just a very short amount of time, you'll be able to see very clearly how important personality is. It defines your entire initial compatibility with a girl, and compatibility is a huge part of attraction, especially on a shallower level. Same with confidence, which will generally create a ceiling for the quality of the women you attract.

[Peanut]

If you want to be in a long-term relationship personality is going to matter (in terms of longevity) and so obviously girls who are looking for a long-term relationship are going to look for that as well. But it does not create attraction, it is simply some box on a checklist they need to check. All I am saying is you cannot create SEXUAL attraction with your personality, which is the main point of the PUAs. Is a girl you're not even slightly attracted to ever going to make you want to sleep with her by behaving a certain way (like telling you how she dated some movie star before or that she had some crazy awesome superfun adventure)? It doesn't work the other way around either. Or do you think some dude in the club hooking up with a hot girl did so because they had compatible personalities?
.

[Tim]

Ok, I see what you're saying, and I agree with it somewhat. You can't make more girls attracted to you just by changing your personality to suit each one, which is what PUA game attempts to do.

But your personality definitely creates sexual attraction. A joke that I make might be boring for one girl, but witty for another. And that can create sexual attraction. Same with talking about politics, or travel, or whatever. And all that is based on personality.

(03-09-2012 11:50 PM)Peanut Wrote:  Or do you think some dude in the club hooking up with a hot girl did so because they had compatible personalities?
.

Yes, absolutely. It might be a shallow compatibility, but it's got to be there. Hot club girls might be shallow in what they look for in a guy, or they might have low standards about what that is, but compatibility is still very important to them. Things like confidence, power, etc can lower the requirement a girl might have for compatibility, but it's always there.

[Peanut]

One girl laughs at your jokes because she thinks you're physically attractive and the other one doesn't. The women you have to be weary of are those who laugh at every man's jokes (unless they all happen to be superfunny).

Thinking you can seduce women with your witty jokes makes no more sense than astrology to me. You're looking for causal relations (like all PUAs) where there aren't any to be found.

(And everybody who is "normal" is compatible with everybody else who is "normal" personality-wise, which is obviously most people)

[Halo Effect]

Wow peanut you are so wrong. Believe the opposite of every single sentence you typed and you will be better off.

[Tim]

(03-10-2012 12:10 AM)Peanut Wrote:  One girl laughs at your jokes because she thinks you're physically attractive and the other one doesn't. The women you have to be weary of are those who laugh at every man's jokes (unless they all happen to be superfunny).

Thinking you can seduce women with your witty jokes makes no more sense than astrology to me. You're looking for causal relations (like all PUAs) where there aren't any to be found.

Wow, that's crazy that you see the world like that...

Why do my friends laugh at my jokes? Is it because they want me to like them, or because they find me physically attractive? No, it's because they find them funny. Hence why they're my friends. Is that not true for you?

You're right, I don't seduce women with the jokes themselves, I seduce women with my jokes because they're an extension of my personality, and they find that personality attractive.

With the way you're painting things, all our motivations come from trying to maximise resources. That's a dark place to be coming from.

[Peanut]

(03-10-2012 12:13 AM)Halo Effect Wrote:  Wow peanut you are so wrong. Believe the opposite of every single sentence you typed and you will be better off.

Show me anything that might indicate that guys who are unattractive & poor with an awesome personality/great "game" in solid relationships with a high-class hot girl consist of more than ~1% of all relationships.

Hell, even if you can show me that a situation like this is more than 1% of all club hookups I might consider it.

Tell you what, why don't you go stand outside a club for an evening and see if you see any ugly guys (who must have awesome game) coming out with girls significantly better looking than themselves. Luckily this has been done already and the results back my story, but if you don't believe me go for it.

[Jon]

I actually have a great natural experiment for this. NY law firms. Everybody at every big firm in NYC makes the same money, per year, basically. So, we have factored out resources. I can tell you that there are good looking guys who do a lot worse than some less attractive guys I know, who are just fucking cool.

[Peanut]

(03-10-2012 12:15 AM)Tim Wrote:  Why do my friends laugh at my jokes? Is it because they want me to like them, or because they find me physically attractive? No, it's because they find them funny. Hence why they're my friends. Is that not true for you?

You're right, I don't seduce women with the jokes themselves, I seduce women with my jokes because they're an extension of my personality, and they find that personality attractive.

With the way you're painting things, all our motivations come from trying to maximise resources. That's a dark place to be coming from.

Dunno, your jokes might be funny. Maybe not. I don't know you or your friends so I can't say what case it is, but it is a well-known fact that people laugh at each other's jokes as a form of relationship building. This is subconscious of course, it's not like they are literally thinking "oh I must laugh now so we will like each other". If a stand-up comedian on TV would make the same jokes would your friends laugh? If so, congratulations, you are actually funny.

I'm coming from a place of if you want to be with the best women you need to be the best yourself. And "the best" is defined very clearly as being the best looking and the most resourceful.

PUA's are coming from a place where it's OK to be fat, ugly and/or poor as long as you act cool.

I still like my version better.

---

(03-10-2012 12:24 AM)Jon Wrote:  I actually have a great natural experiment for this. NY law firms. Everybody at every big firm in NYC makes the same money, per year, basically. So, we have factored out resources. I can tell you that there are good looking guys who do a lot worse than some less attractive guys I know, who are just fucking cool.

What you would consider "good looking" as a male is not necessarily what females consider sexually attractive. There is reasonably decent research on that topic so so go find out what it is, compare that research with your findings and then see how it turns out.

Also, I did point out that next to looks and resources confidence is important because it makes you approach. If you don't approach nothing happens. So if those good looking guys don't approach the women then obviously their problem is in the confidence department (but women aren't more or less attracted to them due to it, it's just that women will almost never make the first move).

[Halo Effect]

How can you possibly read postmasculine and still believe that the only relevant things are money and looks?

I call troll. I will not waste intelligent arguments on this.

[Peanut]

(03-10-2012 12:34 AM)Halo Effect Wrote:  How can you possibly read postmasculine and still believe that the only relevant things are money and looks?

I call troll. I will not waste intelligent arguments on this.

Postmasculine has a lot of style tips (part of looks), recently some stuff about posture (looks), stuff about job interviews (part of money), and a lot of things on how to fix your inner insecurities (part of approaching).

I actually haven't seen anything about "developing a personality which will attract women" which I consider lame and stupid (PUA) and a lot of stuff about "how to develop into being a good-looking, resourceful and confident (i.e. able to approach)".

To clarify: money, looks AND ABILITY TO APPROACH are important imo (and being "normal" personality-wise).

[Tim]

(03-10-2012 12:40 AM)Peanut Wrote:  

(03-10-2012 12:34 AM)Halo Effect Wrote:  How can you possibly read postmasculine and still believe that the only relevant things are money and looks?

I call troll. I will not waste intelligent arguments on this.

Postmasculine has a lot of style tips (part of looks), recently some stuff about posture (looks), stuff about job interviews (part of money), and a lot of things on how to fix your inner insecurities (part of approaching).

I actually haven't seen anything about "developing a personality which will attract women"

Urgh, that's because developing a personality is not something you learn how to do in a book or on a website. And to view it as if you could is extremely soul destroying. You develop your personality based on what makes you tick as a person. For me that's women, dating, indie music, The Wire, football, the tech industry, education, and a million other things. I didn't base these things on what others would think of them, they just came to me. Same with everyone in the world, even those who think they base what they live for on their rational interests.

Expressing these things in an attractive way CAN be learned though, and this site does teach that. It should too; expressing your personality more honestly and clearly makes for more interesting interactions, a more open world, and a richer life.

Halo Effect is right, even if you aren't a troll, this is too depressing to argue any further.

[IdEngager]

Good thing I'm both good looking and rolling in the dough.

Ladies, the line to my penis starts right here.



(Waits for anyone to question why I'm on Postmasculine.com still)

[luda]

(03-10-2012 04:37 AM)IdEngager Wrote:  Good thing I'm both good looking and rolling in the dough.

Ladies, the line to my penis starts right here.



(Waits for anyone to question why I'm on Postmasculine.com still)

Love this response.
Yes looks and being successful in life does help but too go as far as Peanut and say its the only thing that matters is unbelievably ignorant and it removes all responsibility from yourself for not being good with women

[Peanut]

All right, there may be some misunderstandings about my point.

There is no such thing as "being good with women". But there is such a thing as being bad with them.

PUAs say: If a woman is not initially physically attracted to you, then you can make her attracted by displaying certain behaviours like <insert particular PUA method here>

I say: If a woman is not initially physically attracted to you, she never will be (unless MAYBE if you improve your looks). However, if she is, you can make her unattracted by displaying certain behaviours (like neediness, douchebagness etc).

I'm sure you can appreciate the difference. In one case it would make sense to develop your personality to be more compatible with women where in the other case it would make sense to fix your lingering issues like neediness or severe insecurity.

That said, I am only saying that you can't make women sexually attracted to you by way of personality like the PUAs claim. To think that you can is detrimental because every time you get rejected you will think it was because of something you did (rather than because you may just not be physically/genetically compatible).

Of course having a great personality and lifestyle is awesome but it won't make women more or less sexually attracted like PUAs claim (it will however make them more likely, if they are attracted in the first place, to want to be in a LTR with you, like I said before).

So to recap, I am not saying "only looks (& money) matter"! I am saying for sexual attraction, which is what PUAs claim they can get you, this is the only thing that matters. Of course, sexual attraction is not the only requirement for every woman to hop into bed with you (but for some it is).

Of course, a lot of things other than women matter in life, like being confident and having fun. I am merely talking about why PUA material doesn't make any sense (to me, anymore, I used to think it did).

---

(03-10-2012 07:00 AM)luda Wrote:  

(03-10-2012 04:37 AM)IdEngager Wrote:  Good thing I'm both good looking and rolling in the dough.

Ladies, the line to my penis starts right here.



(Waits for anyone to question why I'm on Postmasculine.com still)

Love this response.
Yes looks and being successful in life does help but too go as far as Peanut and say its the only thing that matters is unbelievably ignorant and it removes all responsibility from yourself for not being good with women

Don't misinterpret what I'm saying. Brad Pitt when he was 30 would not be able to get every woman he wanted despite him being extremely good looking and succesful.

Why not? Because you need genetic compatibility and women are far better at determining this compatibility than men on a subconscious level. Almost all men would have sex with Jessica Alba, yet only a small percentage of all women would have sex with Brad Pitt. Within the pool of potentially genetically compatible women, you can increase your odds by being the best looking and best performing you can be and you can decrease your odds by having a problematic personality.

---

(03-10-2012 01:19 AM)Tim Wrote:  Urgh, that's because developing a personality is not something you learn how to do in a book or on a website. And to view it as if you could is extremely soul destroying.

Straw man much? I never said you develop a personality based on books. Exactly to the contrary: PUAs try to develop a "personality" (or rather, try to learn to act as if they have one) through reading books or watching videos.

You guys keep misrepresenting my points, calling me a troll and saying I am ignorant without coming up with any valid counter-points (like maybe some form of proof that personality does, in fact, create sexual attraction). This is typical for people who have no valid arguments except "Well I believe this or that". You might as well believe in astrology.

[Mark]

OK, I had a whole long reply typed out, but I re-read what you said Peanuts, and I think we actually mostly agree. I just think you're not explaining it well and missing a couple key things.

Let me try to straighten this out.

- Looks are generally a barrier to entry with each woman you talk to. They don't necessary get you a girl, but they'll often lose you a girl.
- Money and resources are nice, but only in as much as they improve your lifestyle. Women aren't intrinsically attracted to money (well, few are, at least), but they ARE attracted to guys who live awesome lives. Money can help that.
- If a woman does not find you attractive or appealing, no amount of joking or story-telling will win her over.

I agree with all of these thing and state them a lot in my book. Here are things I would add, or rephrase to what you're saying:

- There is a "grey area" where women are neutral and open to being won over by you. In these cases, demonstrating an awesome personality and identity can and will win them over. (See Chapter 6 of my book).
- When a woman meets you, unless she thinks you are extremely good-looking or extremely ugly, chances are you can influence her perception of you by displaying an awesome personality and identity. I guess what I'm arguing is that her initial attraction to you falls along a spectrum, it's not an immediate yes/no decision. As they say, men are light switches, women are volume knobs.
- Women -- scratch that, humans have perceptual biases. Therefore their perceptions of your physical attraction can change quite a bit. See my article here: http://postmasculine.com/why-we-all-suck-at-dating -- throw on top of that that women's preferences for sexual attraction are also influenced by pheromones, their menstrual cycle, whether they're on birth control or not, when the last time they had sex was, etc., etc.

What I disagree with you about:

- You seem to think that displaying one's personality simply refers to what jokes/stories/lines one has. I find this to be pretty shallow. I'd argue that demonstrating your personality has far more to do with your intentions, emotions, motivations, etc. It's not, "Was that guy's joke funny?" It's "How nervous was he when he told that joke? Who was he trying to impress? Why did he tell that joke and not say something serious? Why can't he keep eye contact with me when he tells it?" THIS is what sparks attraction from behavior. Not jokes or lines.
- Sexual attraction is greatly influenced by status and looks, but it's mostly determined by behavior and identity.. primarily non-verbal and physical communication. Again, a lot of research backs this up as well. A recent study after interviewing thousands of women about why they had sex, came up with something like 244 variables which influenced their decisions. So yeah... let's be a little humble here.

Some recommended reading, since you seem into the whole scientific bases of attraction, but no offense, seem to be under-read:

- The research of David Bass, Meredith Chivers and Lisa Diamond.
- Assortment theory
- "Sex at Dawn" by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jetha
- "Secrets of Love and Lust" by Simon Andreae (NOT the Romance novel)
- "Sperm Wars" by Robin Baker
- Everything by Richard Dawkins -- to prevent any more egregious and grand statements about "evolution determined X."
- Research on personality psychology, since you're giving it a woefully shallow treatment.
- Chapters 1-6 of my book Models, since pretty much all of it is based on the above scientific research.

For what it's worth, the scientific community largely considers the question of what drives female attraction and arousal to be unknown right now. They have some vague ideas, and some theories, but there's no consensus.

So again... be careful when making large statements. The PUA's definitely got it wrong. Looks matter but don't determine your results. Money gives you more opportunities. We'll just leave it at that.

[Peanut]

The PUAs definitely got it wrong and I may be overcompensating a little bit because I am trying to get rid of these false beliefs which I've held for quite some years.

But I never said that personality doesn't matter or isn't important. I just said that personality doesn't spark *sexual* attraction in women. "I'd never sleep with this guy" (and this happens even if you are good looking) no amount of looking confidently into her eyes is going to change this. I don't consider personality to be telling jokes/stories/lines (that's what PUAs try to promote) and so forth so I agree with what you're saying there in terms of it being about your intentions and emotions.

So even though personality cannot spark sexual attraction, that doesn't mean personality isn't hugely important. But that wasn't the subject of this discussion, which is how wrong PUAs are exactly. So unless you are dealing with a loose club girl or any girl looking for plain physical enjoyment and nothing more it will take personal attraction next to sexual attraction before anything happens (also for a lot of men even though they won't admit it). I think the misunderstanding comes mostly from the fact that the PUAs really only discuss sexual attraction and seem to think a woman could get wet in the pants as a result of displays of confidence. Of course if a girl finds you physically attractive and you then make a personal connection it's going to lead to greater overall (sexual) attraction.

On the subject of "looks", I didn't mean that necessarily the hotter you are the better your odds (necessarily). The most important point is that beauty is not the same as attractiveness, even though hollywood would have you believe otherwise. I'm personally not physically attracted to every girl who isn't ugly (not even every girl who is considered beautiful) and the most likely reason for this isn't personality compatibility but rather physical compatibility. No amount of personal compatibility is going to make me want to sleep with them (more than say once or twice if they are beautiful...I'm still a man), and this is true vice versa as well most of the time. These are the girls I am friends with.

So yes I wasn't explaining my point of view right. Here goes for an improved version.
What determines your chances with women:
1) Genetic/Physical compatibility and attraction (looks) --> What matters is if you are her type and if you are not her type nothing is going to happen. Don't confuse that with being in shape/having a beautiful or symmetric face/having a nice haircut. I have no idea how many people are compatible with each other by the way, I don't think anybody does. And it's probably not binary but rather a scale.
2) Lifestyle/Status/Physical Beauty --> Determines your "mate value". So if you have no life and are not beautiful you are going to have low chances at a relationship with a girl who has high status and is beautiful, but it is not impossible if there is physical compatibility. I would say that in order for it to work out then, there needs to be no other guy with whom she is also physically compatible who is more on her level (and of course if you are after a cheerleader these odds are minimal because she talks to a bunch of hot guys with their stuff together every day). So these things help only to the extent that they will set you ahead of the (part of the) competition (that she is also compatible with/attracted to physically).
3) Personality --> I'll admit I don't know anything about personality psychology so I have no clue how this works. I do know I need some kind of personal connection with a girl before I'll actually sleep with her (as opposed to thinking about it/wanting it on a physical level) so I guess this is even more true the other way around. But it is not *sexual attraction*. The attraction is already there, and this is an additional requirement to the baseline.

This is kinda genderless, this goes both ways. But then because I am a guy it is written from that perspective. You could as easily write it from a female perspective.

About the science: I know this is as unscientific as it gets. I only made one reference to evo psych, although I probably shouldn't have it is just my writing style to present things matter-of-factly even if they are mostly hypothetical. I realize that the scientific community considers sexual attraction a gray area (although there definitely is some progress and (imo) most of the findings suggest that people have genetic "types" which are attracted to each other). This is just my personal theory which I find a whole lot more peaceful to live by than PUA or alternative "how to get more women" theory.

Thanks for the reading list. You did forget one of my favourite books on the subject. Maybe you already know it; "The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature" by Geoffrey Miller.

At any rate I think the whole "how to get women" discussion is intrinsically useless unless you are a scientist and the time would better be spent improving one's lifestyle and overall satisfaction. But because I got into PUA I kinda forced myself to have to think about it (because I need to get rid of these counter-productive beliefs). Maybe some other guys who are unhappy with what they've picked up from PUA will read this and find it helpful.

Edit: On the subject of perceptual biases and "changing her view of you": I agree that this happens but it works mostly the other way around imo. I.e. the girl meets you and she doesn't realize she finds you sexually attractive due to her biases. This doesn't mean that subconsciously the attraction wasn't already there, it just means she has conscious resistance which you'll need to work through. The main reason (imo) that men are switches and women aren't is because they get more fucked over by societial views and have more emotional baggage which prevents them from making quick decisions. Sexually mature/confident women will know instantly whether they would potentially sleep with you and then look whether there is a personal connection to be made and whether your value is the highest of all other guys they would sleep with. I guess what you mean by "the girls you can win over with your personality" are those girls who are unable to make snap decisions (but were attracted to you physically without realizing it consciously).

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(03-11-2012 06:13 AM)Mark Wrote:  Sexual attraction is greatly influenced by status and looks, but it's mostly determined by behavior and identity.. primarily non-verbal and physical communication. Again, a lot of research backs this up as well. A recent study after interviewing thousands of women about why they had sex, came up with something like 244 variables which influenced their decisions. So yeah... let's be a little humble here.

A lot of research also backs up that it is determined by genetic type. Just because they say they have 244 variables doesn't mean that the only variable that actually matters is "because I thought he was hot". Refer, for example, to http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2006-23141-023

Those 244 variables probably only make a guy more attractive compared to other males she is also genetically compatible with. But it won't make a guy more attractive if she isn't feeling it subconsciously/genetically.