More Bunk Science

I know. I was being mean to the Daily Mail.

Perhaps since the paper's authors wrote ... They were aware that symmetry is not the be all and end all of what is considered attractive. Also that was not the point of the study at all, which was concerned with co-operation in a prisoner's dilemma game.Has to be said BD, in this case the one who seems to have come in with a preconceived idea and tried to shoehorn the facts to fit it seems to be you. Also as others have pointed out, criticising a scientific study based on how it is reported in the newspapers is almost always an exercise in futility as the media has given you a pre-built strawman to beat up on.TTFN,WK

The Daily Mail can be summed up with this:'Asylum seekers lower house prices, corruption of family values, it's PC'gone mad, god bless Diana, immigrants cause crime and take our jobs, send 'em back home, scroungers win the lottery, single mothers are evil, you can catch gay (and that's what they want to do to your kids), god bless Diana, can't print that in a family news paper, support our brave British lads, British lads responsible for riots, our investigator made his excuses and left, hanging's too god for them, god bless Diana.'You've now read pretty much every Daily Mail printed, ever.

You missed out 'Where's Maddy?', 'Government feeds children to paedo scum' and 'Everything around you causes and/or cures cancer'

There is a well known trait in people to match people on looks when asked to match a selection of individuals to other in the selection range.When people were also asked to rate people as more or less attractive one of the trends for attractivenes was a symmetical face.As I recall there was resaerch into babies spending more time looking at symmetrical faces then none symmetrical faces.Beauty is in the eye of the beholder but on a statistical level there are trends to suggest that generally people find more symmetrical faces more attractive.Another point I rememeber is that people go for people within there looks range (e.g. 7/10s go for 7/10). Again, this is just a general rule.Think of it as a rule of thumb. You have it wrong, they asked "what is a common factor in these people who have been rated attractive, oh I see, they are very symmetrical".From an evolutionary perspective any asymmetry in the face could indicate a body that has not developed as effectively as a more symmetrical body and is thus less attractive in term of fittness.Or a lumpy face with a colliflour ear is idicative of getting into fights aand not being a stable choice in partner. But then you would be putting the cart before the horse. As explained, the conclusion was derived from the evidence rather than the conclusion was sought.That's cooking the books and it ain't science.Edited by Larni, : significant to trends

The bit I've italicised above is your problem here. Nobody is claiming that to be true. What studies have suggested is that, all else being equal people prefer symmetrical faces. If you take a someone with a fat, bulging neck; squat, flattened nose; bloodshot eyes and receding, wispy hair and compared them to a healthy, trim indivdual with a nice nose, but with slightly wonky ears, most people will pick the wonky-eared guy - no-one disputes this.However, studies have shown that if you take the same face, and then adjust it on a computer to make it more symmetrical, people will, on average, rate the symmetrical face as more attractive.Symmetry isn't the be-all and end-all of attractiveness, but it helps.

Every thing cures/causes cancer, lol!Have you read Bad Science by Ben Goldacre?Edited by Larni, : Clarity

Hey, I take exception to this. I've got two cauliflour ears Not due to fights, but a result of me playing the game of rugby as a lock in the scrum while I was younger. I've never been in a fight (off field) and I've been married to the same person for 25 years.I don't have a lumpy face (for a forty seven year old), but I've got symetric cauliflour ears. I am exceptionally attractive, though.

Ha ha! I too played rugby in my younger days but as a fly half. I would dance around the lumbering oats (until I didn't and then I would be knocked head over heels- great days).And like all other rugby players I too, am exceptionally handsome (and god with my hands

Not as handsome as me I've got symmetrical cauliflour ears, remember!

In my days we forwards saw fly-halfs as the dancing queens. We saw them as 'moffies', in your language called 'dandys' Boy, what a great life. If I could only loose about twenty years, I would really look after my symmetrical (uncaulifloured) ears!

The point of the study was to compare people they are claiming are attractive with people they are claiming are less attractive, and deciding which co-operate better.So they choose to decide who was attractive based on their symmetry-even though as you have just pointed out this is not the determining factor for what is or isn't attractive. But they could just as easily have chosen blonde versus dark hair. Or fat versus thin. Or greasy thin hair versus full shiny hair. or thick noses versus pointy ones. So actually these subsets of people are meaningless, unless they considered every possible physical trait and compared them. Maybe it was because they were tall as opposed to short? Maybe the group that co-operated less tended t o be born in summer months more often, while those who co-operated more tended to be born in winter months. Did they check that?How about comparing those with flabby necks compared to those with tight ones? if you made this comparison, I guess one of the groups is going to be either less co-operative or more co-operative, unless the split turns out to be EXACTLY 50/50. And in their groupings was there an equal number of symmetrical people as opposed to asymmetrical? Or were there many more asymmetrical ones, and thus there was lees of a chance of them having statistical anomalies. And what was the dividing line for deciding if someone falls into the symmetrical group or the asymmetrical group? If you ears are lopsided but your nose is straight, which group do you go into? If your eyes are very level, but you have a very asymmetrical chin, do these two features balance each other out in their rating and so you are of average symmetry?So many things that you can be sure this study doesn't address, and yet they are willing to have their study labeled as showing that attractive people co-operate less than unattractive ones. And what do you think their hypothesis was before they did they study? Can we guess what they were looking to find out?I think the truth of the study is that people who ate yellow food before taking a test are much less likely to co-operate then those who ate red food-but they simply forgot to test this correlation. I guess one of those groups co-operates better. I wonder which one?

Maybe you should read the paper, from what you write here it is obvious you haven't so far.TTFN,WKEdited by Wounded King, : No reason given.

No. No.

Not the book, but I used to read his blog.Test you Daily Mail knowledge: Does it cure cancer, cause cancer, or both?