Topic says it all, borrowing a line from Alyson Hannigan as Willow on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Why is it that my brain refuses to work properly when I am in the presence of certain girls I’m acquainted with? Or when I’m… I dunno, preoccupied with a particular girl, why I can’t think about anything else for any extended period of time? I just feel out of sorts, best way I’ve been able to find to describe it is to (mostly) quote Malcolm Reynolds from the movie Serenity
“You fog things up. You always have. You spin me about.”
So anyhow, y’all can read between the lines to figure out why I’m asking this, but are there any accepted explanations for why people get put all out of their right minds sometimes when dealing with certain folks of the other gender? Or does this just get chalked up under “eh, you’re just messed up in the brain”?
My response will have no basis in anything but wild conjecture. That being said, it seems to me that our brains have to be doing somewhat ridiculous things in order to get love to work in the first place. As a male animal, it makes the most sense for us to want to sow our seeds as far and as wide and as often as possible. Humans have developed as being social animals, which also makes sense for the preservation of the species. However, it seems to me that the one mate dealie is (biologically speaking) relatively new. A new, more intensive form of the generalized protective instincts that we used to feel for our entire tribe.
My wild-ass guess on the matter is that we do stupid things because our older instincts are somewhat in conflict with our newer instincts, and all the bugs haven’t been worked out yet.
If any anthropologists would like to step in and correct me, I’d be more than happy
As the owl in Bambi said, you’re just shatterpated. Love blows your head apart. It’s a malady as old as mankind. There are a few cures, but they are worse than love itself. Sometimes, you can tell love from lust, and that might keep you from rushing headlong into one or the other. :dubious: Yeah, right! Ha!
Nothing I can say will keep you from being a fool for love, my friend. Some things, though, can get you fired or arrested as a sexual harrasser or a stalker. Look these things up, so you’ll know when you are about to do something that’s now illegal.
That’s pretty accurate as a non-technical rationale. A more technical explanation would address the neurophysiology, including the production of neurotransmitters that regulate emotional response, and neurotrophins or protein growth factors that encourage growth and differentiation of neurons. The areas of the brain that produce or regulate production of these chemicals are primarily located in the midbrain (which is actually contains the “oldest” structures in the brain, both from a development and evolutionary point of view) and the adjacent (and most primitive) areas of the forebrain, while functions that pertain to rationale reasoning and provide inhibition against impulse are in the forward and more advanced parts of the forebrain. So the old, deeply embedded areas of the brain which are well-developed (and essentially common to all vertebrates) tend to overwhelm the newer and less developed logical thinking areas, which is probably why corny sonnets and senseless romantic comedies are so popular with the lovey-dovey crowd, and annoying to the rest of us.
Regarding monogomy, I would be wary about trying to reduce it to a single rationale with trivial impulses. It’s certainly true that our nearest species in family Hominidaeare decidedly non-monogamous, but even within that the non Pan species often form semi-monogamous attachments within clans. In terms of hominid development, it’s pretty clear that the goal of the female is monogamy once she has settled on a particularly suitable male (i.e. she tries to keep him around and prevent him from expending resources on other women), while for the male there is a desire to at least periodically branch out to ensure maximal distribution of genetic seed. This likely has its origins in the progressively longer rearing cycle as opposed to other great ape species, but the female of the species has clearly developed many strategies and capabilities to fight for monogamy (at least in a limited sense as being the primary mate) as a check against a male tendency to sow seeds wantonly. The sociological rationales follow rather than led these innate instincts.
AskNott, I think that’s twitterpated. I haven’t seen the movie that often, but we used to have the Disney record (LP). It wasn’t a sound track, it was Jimmy Dean reading the story, interspersed with the songs. After Owl’s speech, the birds sing, “Let’s Sing a Gay Little Spring Song.”
Pretty much for the same reason for example, your first trip to Disneyland - your rational thoughts get reduced to “ooooh! I gotta go on that ride!” Then it’s all emotions. Of course, part of it’s also hormones out of control.
Ack. :smack: You’re right. It’s been too long since I saw the movie. Shatterpated is rather more serious. Twitterpated leaves you, mercifully, with a wee trace of sanity.
I believe a great deal of it comes from the portion of our brain that is in charge of our reporductive necessity center. Somewhere back in our deep, dark cave-dwelling past (for some of us, that is more than, hey, 12, 13 years ago) we had to decide whether to logicly respond to women (and go do something important like gather berries, hunt a mammoth or go bowling) or to let our more base side take over and jump her bod. Those that let their logic dominate became extinct and the others have their brain go fuzzy, and pass their genes from generation to generation.
My other theory is that women are just bascially evolved from witches and are capable of doing that to us.
Well, why in the world else would we keep up the species? I mean, if the goal is kind of crazy and pointless, aren’t the incentives going to be, too?
One thing I can tell you, though. You know how fantastic you imagine it would be to have intercourse with that beautiful girl over there? Well, you might have noticed that the few times it’s happened, it was usually nice, but never as fantastic as you imagined, right? That’s because nature doesn’t care if you enjoy sex. Nature only cares that you think you will.
