Puzzle Boxes

[howeird]

Following up on something caprine posted on FB, taking a very different angle.

"...women are not machines you put kindness tokens into until sex falls out."

is the operative line from a post she had linked to. And I disagree with everything in that line except the word "machines". Experience and observation has shown me that most people will reward enough kindness tokens with sex. But there is a catch or three. If there is no chemistry, there will be no physics. Too many tokens offered too soon may backfire. Offering the wrong tokens can be fatal. And the reward may not be sex, it may be some other form of appreciation.

Let me tell you a story.

I was early for rehearsals (this was many years ago) and the theater was empty, so I sat down at the piano in the wings and started plunking out The Minute Waltz. One of the women in the cast walks by, sits on the piano bench beside me and says something like "is there anything you aren't good at?"  The next thing I knew we were dating.


Apparently being able to play piano was one key to her puzzle. Acting and singing were probably in there too, since that's how she met me. And I was not trying to solve the puzzle - she was a 2-time runner-up for Miss California, I thought she was out of my league.

Comments

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

I'd replace the word woman with "people" and remove the word "not". We are machines. Just biological ones that have flexible programming.

[howeird]

Wow. Someone more cynical than I. :-)

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

No. A student of animal behavior. It applies to people too, though more complexly.

To get something you want from someone, you have to give them what they want in return.

And sometimes you give, and never recieve.

[howeird]

Since when is an animal a machine? A machine is designed to give the same response to any given action, regardless of who or what performs that action. Animals (including people) may give wildly different responses to a given action, and that response usually differs when the action is performed by different individuals.

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

Animals are machines. So are plants for that matter. Your premise of what a machine is is incorrect. Or at the very least you're forgetting that given the exact same stimuli, eg a ringing bell, the exact same respnse happens, eg salivating.

Because animals are highly complex machines, there are huge numbers of variables that can affect the response - did the dog just get fed? Is it dehydrated so can't muster saliva? Has there been another program instituted?

Think of the systems you work with and how many variables you have to work with. How could the results change with one intermittent connection on one circuit? Then scale that to millions of circuits each with dozens or more _ways_ it could "fray".

But all things being mostly equal, the dog salivates no matter who rings the bell. And the girl is attracted to a fancier car or more pleasant talk, or whatever.

[howeird]

Nope. Sorry, I don't salivate when someone rings a bell. You are confusing behavior modification with nature.

Pavlov used the same breed of dog, all of which enjoyed a certain kind of food. Had he added other animals to that mix and used the same food, he would have come to very different conclusions.

The dictionary definition of machine is "A constructed thing". All definitions which allow born things to be called "machine" are analogies.

[(Anonymous)]

Then the dozens of researchers and students around the world using different breeds and even different species that have replicated Pavlov's work actually didn't?

Sorry. Nope.

In this case you're dictionary is wrong. A machine is defined as something that does work -elementary school mechanics. A lever, a ramp, and a screw are the simplest of machines and none of those have to be constructed.

[howeird]

My dictionary is wrong? Now you are just being silly.

[fierynotes.livejournal.com]

Well, if that line was used in the context I suspect (I don't do facebook, so I'll have to hope she crossposts to LJ), it's mostly talking about Nice Guys™ -- guys who never make a move, but do nice things in the hopes that the lady in question will recognize how nice they are, and then have sex with them. These same guys are often the ones complaining that only assholes get laid, and why does no one notice their niceness?

This is totally not you -- women find you interesting based on your own merits, and from my limited interaction with you at cons, you're genuinely nice, without the ™ sign. The guys who do nice things in hopes of earnilng barter credit? That's not nice. It's creepy.

[howeird]

I took the quote completely out of context and applied my own. The original post is here:
http://faerye.net/post/the-puzzle-box

She is mostly talking about all guys, and her misconception that we all look at women as a puzzle box with a tasty sex reward inside, and all it takes is enough "kindness tokens" to get the reward.

My response is everyone (for large values of everyone) is a puzzle box.

[fierynotes.livejournal.com]

I can't help thinking that some people are puzzleboxes best left unopened. "Oh, we have such sights to show you..." My sense of humor is a little bent, so this mental image amuses me.

(You'll have to take my word for this, but since I have a cold, I sound just like Doug Bradley, the gent who plays Pinhead in the Hellraiser series.)