14. Seduction Energy
A number of seduction gurus keep on talking about some energy. What the hell do they actually mean by that? On a number of occasions, such as dating myth 12, I have shown what a non-senses it would be, if they would talk about the physics' energy. So, I would not say that they talk about a scientifically proven energy. Just for a single reason – it is quite obvious that they would not be able to defend their claims in such case.
I see two options:
(1) The first option is as an explanation that their energy stands for something else. So, they take the deserved credit of physics' energy, while giving it a new, twisted meaning. Just one question – if they know that it is not energy, why do they call it energy? To me, this is a deception – a pseudoscience at its best.
I don't require them to understand e.g. citric acid cycle. But hey, they could at least try to obey the law of energy conservation. Or, am I asking too much? This is high-school stuff.
Note that if we would take the feelings of having a lot of energy to do something, we actually talk about increased levels of particular neurotransmitters. Considering it as energy, it is a mismatch of energy and feelings terms. Such feelings do not imply that you've got some energy. You may be even spending more energy than usually.
So, if we would take these feelings as energy being spent, e.g. while having a sex, we talk about energy expense – i.e. negative energy. Then, the dating myth 12 applies.
For example, to say that you spent some energy, while thinking about her, that's actually true. To stay alive, body takes some energy to power its biological processes, even while resting. To have a spontaneous, wild sex, the power consumption would rise as the body moves. Also, glucose utilization would rise as the glucose would serve as a primary energy fuel in such scenario. In both cases, you radiate waste energy as a heat (depending on the gradient as given in myth 12).
On a contrary example, to say that you emanate a sexual energy that attracts opposite sex, it is just a common saying for having an attractive body. Or, it is a blabberish whose corner stone, the sexual energy, was never defined properly by the myth-tellers. If you find something to seem as valid in such sentences, it is because of psychological tricks such as Forer's effect and subjective validation, present personal beliefs and lack of scientific understanding of energy.
Some pseudo-scientists try to deceive people with quantification. Science quantifies anything (i.e. energy including) to be objective, when making a judgment. So, these pseudo-scientists come up with numbers and claims of (allegedly proper) quantification. However, the numbers either came out of thin air, or they were allegedly measured with a non-functioning technique such as rod dowsing (why not to move with a rod over a naked body? ;-). With a little bit sense of black humor, it is also quite funny to read statements of money-back guarantees, where a righteousness of claim is conditioned with a non-functioning measuring. For example, the mentioned rod-dowsing is the ideomotoric effect, when measurer believes. Or, it's just a con, when measurer doesn't believe. In both cases, it measures nothing.
As a folklore curiosity, there's a (seduction) energy vampirism. You know, virgins and night robes, a throat naked tastefully, and a vampire sucking victim's blood as a source of life energy. Apparently, today's myth-tellers just left out the blood and kept the energy, while modernizing their vocabularies with New-Age non-senses. Do you see as we get far more away from the scientific understanding of energy? Not mentioning that there are simpler explanations for the so-called vampirism (just like they are there for the old-fashioned vampires).
(2) So, as physical energy claims fail to hold, the second option is to describe the alleged seduction energy as non-physical energy. It is the pseudoscience deception that's well known from CAM (complementary and alternative medicine). As such, it is dangerous as it makes, may be a small, yet a constant pressure to accept CAM non-senses as valid concepts. Especially, I'm worried when they present it exactly the same way as CAM does. This enforces belief into miraculous properties of a non-existent, pseudoscientific energy. Let me remind that this causes a collateral damage, such as:
- Alleged non-physical energies cause no physiological changes. They heal nothing. You may just feel like being healed. This is entirely about the placebo effect. As a result, you may decide to seek a medical care, when it is too late.
- It may result into long-term, unnecessary financial expenses, if you pay for it. Note that it is possible to spend the money in a better way.
- It is unethical as it perpetuates false hopes, while it heals nothing. Do not get me wrong – if there's no hope, it's OK to ignore it somehow. However, if there was a chance and you've missed it because of alleged energy, then it's a different story.
Based on my observations, I realized that an energy-talking seduction guru is quite likely to be involved in a pseudoscience business. At least, guru claims left me with this: such guru does not care about matching his claims to proven facts (especially when logic and the science contradict his claims), while presenting the claims as being proven. Thus, I consider guru advices as a pseudo-psychology and pseudo-psychiatry. Be aware, because it plays with your mind. There are no physiological damages to be seen, or sensed as a clear warning. And on top of it, a believer just doesn't see the danger and a con-artist will simply lie to you.
I hope that it's needless to say that a non-existent energy cannot get you a girl. If you attribute your success to such energy, you are wrong. The real success comes from knowledge. Knowledge you have not, most probably, got from a pseudoscience guru. It is far more realistic to assume that you've learned something new with each rejection, until you finally made it to a date. Just be self-confident enough to keep the credits you've earned and deserve for yourself.
Let us draw a line between realistic assumptions and between dangerous non-senses. Especially, when it comes to non-existent energies, which are so close to alternative medicine.
15. It does not matter what you say, but the way you say it
First, let me make a review of the following text. I split an interaction with a woman into two parts, according to the discussed saying. First one goes for body language (the way you say it). The second one goes for word selection (what you say).
To say that it does not matter, what you say, but the way you say it, it means that the second part is more difficult to be done correctly, than the first part is. So, we can say that the second part is supposed to have greater complexity, aka decision or computational costs.
I consider an existence of two functions, one per each part of the saying. First function gives words to say; second function gives the body language. Then, I show that the first part, the word selection, has actually greater complexity than the second part - the body language. So, I show that this particular saying does not hold, because it contradicts reality.
Well, the review is done.
So, let us a make a little detour into the computer science. There's a so-called big O notation. It states computation costs for a given algorithm. The higher number it is, the costs are greater. The costs depend on number of input parameters.
Regarding the body language, we need just one good body posture to contribute to making of a good impression. Let us take an example: do we talk to at least one woman? True or false? If true, let us take the appropriate body posture. Otherwise, false, the body posture does not matter. Such algorithm has O(1).
Okay, some may object that we can use some sophisticated acting show to increase the complexity (on a purpose). However, such objection is not valid, because we can accomplish our goal with the O(1) complexity algorithm for the body language. Anyway, the complexity would not get higher than the complexity for the world selection, as there's a finite set of input parameters, which are identical for both algorithms.
In one sentence, woman tells us n words. To react properly, we need to analyze all the words – the least possible complexity is O(n). In fact, we would need to count a size of large piece of previous communication. So, the complexity is higher, because we deal with an adaptive algorithm.
Okay, now we have a math proof that it is harder to think up, what to say, than how to say it. Therefore, it is a non-sense to say that it does not matter, what you say.
Wanna proof? No matter how you would say to me that the previously discussed energies of seduction gurus exist, you will not convince me without a valid, holding proof – i.e. it matters what you say, regardless the way you say it.
Just to point out that women like a certain body posture and a firm voice, it is not enough to tell that this is all what it takes. Also, showing the myth on trivial examples, such as Hello vs. Hi, is wrong, because there's no significant difference between these greetings.
There is a more complicated example available. Consider two guys, which found they've got brand new antlers. One of these cuckolds is looser without self-respect; second one has some self-respect. Each adulterer tried to present her treachery in the best light, as if nothing wrong happened. They used all the smiles and a nice tone of voice. Looser gave her another chance, the second one did not. Why? Remember, if you would like to derive significance of words from such situation, you need to realize that it cannot be done. Both outcomes were given by personalities, before the adulterers started talking.
Any expert handbook on social engineering would confirm my conclusion. It's just not enough to look good and behave friendly. You need to say the right words as well. Btw, I know there is a saying that words account just 7% out of 100% of communicated message. Actually, this was never proven. Even the author of 7% did not interpret his findings this way.
Consider a lonely guy, who does not approach girls, because he still thinks about what to say to minimize the chance of rejection. If you would implant him a false belief that words do not matter, you would get him to approach the girls. And this is the real problem with the pseudo-psychology motivation – the consequences.
16. Myth Debunking
A myth may be classified as trivial, virtual or elaborate.
For example, a myth stating that look does not matter is a trivial one. Anybody finds some people unattractive. So, everybody knows a counter-example that disputes this myth. Also, such myth is virtual one, since everybody knows the counter-example. So, the actual myth is that the alleged myth exists. But that's what you are not being told...
Virtual myth is a useful tool for a deceiving guru, who tries to pretend his proficiency. Since the fundament of virtual myth does not exist at all, you are free to come up with whatever you imagine. Virtual myth may be elaborate one as well.
I consider myth number 2 as elaborate one.
In addition, while debunking a myth, the debunking itself may be contaminated with misleading terms, half-truths and other forms of psychological manipulation. People like simple answers and articles named like "5 accidental mistakes that can ruin your date". Deceiving gurus know this as well. They know how to get your attention. So, be on alert.
The merit of the get-attention trick is that people want to hear a simplistic answer, even when there's no such answer. While a scientist insists on valid, but complex answer, people turn to a con-artist that gives false, but simple answer. And when the con-artist gets the attention, he starts to create an appropriate bunch of non-senses to justify his false answer. Let us consider the following two examples:
First example, how soon should I answer her sms? Well, it depends on what she wrote and what happened between the two of you. For example, if you quarreled a little about something and she says she is sorry, there' no point to wait about two hours. If she asks about something that is not urgent, you do not need to answer immediately. And some sms do not even need to be answered at all. So, it really depends. However, you may get a simple answer to e.g. always wait two hours before responding – be it an advice of a con-artist, or an incompetent advisor.
Second example, should I eat more vitamin E? Yes, if you have an adequate shortage of it (in general, this is quite unlikely). But, if there's no shortage, do not. Vitamin E dissolves in fats, so there are health risks because of overdosing. However, non-practitioner of science-based medicine would happily recommend getting more vitamin E, because it has allegedly (and wrongly) no side effects, only possible benefits. That's allegedly because vitamin E helps to align flow of jing and jang energies (or whatever alternative non-sense you like).
The phenomenon of deceiving debunk is well-known from the field of alternative medicine. Despite a solid and holding evidence, there is a plenty of so-called debunks, which prove scientific medicine to be wrong – allegedly. It really does not matter, if we talk about dating, medicine, or something else. They built on luck of understanding of scientific method and the topic by an ordinary man. Quite often, yet not limited to, they utilize emotional context [144] and make appeal to ignorance [84] by personalized stories instead of providing real evidence*. Another popular approach is fear injection, e.g. by describing even a helpful process in such manner so that it sounds terribly to a laic, because he has no expert knowledge on the topic. Some of these "debunks" are even signed by doctors of medicine (perhaps, doctors just technically by diploma they received several years ago). It's a shame and as I said already – be on alert.
Sometimes, you may see an advice that contradicts itself; it's inconsistent with other advices; it's obviously wrong, or it's just an outrageous lie. And on top of it, you can see as there are people, who reason that the myth-teller is doing good job by giving such advices. As their position is not based on logic, you've just encountered a belief that fuels the myths and cons.
It is possible to fake myth debunking as well as the myth itself.
*The girl suffered from cancer and her parents saw her dying before their eyes. As they were desperate as the science doctors were unable to help, they came to me. I instructed them to feed her with a specific herb tea only. After two weeks, the girl got her health back. Not only there is no real evidence that this ever happened, yet the girl would die quick and painfully with such diet (as she would have no painkillers and no food).
In dating, one could say: Follow my advices exactly, learn from her responses and you will get a date in less than 30 days, even if you are a beginner. All you need to do is to instruct (and make to obey) the beginner to approach a sufficient number of girls. Since you already gave him instruction not to repeat anything that girls did not like, he will get a date just because of the number of approach girls. There is no magic, nor expert-ship behind this. Just the problem that beginner might have adopted a number of non-senses from you, since he believes you anything now, because you got him a date, allegedly. In fact, it was his credit to get the date. So, for the third time – be on alert. It is easier to pretend to be an expert than you might actually think.
Picture: Leslie Nielsen and Lysette Anthony as Count Dracula looking at Lucy's sexy throat, while he did not need to say much... Taken from the movie "Dracula – Dead and Loving It".
