If your goal is to pick up women, then yes, absolutely 1 in 50 is a “win”. But if your goal is to refine the art of human rationality, I just don’t see how it’s relevant.
The thing is, with any model (PUA or otherwise), there are many reasons you could lose out on the 49 in 50 (to go with your terminology for now):
They aren’t into your body type, facial structure, height, race, or some other superficial characteristic
They have preferences that are explained by your model, but you messed up or otherwise failed to fulfill them (Similarly: they have preferences that are explained by your model, but you didn’t go far enough in following the model.) This is exacerbated by the tendency of people to go for partners at the edge of what they can realistically expect to attract, which makes it really easy to fall just a tiny bit short of fulfilling their preferences. Even when your improve your attractiveness, then you may set your sights on a higher tier of partners, and you will still be on the edge of being accepted. P(rejection | you go for a random person in the population you are into) is much less than P(rejection | you go after the most desirable person in that population who you still consider a realistic prospect).
They have preferences that are explained by your model, but someone else around fulfilled them better (or they weren’t single)
Taking into account these factors, from the start we know that there is a ceiling for success of under 50. Let’s say that at least one of these factors apply 50% of the time. Then we are really seeing a max success rate of 1 in 25. 1 in 10 max success rate out of 50 is even plausible. If you only pursue people on the higher edge of your attractiveness bracket, then the number could go even lower, and one success looks more and more impressive.
When you expect to meet rejection >50% of the time via your model, using rejection to test your model is difficult. It’s hard to test such theories in isolation. At what point do you abandon or modify your model, and at what point to you protect it with an ad hoc hypothesis? A protective belt of ad hoc hypotheses isn’t always bad. Sometimes you have actual evidence inducing belief in the presence or absence of the type of factors I mention, but the data for assessing those factors is also very messy.
Stated in a more general form, the problem we are trying to solve is: how do I select between models of human interactions with only my biased anecdotal experience, the biased anecdotal experience of others (who I select in a biased non-representative fashion), and perhaps theories (e.g. evolutionary psychology) with unclear applicability or research studies performed in non-naturalistic settings with unclear generalizability? Whew, what a mouthful!
This is not a trivial problem, and the answers matter. It is exactly the kind of problem where we should be refining the art of human rationality. And an increase in success on this problem (e.g. 1 in 500 to 1 in 50, to continue the trend of pulling numbers out of thin air to illustrate a point ) suggests that we have learned something about rationality.
This is not a trivial problem, and the answers matter. … suggests that we have learned something about rationality.
I actually agree with this completely, and I think your analysis is rather insightful. Your conclusion seems to be that PUA topics are deserving of further study and analysis, and I have no problem with that… I only have a problem with assuming PUA-isms to be true, and citing them as “everybody knows that...” examples when illustrating completely unrelated points.
how do I select between models of human interactions with only my biased anecdotal experience, the biased anecdotal experience of others (who I select in a biased non-representative fashion), and perhaps theories (e.g. evolutionary psychology) with unclear applicability or research studies performed in non-naturalistic settings with unclear generalizability?
This is well put. The issue you raise is why I tried to be a little more explicit about the priors that I was using here. Obviously it’s a long way from giving the explicit probabilities that would be necessary to automate the Bayesian updating, but at least we can make a start at identifying where our priors differ.
If your goal is to pick up women, then yes, absolutely 1 in 50 is a “win”
Sure… maybe for when you’re starting out as a rank beginner, doing “cold approach” and “night game”. But my success rate at “social circle game” was an order of magnitude better than that before I knew any PUA stuff in the first place… and in retrospect I can easily see how that success was based on me accidentally doing a lot of things that are explicitly taught to PUAs for that type of game.
Hell, even during the brief period where I went to nightclubs and danced with girls, there are times that I realize in retrospect I was getting major IOIs and would’ve gotten laid if I’d simply had even a single ounce of clue or game in my entire body… and at a better success rate than 1 in 50.
So, I’m not sure where you pulled the 1 in 50 number from, but in my experience it’s not even remotely credible as a “success” for a PUA, if you mean that the PUA has to ask 50 to get 1 yes.
However, if you mean that a PUA can take 50 women who are attracted to him, and then chooses from them only the one or two that he finds most desirable, then I would agree that that’s indeed a success from his POV. ;-)
(And I would also guess that most PUAs would agree that this is much closer to their idea of “winning”, and that even a PUA of modest or average ability should be able to do much better than your original estimate, even for nightclub game.)
AAARGH! You’re still totally responding to this as if we were having this discussion on a PUA forum, rather than on LW.
The 1 in 50 number was totally pulled out of my ass, a hypothetical intended to illustrate the idea that if a given technique works only 1 in X times, but that’s enough to result in getting laid, your brain is likely to count that as a “win”, and ignore the (X − 1) times it failed, leading you to incorrectly assume that the technique illustrates some universally applicable principle of human behavior, where none in fact exists.
The 1 in 50 number was totally pulled out of my ass
That seems to me to be a less appropriate way to do things on LW, personally.
Certainly, arguing that you pulled a number out of your ass in order to refute empirical information providing an inside view of a phenomenon is really inappropriate here.
IOW, your hypothesis is based on a total and utter incomprehension of what PUAs do or value, and is therefore empirically without merit. Actual PUAs are not only aware of the concept you are describing, but they most emphatically do not consider it success, and one guru even calls it “fool’s mate” in order to ridicule those who practice it. (In particular, Mystery ridicules it as relying on chance instead of skill.)
In short, you are simply wrong, and you’re probably getting downvoted (not by me, mind you) not because of disagreement, but because you’re failing to update on the evidence.
Certainly, arguing that you pulled a number out of your ass in order to refute empirical information providing an inside view of a phenomenon is really inappropriate here
It’s very clear from the original context that “1 in 50” was not being proposed as evidence of anything, but simply as colloquial shorthand for “1 in some number X”. And I’m not sure what empirical evidence you’re referring to—the plural of anecdote yada yada yada.
your hypothesis is based on a total and utter incomprehension of what PUA
My knowledge of what PUA entails is based almost entirely on various examples given by PUAs here on LW (that and a few clips from Mystery’s show being ridiculed on The Soup , which you might want to consider as a data point on what the general public thinks of PUA). Maybe if LW’s resident PUAs were to cite examples more like those you gave in your last reply to me, I might have a higher opinion of PUA wisdom.
Look, I totally understand why you and the other PUA adherents are so emotionally attached to the idea: if I were single, and somebody gave me a magic feather that enabled me to get laid a lot, I’m sure I would think it was awesome, and probably wouldn’t stop talking about it, well past the point that my friends and acquaintances were sick of hearing about it. It might be worth remembering, though, that the original topic of this article was Asperger/Autistic spectrum issues, and that one of the characteristic traits of the spectrum is what’s been referred to as “little professor syndrome,” where aspies tend to go on and on about their narrow topics of interest, unable to pick up social cues, like eye rolling, indicating lack of interest in the subject.
I don’t recall whether you responded positively to the “do you have high functioning asperger’s” question, and it’s not my intention to pejoratively imply that you, or anyone else here, does. I just think it might be worth looking at this through that lens.
Look, I totally understand why you and the other PUA adherents are so emotionally attached to the idea: if I were single, and somebody gave me a magic feather that enabled me to get laid a lot, I’m sure I would think it was awesome, and probably wouldn’t stop talking about it, well past the point that my friends and acquaintances were sick of hearing about it.
If you’re implying that I’m single or attempting to get laid a lot, you’ve either missed a lot of my comments in this discussion, or you didn’t read them very carefully.
(Hint: I’m married, and have never knowingly used a pickup technique for anything but social or business purposes.. and I’ve made no secret of either point in this discussion!)
In other words, the numbers aren’t the only thing you just pulled out of your ass. ;-)
I would also point out that it is not particularly rational for you to first rant that nobody is responding to your points, and then, when people reply to you in an attempt to respond, for you to criticize them for “going on and on”.
(Well, it’s not rational unless your goal is to troll me, I suppose. But in that case, congratulations… you got a response.)
Meanwhile, you’ve also just managed to demonstrate actually doing the thing you’re arguing PUAs theoretically do (but actually don’t, if they’re well-trained).
That is, you made a sweeping judgment that doesn’t really apply to the claimed target group.
And, you didn’t make any allowance for the possibility that the specific person you were interacting with might be different from your generalized model of “single with a magic feather”. (Heck, even PUA’s know they have to calibrate to the individuals they encounter—i.e. pay attention.)
If you’re implying that I’m single or attempting to get laid a lot
Nope, I neither said, nor implied anything of the kind. I was simply speculating on why it might be that so many people on LW seem to be so attached to the PUA ideas, despite their not really seeming to have much going for them in the way of Bayesian evidence. I wasn’t referring to you (or anyone) in particular. The format of comment threads requires that comments be addressed to a specific person, and so your comment was the one I happened to click ‘reply’ on, but I was referring in general to the PUA crowd.
not particularly rational for you to first rant that nobody is responding to your points,
I complained about people’s responses not addressing the substance of my argument, not the lack of responses.
and then, when people reply to you in an attempt to respond, for you to criticize them for “going on and on”.
Obviously I wasn’t talking here about your responses to my comments, but about the general inclination of certain PUA-boosters to continually bring up PUA themes in the middle of discussing unrelated issues.
If your goal is to pick up women, then yes, absolutely 1 in 50 is a “win”. But if your goal is to refine the art of human rationality, I just don’t see how it’s relevant.
The thing is, with any model (PUA or otherwise), there are many reasons you could lose out on the 49 in 50 (to go with your terminology for now):
They aren’t into your body type, facial structure, height, race, or some other superficial characteristic
They have preferences that are explained by your model, but you messed up or otherwise failed to fulfill them (Similarly: they have preferences that are explained by your model, but you didn’t go far enough in following the model.) This is exacerbated by the tendency of people to go for partners at the edge of what they can realistically expect to attract, which makes it really easy to fall just a tiny bit short of fulfilling their preferences. Even when your improve your attractiveness, then you may set your sights on a higher tier of partners, and you will still be on the edge of being accepted. P(rejection | you go for a random person in the population you are into) is much less than P(rejection | you go after the most desirable person in that population who you still consider a realistic prospect).
They have preferences that are explained by your model, but someone else around fulfilled them better (or they weren’t single)
Taking into account these factors, from the start we know that there is a ceiling for success of under 50. Let’s say that at least one of these factors apply 50% of the time. Then we are really seeing a max success rate of 1 in 25. 1 in 10 max success rate out of 50 is even plausible. If you only pursue people on the higher edge of your attractiveness bracket, then the number could go even lower, and one success looks more and more impressive.
When you expect to meet rejection >50% of the time via your model, using rejection to test your model is difficult. It’s hard to test such theories in isolation. At what point do you abandon or modify your model, and at what point to you protect it with an ad hoc hypothesis? A protective belt of ad hoc hypotheses isn’t always bad. Sometimes you have actual evidence inducing belief in the presence or absence of the type of factors I mention, but the data for assessing those factors is also very messy.
Stated in a more general form, the problem we are trying to solve is: how do I select between models of human interactions with only my biased anecdotal experience, the biased anecdotal experience of others (who I select in a biased non-representative fashion), and perhaps theories (e.g. evolutionary psychology) with unclear applicability or research studies performed in non-naturalistic settings with unclear generalizability? Whew, what a mouthful!
This is not a trivial problem, and the answers matter. It is exactly the kind of problem where we should be refining the art of human rationality. And an increase in success on this problem (e.g. 1 in 500 to 1 in 50, to continue the trend of pulling numbers out of thin air to illustrate a point ) suggests that we have learned something about rationality.
I actually agree with this completely, and I think your analysis is rather insightful. Your conclusion seems to be that PUA topics are deserving of further study and analysis, and I have no problem with that… I only have a problem with assuming PUA-isms to be true, and citing them as “everybody knows that...” examples when illustrating completely unrelated points.
This is well put. The issue you raise is why I tried to be a little more explicit about the priors that I was using here. Obviously it’s a long way from giving the explicit probabilities that would be necessary to automate the Bayesian updating, but at least we can make a start at identifying where our priors differ.
Sure… maybe for when you’re starting out as a rank beginner, doing “cold approach” and “night game”. But my success rate at “social circle game” was an order of magnitude better than that before I knew any PUA stuff in the first place… and in retrospect I can easily see how that success was based on me accidentally doing a lot of things that are explicitly taught to PUAs for that type of game.
Hell, even during the brief period where I went to nightclubs and danced with girls, there are times that I realize in retrospect I was getting major IOIs and would’ve gotten laid if I’d simply had even a single ounce of clue or game in my entire body… and at a better success rate than 1 in 50.
So, I’m not sure where you pulled the 1 in 50 number from, but in my experience it’s not even remotely credible as a “success” for a PUA, if you mean that the PUA has to ask 50 to get 1 yes.
However, if you mean that a PUA can take 50 women who are attracted to him, and then chooses from them only the one or two that he finds most desirable, then I would agree that that’s indeed a success from his POV. ;-)
(And I would also guess that most PUAs would agree that this is much closer to their idea of “winning”, and that even a PUA of modest or average ability should be able to do much better than your original estimate, even for nightclub game.)
AAARGH! You’re still totally responding to this as if we were having this discussion on a PUA forum, rather than on LW.
The 1 in 50 number was totally pulled out of my ass, a hypothetical intended to illustrate the idea that if a given technique works only 1 in X times, but that’s enough to result in getting laid, your brain is likely to count that as a “win”, and ignore the (X − 1) times it failed, leading you to incorrectly assume that the technique illustrates some universally applicable principle of human behavior, where none in fact exists.
That seems to me to be a less appropriate way to do things on LW, personally.
Certainly, arguing that you pulled a number out of your ass in order to refute empirical information providing an inside view of a phenomenon is really inappropriate here.
IOW, your hypothesis is based on a total and utter incomprehension of what PUAs do or value, and is therefore empirically without merit. Actual PUAs are not only aware of the concept you are describing, but they most emphatically do not consider it success, and one guru even calls it “fool’s mate” in order to ridicule those who practice it. (In particular, Mystery ridicules it as relying on chance instead of skill.)
In short, you are simply wrong, and you’re probably getting downvoted (not by me, mind you) not because of disagreement, but because you’re failing to update on the evidence.
It’s very clear from the original context that “1 in 50” was not being proposed as evidence of anything, but simply as colloquial shorthand for “1 in some number X”. And I’m not sure what empirical evidence you’re referring to—the plural of anecdote yada yada yada.
My knowledge of what PUA entails is based almost entirely on various examples given by PUAs here on LW (that and a few clips from Mystery’s show being ridiculed on The Soup , which you might want to consider as a data point on what the general public thinks of PUA). Maybe if LW’s resident PUAs were to cite examples more like those you gave in your last reply to me, I might have a higher opinion of PUA wisdom.
Look, I totally understand why you and the other PUA adherents are so emotionally attached to the idea: if I were single, and somebody gave me a magic feather that enabled me to get laid a lot, I’m sure I would think it was awesome, and probably wouldn’t stop talking about it, well past the point that my friends and acquaintances were sick of hearing about it. It might be worth remembering, though, that the original topic of this article was Asperger/Autistic spectrum issues, and that one of the characteristic traits of the spectrum is what’s been referred to as “little professor syndrome,” where aspies tend to go on and on about their narrow topics of interest, unable to pick up social cues, like eye rolling, indicating lack of interest in the subject.
I don’t recall whether you responded positively to the “do you have high functioning asperger’s” question, and it’s not my intention to pejoratively imply that you, or anyone else here, does. I just think it might be worth looking at this through that lens.
If you’re implying that I’m single or attempting to get laid a lot, you’ve either missed a lot of my comments in this discussion, or you didn’t read them very carefully.
(Hint: I’m married, and have never knowingly used a pickup technique for anything but social or business purposes.. and I’ve made no secret of either point in this discussion!)
In other words, the numbers aren’t the only thing you just pulled out of your ass. ;-)
I would also point out that it is not particularly rational for you to first rant that nobody is responding to your points, and then, when people reply to you in an attempt to respond, for you to criticize them for “going on and on”.
(Well, it’s not rational unless your goal is to troll me, I suppose. But in that case, congratulations… you got a response.)
Meanwhile, you’ve also just managed to demonstrate actually doing the thing you’re arguing PUAs theoretically do (but actually don’t, if they’re well-trained).
That is, you made a sweeping judgment that doesn’t really apply to the claimed target group.
And, you didn’t make any allowance for the possibility that the specific person you were interacting with might be different from your generalized model of “single with a magic feather”. (Heck, even PUA’s know they have to calibrate to the individuals they encounter—i.e. pay attention.)
So… pot, meet kettle. ;-)
Nope, I neither said, nor implied anything of the kind. I was simply speculating on why it might be that so many people on LW seem to be so attached to the PUA ideas, despite their not really seeming to have much going for them in the way of Bayesian evidence. I wasn’t referring to you (or anyone) in particular. The format of comment threads requires that comments be addressed to a specific person, and so your comment was the one I happened to click ‘reply’ on, but I was referring in general to the PUA crowd.
I complained about people’s responses not addressing the substance of my argument, not the lack of responses.
Obviously I wasn’t talking here about your responses to my comments, but about the general inclination of certain PUA-boosters to continually bring up PUA themes in the middle of discussing unrelated issues.