CityandLights

You just called out (correctly) a man being gay over the internet, after only seeing a single picture or two. I think that gives your gaydar some credibility. I get the point. But, yes, I am hung up on the genetic aspects, because I'm interested in genetic engineering. I'm currently working on a biomedical engineering/computer science degree (I'm a natural digital systems / computer person, which is why I'm requesting input from biologists.) I know there are many social and environmental factors involved, including taking care of oneself, diet, and exercise, but I understand those already. Those parts don't fascinate me as much because virtually everyone has the ability to change those factors in this time period. The complex relationship between the on/off switches in our DNA and the hundreds of thousands genes we inherited? We're just numbers in a genetic lottery, we don't get to choose our parents--no control at all, not until parents begin to be able to engineer babies. The genetic element is the unknown factor that fascinates me. I'm not looking for someone to say "genetics trumps all," I'm simply wondering what complex relationship of what genetic symposium gave Angelina Jolie her lips, while Brad Pitt has hairline lips. That's not environmental, even if height or perceived attractiveness is more about diet or how well one dresses oneself. Let's write the word "beauty" on a piece of paper. Now, this thread is going to throw it away. I should rephrase the original question, what genes actually ARE involved in ones physical appearance, not necessarily beauty or ugliness, and in what relationships amongst one another. The reason no one has given me any links or whatnot is because no one ****ing knows, there's not enough research or links out there to begin with. The answers I get are just circumventing the genetic aspects of the physical shape of our bodies, I've already said I "get it" in terms of the external aspects involved in how one appears. Saying that genes are involved to a minuscule point of being irrelevant in ones physical appearance is, to me, bullshit. If Halle Berry's wearing sweatpants and a wifebeater, her curves still show through. I don't look like her because the complex relationship between the hundreds of thousands of human genes we share express themselves differently in our bodies, that and I need to work out more, and maybe she had a better diet growing up. Regardless, if she gained 50 pounds and rolled in dirt for a month, I bet you she would still be pleasing to the eye compared to the fictional hunchback Quazi Modo, or some quintessential "unattractive" person. By map out, I mean literally listing the genetic relationships between alleles or relate known complex interactions based in the DNA that contributes to physical appearance. So far, no one's done that, nor even given links to any sites that might be relevant to such research. I know it's not that "simple," but isn't that the point of freaking research? Here's an analogy. Finding the cure for cancer or diabetes isn't easy either, arguing of how much genetics, stress, or environment plays into causing the cancer to express itself is irrelevant to making it go away in an individual, it's already there, and arguing is not helping map out the cure... you can still do research on what causes it, and obviously those are both very complex phenotypic entities. I love your example, but what genetic components are involved that make the twins look how they look, regardless if one is more confident or sexier than the other? No one knows here, and I will just be redirected to diet / exercise because no one has an answer that's "simple" enough. I know it's not a simple answer, it's more or less a rhetorical question. I'm guessing there's no research in the world going on in this regard? Is it considered veering dangerously close to eugenics? Aryan race-style? Etc.? No matter how minuscule a role genetics plays, if person A's sexual capital is exploited to the fullest (they take care of themselves, eat a proper diet their entire life, grow to their fullest height, wear nice clothes), they might still be less attractive than person B who also maximizes his or her sexual capital due to genetics, assuming both are perceived as equally sexy in confidence and personality and whatnot. Genetics may not be very important, but it's the aspect that fascinates me the most, irregardless of how complex the inner workings are in terms of the role ones thousands of genes play in ones ultimate, corporal end result. Exactly! That's what I'm referring to. Regardless of how complex, the thousands of subtleties are still genetic to a certain range. And the mathematical permutations of all those gene expressions are well over 9,000, which makes them null and pointless of researching according to the attitude of this thread, since environment totally owns genetics. No matter how much make up I wear or well-exercised I am, at the end of the day, I still won't look like Angelina Jolie. Why? Genetics. (And please no one throw the environment/social perception back at me, I know! I'm just saying it's the genetic aspect that I would like to see links about posted here in this thread.)

I suppose that ridiculously complicated interaction is too menacing for anyone to ever attempt to map out? I wouldn't be surprised if one day the Human Genome Project found correlations for certain traits, despite how ridiculous the relationship might be between the thousands of genes that are involved in how one appears (irregardless of one taking care of him or herself, the original body). Here's food for thought: http://www.eupedia.com/forum/showthread.php?t=24625

Good call. The dude, when I met him, was utterly flaming. But why is that? Why is there such a strong stereotype of beautiful, if not womanly gorgeous, men being gay? Maybe there's proof of a "beauty" allele(s) that either men or women can inherit, which may also premeditate a sexual appetite for men. I have read about recessive genes, and referenced it in my post. I've also read the other answers, but really, I think saying "sexiness is relative" or "how attractive one appears can be environmental" is just an excuse to not delve deeper into how we inherit genes that actually cause someone to be more physically attractive regardless of the environment, and inherit the kind of physical appeal that spans across cultures and is universal at the core. Basic example: facial symmetry. A sultry voice for guys (Think Brad Pitt). A fey voice for women (Think Madonna). A filled out body (rather than scrawny). Height (more subjective than the others, but society tends to like tall models). Prominent cheek bones. A strong, square jawline for men, and the coveted heart-shaped face for women with S-shaped jaw lines (Think Angelina Jolie). Again, I'm going to ask readers to stop pulling the "subjective" card. It's been said already. I get it. But that still doesn't quench my curiosity for wanting to know what alleles carry the traits of what I perceive to be attractive. Read the paragraph above this again if you still don't get what I'm talking about. I don't care if you think Steve Baldwin or Steven Hawking are gorgeous, there are some traits that I would argue are universal signs of sexiness or health (thick hair, height). I guess I'll stop being lazy and articulate what everyone on this forum tells me to read about. Assuming there are certain alleles across the human genome, for what I perceive as physical beauty... for the sake of simplicity and basic understandability, I'll oversimplify this trait into one "beauty" allele called "b". Mendel's first law of Genetics would imply that extraordinarily beautiful people inherit two recessive versions of b that in interact and produce the extraordinarily beautiful phenotype; or, there is one very rare dominant beauty allele ("B"). Let's say for the fellow, b contains height, a filled out body, tan-smooth skin, and thick hair texture. His sister inherited Ab, a recessive b allele from the mother that was dominated from the paternal A allele. However, the boy lucked out and got bb, inheriting the b from his mother and not inheriting the A from the father (receiving the Y chromosome instead of the X, I suppose, thus forcing "b" to express itself as the only present allele, or inheriting another autosomal "b" if the allele is not on the X-chromosome). Consequently, the boy's recessive b phenotype expresses itself as him being physically "beautiful." For the girl, A overrides b, although the siblings have similar features otherwise. That, or the boy inherited a very rare "B" allele from the mother, while the girl may or may not have, either way another allele(s) is/are overriding the traits of height and flawless skin here. Assuming the allele wouldn't express itself differently in daughters, he would most likely have a chance of having gorgeous daughters. Though the genes would skip a generation for expression in males, so long that those daughters had sons. Same thing with the blonde woman, except maybe an "m" allele for sexy traits for Marilyn Monroe reminiscent females rather than the "b" allele that makes the man beautiful. In females, I suppose she would have a chance of having both "fabulous" looking sons and daughters, assuming the genes didn't express themselves differently depending on the sex of the beholder, without the traits skipping a generation. Need another picture? I met this woman in person... she was my teacher. Believe me, she's gorgeous in my opinion. We're discussing traits that would benefit a person if expressed phenotypically in sexual selection. I'm wondering if there's been any research on alleles that might be related to "beauty." I.e., what alleles give Halle Berry her notorious curves? What alleles give Angelina Jolie her lips? What alleles make for stunning, blue eyes? What alleles make for broad shoulders and height? New question for the posters: If you could engineer your baby to be the most beautiful baby in the world, what genes on what alleles would you make express themselves in the baby's phenotype? Yes, beauty is subjective, but the alleles that carry traits that YOU consider to be beautiful still exist.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/03/070328073301.htm http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1690211/ http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:-1e2Hg6uOGUJ:www.epjournal.net/filestore/EP06134146.pdf+genes+for+attractiveness&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESiqJ9XyU1HQ1umiqL0OJTSz1pWVzHBMicHdUSV6cA8bh-b0UR24FkULJnXPrN8nMXEAXWvU9HuBIj5wDwoNr_cozJD7TIBOcLNfEflwMVNyGzI7se_Nvv0oKsbZUFk0aMHnM8hi&sig=AHIEtbR8c_s5El4RD1NAxob9LZSuBYoFBg Good call, Kyrisch. I'm female, and I do have a crush on him, along with the girl I mentioned. Bisexuality? Who knows. I grew up with both of them, and perhaps I have nostalgic attachments. Though, I wouldn't think twice about hooking up with either of them if I had the opportunity. There's another mystery for you biologists: bisexuality and homosexuality. My theory about that is it's simply genetic baggage, once sexuality itself got introduced to the evolution process, the domains weren't exactly thinly defined with a scalpel, if you have same-sex attractions they come along for the ride with your opposite-sex attractions (bisexuality), but homosexuality? Prenatal hormones can do that, too, I suppose. Little to no attraction to the opposite-sex >> prenatal hormones. Though, attractiveness tends to be correlated to health, according to an article above. Maybe these individuals just appear very healthy to me? Or like someone said, maybe my body is trying to tell me that my genes would mix well and produce healthy offspring with their genes? Here's another attractive fellow (red sweatshirt): Now here's him and his sister: I suppose that's what he'd look like as a female with some variation? Would she be "less" healthy than her brother? http://www.metroactive.com/metro/11.08.06/work-0645.html I asked him what his parents looked like, and he said they were much, much shorter than him (he's 6'2"-6'4"). Recessive genes at work, I guess, going against the regression towards the mean. Here's a beautiful woman I had as a Chemistry lab professor: We don't all have daughters, sisters, or mothers that look like this because... They're less healthy and/or they didn't inherit the same phenotypic permutation of the same genes in our species. She resembles her mother, except she's taller and more voluptuous (perhaps got the traits from her father's X chromosome?) Her sister just looks like a random blond girl without too much resemblance to her. I wish I looked like that, and that's all I'll say about her. And, to add to my point that some traits of perceived attractiveness are universal, if you put the guy in drag and died his hair blonde, he might distantly resemble my bombtastic Chemistry professor. Maybe the genes for model-like attractiveness are primarily on the "X" chromosome, and only express themselves in males lucky enough to inherit an X-chromosome with those genes and females who express the chromosome with those genes rather than the other one.

So far, the most popular theories are random chance and the mailman. I would go with the mailman theory if it weren't for the fact that his nose and mouth resemble his father's. They may not be mindblowingly attractive in terms of looking absolutely perfect, but compared to the range of ugly that falls into genetic diversity, I'd say the kids are pretty good looking. I have yet to see another person with hair like the boys, though. I just don't see where it comes from, considering no one else in his family has hair like that. I can't even think of any Caucasian models with hair like that.

I'll add photos in the name of science, because among the vastness of the internet, I feel that anonymity is still more than enough to protect privacy. If it becomes a problem, I'll take them down. Yes, attractive is relative to individuals, but I feel that there are just some universal traits of attractiveness that you can not deny. This is the curly-haired boy from family A. ^ His sister is on the left, his dad is on the right. ^His mom is on the right. Probability is a fine answer. I guess I want more details. I know the genes recombine, with the genes of both sets of the grandparents remixing rather than the parents genes, I'm just always in awe when it produces the "most" (relative term, I know) attractive or intelligent outcomes. I'm a physically average individual from physically average parents, so I suppose I'm just jealous that I'm not as "lucky" as the model-esque humans out there. Most of the great looking people I know at least have one parent that looks like a model, too, but I guess not everyone. I mean, look at Johnny Depp's parents. Average folks, but their genes recombined in just the right way to produce a man who is perceived to be one of the most attractive in the world. Is it the genes just mixing in the perfect combination for what I perceive to be the most attractive outcome, one of the rarest probabilities? Or are their deeply recessive, hidden genes lying dormant within almost all of us for super attractive children? Or both? I guess there's hope for my children? Laughing... I should just be thankful nature had mercy, and I'm lucky to not have any life threatening diseases or disfigurations of all that sort. Not sure what's up with all of the misology on this forum, either. It's like you guys are afraid to delve deeper. Entertain the game while it's going, yeah? Unless it's no deeper than just "probability." That's like saying it's just God. There's a method to the madness. I'd like to map it out... What genes determine symmetry? Baby eyes? A musical voice? Tan skin? Adonis-like, bronze curly hair? Crystal blue eyes? I would love to do research on this one day. Or better yet, even if differentiation is normal, why isn't everyone perfectly symmetrical? Mutation? Flawed formation in utero? We're going to be engineering our babies one day, anyway...

Don't tell me you haven't ever seen this phenomenon. Considering the fact that I've seen pictures of the parents when they were younger, I'd say they weren't as attractive as their children, at all. In Family A, one child actually resembles them. The others? Not so much. Plus, it's not like their parents are that old. If anything, their parents have aged less than the average person their age. A hint of good genes, I guess. I suppose what I'm asking is, what predetermines good looks? Conception? The quality of cellular cleavage in formation? The genes that predetermine what you'll look like after puberty? Again, what gives? I still have yet to get an attempt to answer "how." I.e., how does a model like Angelina Jolie come from Jon Voight and Marcheline Bertrand? ...Genetic accident?

This question has been on my mind for years, and it's driving me nearly insane. Even if I get the answer, like, "Oh, it's just probability," I still would like a more in depth answer--how? For example, my family has some neighbors named Family A. In family A, the mother is alright-looking, while the father isn't that great looking, but he's a smart guy. The first son of theirs is fairly good-looking, but probably has Asperger's, got a perfect score on the SAT, etc. (He's the only on that actually looks like his parents).The first daughter looks like a downright model, with blonde hair and perfect skin. The second son just blows my mind. He is well over 6'4", Adonis-like, THICK curly-brown hair, not that half-curled bird's nest kind of curls, this boy has hair like you've never seen. Think an African American afro, but with caucasian, brown locks rather than tight, sponge-like material. Despite his size and height, he has a baby face, with big, hooded green eyes, a great smile with small, symmetrical white teeth, and bronze skin. If you gave him the up-down, not only does he have height, but his muscles are defined like a super hero. His legs aren't scrawny, they're thick and filled-out like a model. And his backside? Perfectly shaped, almost like he has the shoulder-wedge of a man but the backside of a female. In family B, the parents are a bit larger, not ugly, but not great looking, either. Though, they have very distinct features. The 6'4" dad has ice-blue, hooded eyes and tan skin, while the mom has strikingly black hair and pale white skin, and both have normal voices. The daughter in family B, however, looks NOTHING like them, with the exception of her father's breath-taking ice-blue eyes. Her face looks like it was perfectly carved by a higher deity, with a straight nose so thinly defined in detail you would think she had plastic surgery (she hasn't). Not only that, but she has a perfect figure, although a bit on the bigger side--but this girl's sexier than a skinny model because she has curves. She's gorgeous. On top of that, she has a voice like I've never heard--a voice that you'd think was fake because, normally, you would only hear it in a porn video--the kind of sexy musicality that is very rare in real life. This girl also got a perfect score on the SAT, I guess I should mention both families are upper-class and intelligent, also. How are gorgeous children born from normal parents? What gives? (I am not a pedophile, these "children" are actually my age. I'm 19.)