I’m obsessed w this. 26 yr old woman in LA and I got top 5%!!! Made me feel better despite the fact that my dating life feels dead on arrival. Medium hard to get a date and then extremely difficult to feel a real connection, flow, chemistry etc with someone. Lots of people who are very nice and good and normal but feels like talking to a pleasant co-worker—after some hours I’d probably get really annoyed. every 1-2 years I do encounter someone who feels like they could be the real deal. and at least im in the top 5%. I guess my q is, does the ranking matter? I mean it would be easy for me to get married, yes. I get a lot of likes on apps. But so what? Idk if those people actually would deeply care about me or be interested or if they just want a body and the convenience of having a girlfriend. I know so many people more so in the middle range, like 50th percentile, who are actually in loving committed relationships.
Thanks so much for the kind words and I'm glad it made you feel good! With the obvious disclaimer it's just a model, my theory having seen my own friend group is that being in a top percentile is both a blessing and a curse, in the sense that being in a top percentile gives you so many options.
This part sticks out to me:
"I mean it would be easy for me to get married, yes. I get a lot of likes on apps. But so what? Idk if those people actually would deeply care about me or be interested or if they just want a body and the convenience of having a girlfriend."
I feel if someone didn't have as many options as you, they might feel ironically happier even with a "worse" match since they'd be glad someone liked them.
I also feel, and again this is unscientific, that some people are just wired differently. I know some people who settled down fast and are seemingly very happy, and some who just can't. I think the nature vs nurture thing is so real, and also people's parental role models with relationships is so real too.
Thanks again for checking it out and please take everything I said with a grain of salt. Do you have any thoughts on this? I'd also be curious what @LanaLi thinks
My entire substack centers around this idea of “I am objectively fine and have tons options of first dates from apps but why can’t I find someone despite trying so hard?!” For me, the answer was complex and tangled up - a combination of factors, where I wasn’t showing up happy/optimistic, I just was a hard person to match, I vaped too much, I was choosing men who weren’t that exciting to me so I didn’t seem excited and into them which led to them not pursuing me, etc etc. you will figure it out! It does require some experimentation and introspection.
I find it interesting that, as a 54 year-old male, my ‘long-term’ worth is 55% greater than my ‘short term’ worth. I mean, considering that in the long term my career will have plateaued by this point, I am far less likely to want to start a new family, my likelihood of fathering healthy children (even with a much younger woman) is reduced, my current wife is still alive, my risk of serious health concerns and cognitive decline is elevated, and other nebulous details such as having ‘old man smell’ to look forward to.
Thanks for your comment and for checking it out. First I would say the model might not be 100% true in all cases, and it certainly does not take into account some of those factors like you or anyone else being married. I also didn't take into account fertility (beyond some probably unavoidable age effects) because some couples don't want children anyway, and because people still have sex after menopause/on birth control. So I would say you might be correct it could be overrating or underrating you (or anyone else) in certain conditions.
Beyond that, and perhaps this is too crude, but I would say the example you gave broadly intuitively makes sense to me if you consider the potential considerations of a hypothetical new partner. Let's say you were single and a woman who is 40 was considering two men for short or long term dating. One is 14 years older, and one is 14 years younger than her. (So a 26 year old vs a 54 year old). Let's say both of the men are in excellent shape. It seems, to me, intuitive the 26 year old (or a 35 year old, at least) would usually be more desirable for short term. But at the same time, the 54 year old would be stable, probably own a house, be mature, etc. etc. And the 26 year old might move on to other partners, but the older man might not. I suppose if you knew the 26 (or 35 year old) would never leave you might prefer him? Maybe it comes down to somewhat of a trust problem?
That is just me guessing though, and I want to say I appreciate your comment and concerns.
Thank you for your comment. With the obvious disclaimer made many times—that the calculator is an imperfect approximation— I have two relevant things to say: 1) The kindness and personality scores are extremely subjective and notoriously hard to pin down at mass scale, but at a personal level, everyone has friends we like, friends we love, people we dislike and loathe, etc. Kindness and actually liking someone is really important for long-term dating, but less important for short term hookups. This is why the scores are weighted differently depending on what the dating goal is. (to get extreme with it, someone exclusively after sex, or even looking for a prostitute, might not care about personality at all, while most people thinking of the mother/father of their children might prefer an ultra kind person they can depend on in the long term, rather than someone who is hotter but meaner) 2) There is actually interesting and proactive research that suggests that dark triad traits, like narcissim and selfishness etc. might make someone more attractive for short term dating though we didn’t implement that in the model 3) Kindness and personality in this calculator really should just be seen as a hypothetical personality match with whatever hypothetical person you are dating. Someone can have a personal taste difference or fetish and think someone who most think is unattractive is a 10 for them, and likewise someone with an awkward personality might be a 10 in personality for a specific person. — I’m writing this very jet lagged so I think it’s not quite as good as I want it to be, I may add more later, thanks again for your comment
Good question, and one I should have addressed earlier. No data is stored in this version. Indeed, I bet most people are changing attributes multiple times so even if we did store data, which we definitely do not, I bet it wouldn’t be that useful. (For example I am not a 23 year old woman or a 55 year old man but I spent time playing with adjusting variables around those ages/genders. If we stored data it would look weird. I have thought about doing it in the future but if we did it would be explicit. Anyway, please use it knowing there is no data collected. All the best and I hope you like it, Alex.
I’m obsessed w this. 26 yr old woman in LA and I got top 5%!!! Made me feel better despite the fact that my dating life feels dead on arrival. Medium hard to get a date and then extremely difficult to feel a real connection, flow, chemistry etc with someone. Lots of people who are very nice and good and normal but feels like talking to a pleasant co-worker—after some hours I’d probably get really annoyed. every 1-2 years I do encounter someone who feels like they could be the real deal. and at least im in the top 5%. I guess my q is, does the ranking matter? I mean it would be easy for me to get married, yes. I get a lot of likes on apps. But so what? Idk if those people actually would deeply care about me or be interested or if they just want a body and the convenience of having a girlfriend. I know so many people more so in the middle range, like 50th percentile, who are actually in loving committed relationships.
Thanks so much for the kind words and I'm glad it made you feel good! With the obvious disclaimer it's just a model, my theory having seen my own friend group is that being in a top percentile is both a blessing and a curse, in the sense that being in a top percentile gives you so many options.
This part sticks out to me:
"I mean it would be easy for me to get married, yes. I get a lot of likes on apps. But so what? Idk if those people actually would deeply care about me or be interested or if they just want a body and the convenience of having a girlfriend."
I feel if someone didn't have as many options as you, they might feel ironically happier even with a "worse" match since they'd be glad someone liked them.
I also feel, and again this is unscientific, that some people are just wired differently. I know some people who settled down fast and are seemingly very happy, and some who just can't. I think the nature vs nurture thing is so real, and also people's parental role models with relationships is so real too.
Thanks again for checking it out and please take everything I said with a grain of salt. Do you have any thoughts on this? I'd also be curious what @LanaLi thinks
My entire substack centers around this idea of “I am objectively fine and have tons options of first dates from apps but why can’t I find someone despite trying so hard?!” For me, the answer was complex and tangled up - a combination of factors, where I wasn’t showing up happy/optimistic, I just was a hard person to match, I vaped too much, I was choosing men who weren’t that exciting to me so I didn’t seem excited and into them which led to them not pursuing me, etc etc. you will figure it out! It does require some experimentation and introspection.
I find it interesting that, as a 54 year-old male, my ‘long-term’ worth is 55% greater than my ‘short term’ worth. I mean, considering that in the long term my career will have plateaued by this point, I am far less likely to want to start a new family, my likelihood of fathering healthy children (even with a much younger woman) is reduced, my current wife is still alive, my risk of serious health concerns and cognitive decline is elevated, and other nebulous details such as having ‘old man smell’ to look forward to.
Thanks for your comment and for checking it out. First I would say the model might not be 100% true in all cases, and it certainly does not take into account some of those factors like you or anyone else being married. I also didn't take into account fertility (beyond some probably unavoidable age effects) because some couples don't want children anyway, and because people still have sex after menopause/on birth control. So I would say you might be correct it could be overrating or underrating you (or anyone else) in certain conditions.
Beyond that, and perhaps this is too crude, but I would say the example you gave broadly intuitively makes sense to me if you consider the potential considerations of a hypothetical new partner. Let's say you were single and a woman who is 40 was considering two men for short or long term dating. One is 14 years older, and one is 14 years younger than her. (So a 26 year old vs a 54 year old). Let's say both of the men are in excellent shape. It seems, to me, intuitive the 26 year old (or a 35 year old, at least) would usually be more desirable for short term. But at the same time, the 54 year old would be stable, probably own a house, be mature, etc. etc. And the 26 year old might move on to other partners, but the older man might not. I suppose if you knew the 26 (or 35 year old) would never leave you might prefer him? Maybe it comes down to somewhat of a trust problem?
That is just me guessing though, and I want to say I appreciate your comment and concerns.
Thank you for your comment. With the obvious disclaimer made many times—that the calculator is an imperfect approximation— I have two relevant things to say: 1) The kindness and personality scores are extremely subjective and notoriously hard to pin down at mass scale, but at a personal level, everyone has friends we like, friends we love, people we dislike and loathe, etc. Kindness and actually liking someone is really important for long-term dating, but less important for short term hookups. This is why the scores are weighted differently depending on what the dating goal is. (to get extreme with it, someone exclusively after sex, or even looking for a prostitute, might not care about personality at all, while most people thinking of the mother/father of their children might prefer an ultra kind person they can depend on in the long term, rather than someone who is hotter but meaner) 2) There is actually interesting and proactive research that suggests that dark triad traits, like narcissim and selfishness etc. might make someone more attractive for short term dating though we didn’t implement that in the model 3) Kindness and personality in this calculator really should just be seen as a hypothetical personality match with whatever hypothetical person you are dating. Someone can have a personal taste difference or fetish and think someone who most think is unattractive is a 10 for them, and likewise someone with an awkward personality might be a 10 in personality for a specific person. — I’m writing this very jet lagged so I think it’s not quite as good as I want it to be, I may add more later, thanks again for your comment
I was taking your concerns seriously, apologies if I shoudn't have
Good question, and one I should have addressed earlier. No data is stored in this version. Indeed, I bet most people are changing attributes multiple times so even if we did store data, which we definitely do not, I bet it wouldn’t be that useful. (For example I am not a 23 year old woman or a 55 year old man but I spent time playing with adjusting variables around those ages/genders. If we stored data it would look weird. I have thought about doing it in the future but if we did it would be explicit. Anyway, please use it knowing there is no data collected. All the best and I hope you like it, Alex.