Listen / Read
I found today’s Thought quite thought provoking. But mainly just because of the research that was discussed, and the link provided on Platitude of the Day to the New Scientist article mentioned by Draper.
Until recently, research has tended to suggest that humans probably aren’t as receptive to pheromones as we are popularly led to believe. Whereas animals tend to have a vomeronasal organ within their olfactory system that specifically sniffs out pheromones and sends corresponding signals along neurons to the brain, humans lack the neurons necessary for this process to take place.
But now there is new evidence that some animals use their normal olfactory system to respond to pheromones, it makes the case for human pheromones more compelling. Studies (of varying rigour) have been conducted into both stated reactions to pheromones as well as the brain’s electrical responses, and it seems there is indeed a connection. Somehow, our brains do seem to respond to pheromonal stimuli.
So should I buy a little tube of spray-on pheromones from the oddly located dispenser in my local boozer (it’s still got a tap room, and it isn’t exactly what you’d call a fuck-hub)? Well, no, the overall impact of pheromones is almost certainly negligible compared to other factors:
As for whether it’s worth investing in pheromone-laced aftershave for that big night out, Lundstrom sounds a note of caution. “Most of these companies are selling andosterone – it’s a pig pheromone that 60 per cent of people can’t smell and the rest think smells like urine,” he says. On balance, it’s probably worth working on some witty conversation instead.
Bugger. Oh well, I’m a vegetarian anyway. And to be honest, after reading this article, I’m not exactly in a rush to sniff out a mate. Whereas the male hormone that gets heterosexual women going is contained in bloke sweat, the female hormone that does it for heterosexual males is found in lady wee. Whilst that pissy pig juice makes more sense now, I’m not remotely into water sports. Plus, I’m now worried that I’ll find myself pulling piss-stained panties off my next conquest. With my teeth. Science can be a real turn-off sometimes (so it’s a good job conquests are an entirely hypothetical concept in my life).
And what about anosmiacs? If you’ve got no sense of smell, and humans use their normal olfactory system for pheromone processing, are you less likely to find yourself getting the hots for someone, or just more likely to get the hots for someone who stinks of shit?
Wikipedia tells me that an anosmiac founded the Christian Science movement. Double boner-shrinker, one might think, but Mary Baker Eddy married three times. Though her first husband died within a year, her second husband readily admitted to adultery during divorce proceedings (’Yeah I fucked other women, what do you expect? Christian Science is a double boner-shrinker and I never get to win who-smelt-it-dealt-it!’) and her third husband also died prematurely, you can’t say she didn’t try to sniff out the menfolk.
Still, what if the opposite is true, and lady piss pheromones were behind her 19th century marriage tally? Perhaps her ability to lure these suitors was just down to the fact that TENA Lady wasn’t on the market back then. Maybe recent drops in birth statistics can be correlated to sales of TENA Lady Mini Magic™. It could be that throughout human history pissy flaps have been the the way to a man’s penis, and now modern vaginas, all clean, dry and piss free, could lead to our undoing. Or our not undoing, as it were.
But then Wordsworth was an anosmiac too and he didn’t have a problem falling for the ladies; English ladies, French ladies; he could barely even resist his own sister. He couldn’t smell flowers either, and he still managed to write about them like he wanted to personally pollinate the petally little prick-teases.
Then there’s Stevie Wonder, a man who, despite being unable to see women, let alone smell them, gets on the blower to his ‘cherie armour’ just to tell her he loves her. Yes, that’s all he called to say, and this was 1984, well before free weekend and evening calls.
And then there’s Michael Hutchence, who was infamous for getting it on with supermodels and pop stars galore; he didn’t need to smell any poxy pheromones to want to sex them up. Then again, he didn’t really need any company either. You could give the guy a leather belt and a sturdy ceiling fitment and he’d entertain himself for entire minutes before you had to call the paramedics.
Overall, I’m thinking that not being able to smell those pissy, sweaty, sexy pheromones isn’t really much of an impediment, for either the prowlers or the prowlees. So ladies, if you promise not to piss in your pants, I’ll try not to get a dab on, and we can set aside our contagious fears that romance is a stinky, pissy mess waiting to happen, and just get our fuck on.
You do ass-to-mouth, right?