The document discusses the concept of beauty and questions whether it has an evolutionary purpose. It notes that beauty is subjective but cultures tend to have norms of beauty. It argues that celebrities presented as beautiful rely on advantages ordinary people don't have access to, so their beauty may be an illusion created by resources like trainers, makeup artists, and plastic surgery. The document asks readers to consider what feelings of beauty different images conjure in them to think about what decides their own views of beauty.

1. *
How Do You Recognize Beauty?
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2. * Pollan asks if beauty has a purpose.
* He believes there is a co-evolutionary design.
* That which is beautiful gains advantage and the one
who recognizes the beauty grants the advantage to
the item, creature and so forth.
* This begs the question: does something have to be
beautiful in order to compete successfully according
to the rules of natural selection?
* Perhaps we need to think about our own
relationship to beauty.
*
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3. * Clearly beauty is subjective, yet each culture
seems to have some absolute norms for beauty.
* We have celebrities shoved in our faces, told
that their beauty is superior to ours, but we
also know that it is their job to be beautiful, so
they will have advantages to maintain that
beauty that others cannot have.
* Celebrities have personal trainers, time to
work out, make up artists, the best clothes
designers, money, personal chefs, massage
therapists, access to every beauty fad,
personal photographers with special lighting,
luxurious furniture, travel to exotic places and,
of course, plastic surgeons.
* So it is possible we aren’t seeing beauty at all,
but the illusion of beauty.
* And since we are bombarded with these
images, after a while we convince ourselves
that beauty is exactly what they seem to be.
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4. * Look at the following slides. Do these images
conjure up feelings of beauty in you? Why or
why not?
* The purpose of this exercise is for you to think
about beauty. It may not fit some social norm,
but if it works for you, that is all that matters,
right?
* Is beauty something you decide for yourself or
do you unconsciously let others decide for you?
*
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