Some bugs just gotta have it when they get an olfactory jolt. And when a female pig gets a whiff of pheromones emanating from a sweaty male pig, she spreads her nostrils, turns her rump toward him, and oinks seductively.
In human animals, sweat, foot odor, and vaginal fluids (the odors that Americans gratefully pay deodorant companies to wipe out) would count as pheromones. Do they work? Do male body
odors have the same effect on human females and vice versa as they have on the opposite sexes in the animal kingdom?
Certain humans do openly respond to body odors.
Many men like the scent of a woman's underarms.
Napoleon report-
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edly sent a letter to his beloved Josephine imploring her, "I will be arriving in Paris tomorrow evening.
Don't wash." Today, however, the average wife would be more apt to send her pit-sniffing husband to a sex therapist.
Skepticism aside, some researchers still harbor high hopes for human pheromones. Half a dozen respected scientists think they have discovered a new sense organ in our nasal cavity called the
vomeronasal organ , or VNO . These scientists tell us that anatomists have overlooked this organ for centuries. No wonder—it is nothing more than a tiny, pale pit near the bottom of the septal wall dividing the nose. This minuscule dent is reported to detect chemical signals passed unconsciously between people.
To prove their point, these scientists did what all scientists do. They conducted experiments. But when their human research subjects lay flat on their backs flaring their nostrils for science, nothing happened.
Women who sniffed armpit pads that men had worn for several days did experience a slight change in their menstrual cycles, but they certainly reported no feelings of sexual attraction.
However, modern-day scientists and entrepreneurs, ever in search of a headline-grabbing discovery, continue their research. The hope (and the hype?) is that by bottling a form of human body odors, humans will be able to generate the same reaction as the female pig when she gets a blast of boar breath. One clever entrepreneur has already bottled a new form of the old substance, body odor,
and is selling it at seventy dollars for fifty millimeters.
Mail-order catalogues have jumped on the BO
bandwagon and are advertising secret ingredients from the human body guaranteed to hypnotize and attract members of the opposite sex.
I've conducted little firsthand research in this area, but my own unscientific observation is that, if you dab some pheromones behind each ear, you may indeed find horny female insects flying around your head. No evidence to date proves to me that pheromones can cause the same reactions in humans.
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The sense of smell, however, is a powerful attraction.
Who knows? There's a whiff of evidence that these scientists and entrepreneurs are on to something—
enough, at least, to warrant one final bit of advice: Be very conscious of the effects your smell can have on your Quarry.
TECHNIQUE #85:
WHO NOSE?
Don't expect your Quarry to fall nose over heels in love with you just because of your scent. However, since pheromones play an important role in animal erotica, cover your bets. Give your relationship an olfactory boost by letting your Quarry choose your perfume or aftershave for you.
AFTERWORD
We enter this world from our mother's womb, alone.
We live our lives in a solitude defined by the boundary of our mind and our body. And we exit this earthly existence unaccompanied. If, in between, two solitudes can find togetherness and communion with another mortal, they find true happiness indeed. But true love is a luxury, not our preordained birthright. As with achieving any luxury, we must examine the most powerful methods to acquire it.
We look to scientific research to tell uswhypeople fall in love and then fashion our deeds to meet the needs of the mortal we want to make fall in love with us. But, as the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote in a letter to one of his colleagues, ' I believe the souls of five hundred Sir Isaac Newtons would go to the making up of a Shakespeare or a Milton."
So it is with love. Harken the studies which tell us of the six elements we have explored:
the impact of first impressions , theinfluenceof similarity , the skewed reckoning of the narcissism of
the magnitude of the joy and enrapturement of equity , ego ,
gender differences
, and sex .
Spike your arrow with this wisdom and the techniques that science has spawned. But as you take aim at your Quarry, never forget the artistry, the creativity, and thmeagicof love. A great performer studies techniques for a lifetime but, flooded by the warmth of the spotlight, those grueling years of practice fade into the past. Triumphant performers give themselves to the moment, and let the magic unfold naturally. So it is with romance. Study and practice the techniques to make somebody fall in love with you. But when the moment arrives, give yourself to it. Follow your instincts and obey your heart.
I wish you love.
NOTES
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1. Peretti, Peter 0., and Kippschull, Heidi. 1989.
"Influence of Five Types of Music on Social Page 311
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2. Rosman, Jonathan P, and Resnick, Phillip J. 1989.
"Sexual Attraction to Corpses: A Psychiatric Review of Necrophilia."Bulletin of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law 17(2):153–163.
3. Voigt, Harrison. 1991. "Enriching the Sexual Experience of Couples: The Asian Traditions."
Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy 17(3):214–219.
4. Ronai, Carol Rambo, and Ellis, Carolyn. 1989.
"Turn-Ons for Money: Interactional Strategies of the Table Dancer."Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 18(3):271–298.
5. Tannen, Deborah, Ph.D. 1990. You Just Don't Understand . New York: William Morrow and Company.
6. Gray, John, Ph.D. 1992. Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus . New York: HarperCollins Publishers.
7. Money, John, Ph.D. 1986. Lovemaps . New York: Irvington Publishers.
8.DeWitt,PaulaMergenhagen."AlltheLonelyPeople.A
"mericanDemographicsApril1992, 44–48.
9. Goode, W. J. 1959. "The Theoretical Importance of Love."American Sociological Review 2:38–47.
10. Murstein, Bernard I., Ph.D. 1980. "Love at First Sight: A Myth."Medical Aspects of Human Sexuality 14(9).
11. Berscheid, Ellen. 1980. Commenting on "Love at
