From: davidg@aegis.or.jp (Dave McLane)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Pheromone and Roman Hikou -- Would you grow up a little, please?
Date: 1 Jan 93 01:58:31 GMT

masuda@fcs280b.ncifcrf.gov (Michiaki Masuda) writes:

>   First, there is no proved evidence that a certain chemical or 
>biological substance acts as "pheromone" in human to attract everyone of the
>opposite sex.

I think this all depends on what you mean by "proved". There is
certainly evidence for something along these lines ... unfortunately
I didn't save the references but for sure there has been
experimental research which suggests that pheronomes are generated
by and have an affect upon human beings. 

>   Secondly, it is very likely that during the process of evolution of human 
>being, pheromone lost its function as sexual message and that the molecule 
>which used to act as human pheromone may be no longer produced in modern 
>human. It is also reasonable to assume that the connection between receptor
>of the pheromone and a sexual sensation has been lost. In other words, if 
>someone succeeds to identify pheromone of prototype human, he/she may not
>be able to lure women/men with it.

While this may be likely, it is also likely that during the process of
evolution the conscious awareness of the effects has been lost but the
effect remains.

>   Thirdly, the level of a body odor seems to be determined by the number
>of "apocrine" sweat gland. Even though some hormones regulate the sweating
>and could control the body odor, relating the level of testosterone and
>that of "male human" pheromone which doesn't seem to exist would be rather
>ilogical. In addition, as far as I know, there is no significant 
>race-specific difference in the level of testosterone.

Surely there is a difference in the level of testosterone between human
beings ... I don't know of any studies that have tried to relate the
averge level between races/culturs, though.

>   Ok. So long for science, and I'll go into some sociological issues which
>I am rather naive about.

>   First, discussing how the difference in the level of male pheromone
>deteremines the success of failure in luring women is a typically sexist
>attitude. Would you guys be attracted by a certain woman only by her
>body odor? As you count other factors (e.g., personality, intelligence,
>religious belief, etc.), so does most women. You might not want to talk
>as if you were assuming that women are animals of a lower class controled
>only by basic instincts. 

From what I know pheronomes affect both sexes. I guess you could
call it a uni-sexual response :-) While other things play their
part, both men and women are physically animals, are they not. 

>   Secondly, arguing that Japanese men are less attractive to women because
>they lack pheromone is a typically racist attitude. There are many Japanese
>women who are attracted by Japanese men and even more so than by non-Japanese
>men. I also believe that there are non-Japanese women who could be attracted
>by Japanese men rather than non-Japanese men. 

I think the argument goes that people are less sexually attracted to
men without pheronomes, no matter what the race. The supposed low
pheronome level of Japanese men is just an example. IMHO, it applies
equally to Japanese women over the age of many 35. 

As for Japanese women being attracted by Japanese men, I'm not so
sure about that.  One of the big issues related to the low birth
rate in Japan is the fact that men and women aren't particularly
attracted to each other. It's not that they don't have children,
they don't want to get married, and further they don't even want to
see each other socially. Or so surveys in the English newspapers
report. 

While there must be non-Japanese women who are attracted by Japanese
men, from the couples I see, these are mostly (but not all) other
Asians. No hard data though, it's just my observation that when you
see a mixed couple, it's almost always an Anglo-Saxon man and
Japanese women. 

>   Thirdly, Japanese female "yellow cabs", the presence of which I also 
>have heard of, are not an expression of inferiority of Japanese men.
>Even if they are doing what they are doing being attracted by the high
>level of "pheromone" of non-Japanese men, do you think many Japanese
>men would try to increase their pheromone just to make the "yellow
>cabs" come back to Japan or to prevent potential "yellow cabs" from
>leaving Japan? I personally don't mind what those girls do or why,
>but if someone unreasonably tries to extract the inferiority of
>Japanese men out of it, I would take it personal.

Perhaps you are right. According to yet another article (there seems
to one every couple of weeks) one of the problems is that Japanese
men are social inept when it comes to relating to women. Thus JTB is
beginning to offer courses for men on how to behave on your
honeymoon to avoid the "Narita divorce" effect (when they come back
from the honeymoon the woman leaves the man at Narita). 

However, the highest rate of divorce is among retired salarymen and
their wives: he leaves the company, starts staying at home and
treating his wife (who has been boss for all those years) like a
office-lady. 

Something to think about....

Dave

--
Dave McLane 
JUNET: davidg@aegis.or.jp (ONLY within Japan: post otherwise)
Nagaokakyoshi, Kyoto Japan Tel: +81-75-951-1168 Fax: +81-75-957-1087