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Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by jeb on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:42AM (#1497261)
I'm planning to identify a suitable candidate to get married to, and who is genetically appropriate enough to give me good quality kids, then convince this person to marry me and carry my child, within the next year.

Difficult, but I assume interesting.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by MarkPNeyer on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:53AM (#1497292)
My Advice:

1) Accept the person that you are, and learn to love that person. If you don't accept who you are and love yourself, others will have a hard time following suit.

2) Do the things you love. In doing so, you're likely to meet others who share the same interests.

3) Stop worrying about whether you'll ever find someone. When you do this, you project a sense of desperation, and others can pick up on this.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by sangaya on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:32AM (#1497665)
Great advice! I stopped trying to get dates, and focused on enjoying various activities in life. During that time I had more dates than I ever previously had. Doing something you love leads to happiness, and people seem to generally be attracted to happy people.

Also, why the tight time frame? You don't get married to become happy, you get married because you're already happy.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by barmstrong on Thursday July 08, 2010 @02:29PM (#1498292)
Great advice, and totally agree.

On a more practical level, try OkCupid.com. Seriously, I've been so impressed with that site. If match.com is like myspace, okcupid.com is like facebook. High quality, smart people. The girls actually write you back. I'm averaging about 2 dates a month from OkCupid right now.

Also, the site is just a well designed and fun web app, so I can appreciate it on that level.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by Magneus on Friday July 09, 2010 @01:26AM (#1499858)
Seconded. Great site.

I haven't used any other dating sites, so I have no proper basis for comparison, but I've been very satisfied with the site, from matching system, search options, etc.

Bottom line: I ended up meeting my current girlfriend there and things are going very, very well with her. Anecdotal evidence, yes, but I hope it complements the nuggets of awesomeness you'll find on OKTrends (http://blog.okcupid.com).

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by starkfist on Thursday July 08, 2010 @02:35PM (#1498317)
OkCupid is great because the women are super easy. But I'm not sure those are the ones you want to marry. However, I guess given the marriage choice between frigid and easy I would pick easy. Just be sure to get tested, and maybe don't ask about things you don't really want to know.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by jongraehl on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:46AM (#1497717)
As a supplement to 2: make sure you are regularly meeting and talking to women, if you are not already perfectly comfortable doing so. As for worrying, definitely avoid it as long as you're doing the above.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by FraaJad on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:50AM (#1497285)
Step 0: Get adopted by Indian parents.

Step 1: sit back and relax ;)

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by mrtron on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:57AM (#1497747)
I was shocked to discover how often that occurs with families, even in the north america.

A friend of mine is having a difficult time convincing his parents and hers that he has found his own partner - even though they would be very suitable candidates for an arranged marriage.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by FraaJad on Thursday July 08, 2010 @12:10PM (#1497787)
The Indian parents living in NA are still carrying their "culture" from 1960s (or whenever they left India) on their backs. Parents in India, esp in Cities, are open to "love marriages", as long as you don't deviate too much in terms of caste, language, social status, educational qualification and economic status :) . Yes, all that matters.

Indians do not marry for love. Love is what happens afterwards.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by adamilardi on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:56AM (#1497305)
My advice: Don't tell them that on the first date.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by wallflower on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:03AM (#1497325)
Previously on News.YC:

"Optimizing your wife

If a man can expect to meet exactly N eligible women in his life, what strategy should he use to maximize his chances of choosing the very best one?"

http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath018/kmath018.htm

Just curious, are you attempting to quantitatively rank the candidates in a spreadsheet, especially the intangibles like 'as potential mother'?

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by MicahWedemeyer on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:48AM (#1497510)
I know it's all in jest, but there is a lot of "me" and "my" in there. Does this prospective partner not have any ownership over the relationship and/or kids?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by Rod on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:23AM (#1497411)
Why the rush? It's not like you're gonna be impotent at age 40 or something. The pressure to "do or die" in one year only is likely to jeopardize your effort... unless you date single, childless 40 year old women. But what self-respecting man would do such a thing when there are so many younger, hotter women?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by araneae on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:34AM (#1497451)

  carry my child
If they're a woman, they're a lesbian. I'm pretty sure men can't bear children.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by sqrt17 on Thursday July 08, 2010 @12:15PM (#1497810)
As common wisdom goes, children are created through an act by one male and one female human, and subsequently carry about 50% of each partner's core DNA and 100% of the female partner's mitochondrial DNA.

As a result, neither egocentrical males nor lesbians can bear children by themselves, even though artificial insemination and foster mothers may make it easy to live in the illusion that it's a possibility. (Or were you implying that the backward model of gender roles that is expressed in "carry my child" would be sure to drive any sane woman away unless the OP is a lesbian woman, because lesbian women can get away with chauvinistic opinions without raising any red flags?)

On the other hand, yes, his or her wife may be perfectly able to carry his or her existing child around if he or she is a single parent with a sore back.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by araneae on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:43PM (#1499685)
"[T]o bear" means "to give birth" in common parlance.

So lesbians can certainly bear children by themselves, but men, the vast majority of which have no wombs, cannot.

Citation: #3 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bear

And while you may consider yourself witty, I feel I must point out that in the context in which I was using it, "to carry" a child refers to the state of being pregnant with it. Citation: #6 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/carry Yet again, something the wombless may have trouble with.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by sqrt17 on Friday July 09, 2010 @03:17AM (#1500032)
Lesbians can certainly bear children by themselves, just as any woman could. By that point, it does not matter (for the biological notion of conception) if that woman is lesbian, heterosexual, asexual, or anything else.

As opposed to that, the mindset of getting a partner for the sole purpose of having a family, while certainly more often found with those with non-womb reproductive organs, can probably be found with both males and females and in either case is sure to be appalling to the partner (or to other people at large).

While I strongly agree with your basic point, I'm not sure I like the way you make that point.

In my understanding, both the OP and yourself implicitly talk about the whole parenting affair and not just getting pregnant with a child, at which point the social faculty of being a good parent becomes more relevant compared to biological disposition.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by hugh3 on Thursday July 08, 2010 @03:59PM (#1498569)
If an egg from Woman A gets fertilized and implanted into Woman B, then one lesbian can be carrying her lesbian partner's baby.

It would be difficult to find one who would agree to this arrangement, though.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by eirene on Thursday July 08, 2010 @12:27PM (#1497845)
Says alot about HN that this reply hasn't been downvoted more.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by Rod on Thursday July 08, 2010 @02:12PM (#1498227)
If you want to hear pretty lies, go watch Sex and the City. It's well known that 40 year old women are almost infertile. And their pregnancies tend to be riskier. I didn't make the rules, so don't shoot the messenger.

Show me a man starting a family with a 40 year old, and I will show you a man without options.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by anthonyb on Friday July 09, 2010 @01:19AM (#1499845)
Why would women date you at 40 when they could go for the "younger, hotter" model?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by Rod on Friday July 09, 2010 @04:13AM (#1500116)
No one is talking about dating. We're talking about starting a family, which is an entirely different bag of cookies. Wake the f*ck up.

Assuming that women and men are the same, have the same goals, and obey the same rules is an immensely stupid mistake to make, one that could be avoided by observing the real world social dynamics, and one that only clueless feminists such as yourself make.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by anthonyb on Sunday July 11, 2010 @11:21PM (#1506689)
Why so hostile? Assuming that all women and all men obey the same rules is also an immensely stupid mistake to make. Not all of us are micro-optimising assholes - some of us actually care about the people that we choose to start a family with.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by hugh3 on Thursday July 08, 2010 @04:19PM (#1498629)
pretty lies

Well, somebody's been reading his Roissy.

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by MrMatt on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:46AM (#1497276)
You going to be split-testing?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by swombat on Thursday July 08, 2010 @09:56AM (#1497306)
He'll definitely be using genetic algorithms.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by jholman on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:44AM (#1497496)
Before he tries that, he may have to divide and conquer.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by weirdwonka on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:35AM (#1497455)
choose as much exotic race as possible with highest possible iq + looks

Such as if you are White I suggest a good looking Indian girl who is pursuing PhD in CS or some such

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by starkfist on Thursday July 08, 2010 @03:02PM (#1498412)
Based on your theory of genetic difference, this isn't necessarily sound advice. "White" and "Indian" are not distinct genetic groups . The genetic distance between a Swede and a Czech (both white) is bigger than the distance between a "white" southern european and someone from northern india.
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by moultano on Thursday July 08, 2010 @02:45PM (#1498348)
From personal experience, let's just say dating an Indian girl as a white man is non-trivial. (Assuming Indian means from-India, not just Indian descent.)
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by huherto on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:02AM (#1497552)
care to explain?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by weirdwonka on Thursday July 08, 2010 @01:30PM (#1498057)
The more genetically distinct your spouse is from your self the better will your kids be.

At the same time you must look out for IQ and Looks which are quite a bit genetically dependant

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by hugh3 on Thursday July 08, 2010 @04:24PM (#1498650)
The more genetically distinct your spouse is from your self the better will your kids be.

Any evidence for this? (Once you get past marrying siblings and maybe cousins?)

Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by dgallagher on Thursday July 08, 2010 @10:05AM (#1497339)
You should watch "The Invention of Lying." I think you'll like it. :)
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by asnyder on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:28AM (#1497650)
That was a terrible movie. I'm sorry. It started out good, but then just went on and on and on. Why would you subject someone else to it?
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by kadavy on Thursday July 08, 2010 @03:26PM (#1498478)
Re:Ask HN: What's your most interesting life goal currently? by executive on Thursday July 08, 2010 @11:26AM (#1497636)
John Nash?