A man can impregnate many woman in this same period of time. All of these woman have a good chance of creating offspring, so the main concern of an individual woman is finding a man who will be able to provide for her child. This is a complex requirement - it isn't necessarily sufficient to just look at a man to gauge his ability to secure resources. Also, the energy cost of becoming pregnant is extremely high for a woman. Therefore, the woman reacts based on a large number of variables. She also assumes that other woman are searching for a man based on similar requirements, so the fact that a man is surrounded by other woman increases his value as a potential mate.

I realize that this simplifies things quite a bit, but I think the fundamental argument is sound.

I remember when I was a student, going to parties with my homies, some of them genetically blessed indeed. Even though these guys were very attractive, it was still hard to get girls to feel comfortable around them. I conjecture that went on inside these girls' minds was:

"yeah, these guys are quite handsome, but if the market is efficient, then they should have girlfriends or flings accompanying them, and since they are in a group of guys, there must be something wrong with them."

I adopted a different strategy. I started going to these parties accompanied by my best friend only, and a bunch of stunning eastern european exchange students I knew at the time. Oh boy, all of a sudden, it was so easy to get engaging conversations going with members of the opposite sex :-))) [insert evil smile here] I guess what the girls were thinking was:

- couple of guys and 5 gorgeous foreign girls

- the girls seem to be accompanying them on a voluntary basis, so there must be something interesting about those two guys

- if girls of that caliber hang out with them, then they're probably not assholes.

Enough of theories. It worked wonders. "Using" attractive out-of-my-league female friends as "social validation" to flirt girls who were more in my league at parties was one of the coolest things I ever did in my life. Call it a "social hack" if you will.

I knew about the cool "underground" parties. They benefited from my information. I benefited from their company. They met tons of guys. I met tons of girls. It was a win-win situation. I wouldn't call it a "mercenary way" (not that I am offended by that notion). I just think that in life there are positive-sum games to be played, and those are the games I like to play :-)

I'm a big believer in free will. The idea of moral absolutes have always seemed quite odd to me. In my experience the world is very rarely black and white, usually more shades of grey. Only those who can't handle the complexity introduced by ambiguity seem to need moral absolutes.

I would posit that women on average tend to perceive the world in a way that makes sensory information and emotion more salient than it is for men, and somehow men already in relationships seem more desirable when seen through this lens. But I could just be completely full of it.

I guess they don't have child support wherever you're from.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_proof

Conversely, men rate women as less desirable when they are surrounded by other men, compared to being alone or surrounded by other women.

The times I've done it / the first twenty seconds after you have broached their airspace is among the most scary and exhilirating experiences. The more women, the better. Do not hover!

For bonus points, sidle over and drag a chair loudly from one side of a room to where they are and sit down (presuming they are seated, you have most likely pulled off the icebreaker that needs no icebreaker)

This is also why guys that go to bars with friends have a significantly lower chance of being labeled "creepy" than a guy that goes by himself.

I've noticed that when I go somewhere with a friend, even if just one, I feel like I can hang out forever. While, if I were to go to a bar by myself, even though that's easy to do, it's not fun - I feel über self conscious (everyone is looking at me / even though that is probably your false perception).

When you go to a bar by yourself, you have to invest a lot of your energy to initially meet people (think of the times when you've been travelling and in a place where you know no one).

And, on the social side, when I am out with a female friend, I feel even more confident and feel like I have license to flirt shamelessly with near everyone.

I feel going out with friends can give you the support base to go out and venture. However, too many friends can devolve into the classic circle-the-wagons formation. Of course, there is the social hack of working the room that nearly always works and requires fearless action: start with one, engage him/her, offer him/her an opportunity to approach with him/her to a group or leave, engage the group confidently, wave at someone in another group, etc. Done confidently and charmingly, it is quite a feeling / to bootstrap yourself from a loner to someone other people are looking at and wondering 'who is this guy?'

In other words, men are undesirable in heterosexual culture. So we conclude that, if you're a guy, your only hope is to find a hot bisexual girlfriend and then surround yourself by women that she likes.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/hn2ufdx4rruyllnc/

The results show that women do not find men signaling engagement, or being perceived as having a partner, more attractive or higher in socioeconomic status. Furthermore, signs of engagement did not influence the women’s reported willingness to engage in short-term or long-term relationships with the men.

"Poaching" is also very cheap and relatively safe (as far as identifying goes), so it would be more popular with females/males who don't have other good criteria.

I think "Flight of the Concords" got this one right (nsfw) ~ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Wl_uQOABxg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY8jaGs7xJ0

I'm not sure if the study design or sample size

http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html

reported here inspires confidence in the conclusion, but this would definitely be an issue worth investigating some more. I'm not sure how many men would guess this, or for that matter how many women would guess what this article says about men. I can think of one example of a woman I knew (back when I was single) who seemed to be signalling to me that she wanted me to "poach" her by telling me she had a boyfriend. But to me that was just off-putting. (I was already put off from a romantic relationship with her--I knew her strictly through studies we were both pursuing at the time.)

Really? I've always believed it to be common wisdom that some women strongly prefer men in relationships.

Interestingly, it seems that while women prefer it, they do it a whole lot less than men. And that men that are in a relationship may be more attractive, but the women they will get will on average be less nice...