The Myth of "The One", Debunked with Math
There's is this myth. That in this world, there is 1 (and only 1) person who is destined for you. They are ideal for you, that perfect match, the person that has whatever it is that meshes perfectly with whatever it is you need. You are the key and they are the lock. It is the myth of "The One".
The myth is used as a trope in several tv shows and movies (both dramatic and comedic). It is fairly well established in popular culture. It irritates me.
Lots of people believe that they found/fell in love with/married their 'soul-mate' or their 'one'. Who am I to say they haven't? I'm not saying they didn't. On the contrary I believe lots of people have. Yes half of marriages end in divorce. Half don't! Among the 50% of marriages that don't fail, I imagine a sizable portion of those folks believe they found their 'one' (like I think I have). I'm asserting that the media or culture or whatever over-romanticized/overstates the rarity of someone you can be truly happy with. This misconception I imagine creates sadness for those who are looking, or hopelessness for widows. "How will I ever find them?! there is only one and millions of people around!", or "How will I ever find someone again? 'True-love' only happens once in a lifetime."
I am so thankful that I found someone to share my life with. If I had my whole life to do over again, I wouldn't change a thing out of fear of not getting back to the point I am right now. the debunking of the myth doesn't change the fact that I cherish what I have and whom I am with. I'm asserting that many people, maybe most people can be as happy as I. A relationship takes effort. I am firmly of the opinion that something you work for is worth more valuable than something that you get by chance or without putting forth the effort. At the same time, I am aware that there are millions of people within an hour's drive of where I am right now - how arrogant would I need to be to believe that the universe contrived to set in motion a series of events to allow me to meet "the one?" out of millions in the area (or hundreds of millions within a day's travel by car or billions withing a day's travel by train/plane?) Why would I believe that I am that special of a snowflake?
here's how you debunk the myth with math:
lets state the myth mathematically. There exists among the set of potential mates, one (and only one) that is ideal.
ok we need to know the set size and something about sampling rate to calculate probabilities.
Lets'd do a thought experiment:
In the United States, most people don't start dating before they are 13 or 14, and the median age to get married is somewhere in the late twenties (according to US census data 27 for women, 29 for men) so lets call the sampling TIME 15 years say, between the ages of 15 and 30. That should cover the dating life of most.
Now in in that time - how many interactions (potential samples) were you likely to have? How many people were in your high school? University? how many friends/coworkers in your 'network'? how often would you go to a bar hoping to meet someone - how many people did you make a connection with? what about other social events? mixers? etc. Even if you factored all of those in - it is unlikely that over those 15 years you met a new person (potential mate) every day - lets set 1 a day as the upper limit of as our pool. 1 potential date a day x 365 days a year x 15 years =5475 (a more realistic rate would be 1/week which would drop to set size to 780)
So the myth is, you find the 'one' and you marry them and live happily ever after.
1 out of (at most ) 5500. I don't have real statistics - but for the sake of the argument - lets take the middle ground between 780 and 5500= about 3000 (you met a new person everyday for 7.5 years before you found "the one" or 1 person every 3 or 4 days for 15 years before finding them.
Finding something that is 1 in a thousand or 1 in 5,000 is nice - but not particularly rare. It's about the frequency of Volvo's vs other cars on the road.
Here's another tidbit. From my home, a circle with a 10 mile radius, would pretty much encompass all of DuPage county, population (in 1995 the year in which I was last single/available )was approximately 925,000, of which 62,000 were females between 20-29 years old. If I assume that 1 in 10 was single/available- that's over 6,000 eligible ladies. (If we tighten the age range to 23-28 I think it would be about 3000). So at that moment in time - my pool of eligible ladies within a 15-20 minute drive of my home was the same as the pool of everyone I was likely to ever meet!
I'm sorry if my analysis takes some of the magic out of romance - finding "the one" may seem impossible while you are looking for them, and you may feel like the odds are astronomically against you, but it turns out (statistically at least) - you are not that special. Your 'soul-mate' isn't one in a million. Closer to one in a thousand. (which is a good thing!)
The myth is used as a trope in several tv shows and movies (both dramatic and comedic). It is fairly well established in popular culture. It irritates me.
Lots of people believe that they found/fell in love with/married their 'soul-mate' or their 'one'. Who am I to say they haven't? I'm not saying they didn't. On the contrary I believe lots of people have. Yes half of marriages end in divorce. Half don't! Among the 50% of marriages that don't fail, I imagine a sizable portion of those folks believe they found their 'one' (like I think I have). I'm asserting that the media or culture or whatever over-romanticized/overstates the rarity of someone you can be truly happy with. This misconception I imagine creates sadness for those who are looking, or hopelessness for widows. "How will I ever find them?! there is only one and millions of people around!", or "How will I ever find someone again? 'True-love' only happens once in a lifetime."
I am so thankful that I found someone to share my life with. If I had my whole life to do over again, I wouldn't change a thing out of fear of not getting back to the point I am right now. the debunking of the myth doesn't change the fact that I cherish what I have and whom I am with. I'm asserting that many people, maybe most people can be as happy as I. A relationship takes effort. I am firmly of the opinion that something you work for is worth more valuable than something that you get by chance or without putting forth the effort. At the same time, I am aware that there are millions of people within an hour's drive of where I am right now - how arrogant would I need to be to believe that the universe contrived to set in motion a series of events to allow me to meet "the one?" out of millions in the area (or hundreds of millions within a day's travel by car or billions withing a day's travel by train/plane?) Why would I believe that I am that special of a snowflake?
here's how you debunk the myth with math:
lets state the myth mathematically. There exists among the set of potential mates, one (and only one) that is ideal.
ok we need to know the set size and something about sampling rate to calculate probabilities.
Lets'd do a thought experiment:
In the United States, most people don't start dating before they are 13 or 14, and the median age to get married is somewhere in the late twenties (according to US census data 27 for women, 29 for men) so lets call the sampling TIME 15 years say, between the ages of 15 and 30. That should cover the dating life of most.
Now in in that time - how many interactions (potential samples) were you likely to have? How many people were in your high school? University? how many friends/coworkers in your 'network'? how often would you go to a bar hoping to meet someone - how many people did you make a connection with? what about other social events? mixers? etc. Even if you factored all of those in - it is unlikely that over those 15 years you met a new person (potential mate) every day - lets set 1 a day as the upper limit of as our pool. 1 potential date a day x 365 days a year x 15 years =5475 (a more realistic rate would be 1/week which would drop to set size to 780)
So the myth is, you find the 'one' and you marry them and live happily ever after.
1 out of (at most ) 5500. I don't have real statistics - but for the sake of the argument - lets take the middle ground between 780 and 5500= about 3000 (you met a new person everyday for 7.5 years before you found "the one" or 1 person every 3 or 4 days for 15 years before finding them.
Finding something that is 1 in a thousand or 1 in 5,000 is nice - but not particularly rare. It's about the frequency of Volvo's vs other cars on the road.
Here's another tidbit. From my home, a circle with a 10 mile radius, would pretty much encompass all of DuPage county, population (in 1995 the year in which I was last single/available )was approximately 925,000, of which 62,000 were females between 20-29 years old. If I assume that 1 in 10 was single/available- that's over 6,000 eligible ladies. (If we tighten the age range to 23-28 I think it would be about 3000). So at that moment in time - my pool of eligible ladies within a 15-20 minute drive of my home was the same as the pool of everyone I was likely to ever meet!
I'm sorry if my analysis takes some of the magic out of romance - finding "the one" may seem impossible while you are looking for them, and you may feel like the odds are astronomically against you, but it turns out (statistically at least) - you are not that special. Your 'soul-mate' isn't one in a million. Closer to one in a thousand. (which is a good thing!)
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