12. Predominance of Rationality

I had started with the simplified statement, that I am looking for someone, whose rationality is stronger than gullibility and instinctivity. But this needs a more elaborate explanation.

First of all, I am not referring to those instincts, that serve the survival of the individual. The needs for a minimum of food, water, air etc. is not something irrational that could be overridden by rationality.

Such instincts as also are most basic emotions are facts to handle rationally. Survival needs and emotions of well being are both in need of homeostasis. For both, rationality cannot remove them or avoid them, rationality is needed to create homeostasis. Rationality can help to be aware of needs and emotions, to know, what triggers and causes them, to know, what is best to reach homeostasis.

When I am looking at the relative predominance of rationality over instinctivity and gullibility, then this is restricted to all urges, that are detrimental to the well being of the individual.

Instinctivity and Rationality

Instinctivity and rationality can be two independent traits. There are different variations of the level and predominance of these traits. The choice of examples is from my perspective of a woman, there could be many other examples.

1. Low instinctivity and low rationality. People are just not driven by instinct to do anything but they are most probably not even aware of this. They may not have any part in their value system in favor or in rejection of that instinctive behavior. The may not have conscious reasons not to do, what they are not inclined to do.

Example. A man, who is himself not attracted to pornography, but who has no objections to other men consuming pornography.

2. Low instinctivity and high rationality. With high rationality, they have a value system and attitudes in congruence. They are not only aware of the absence of instinctive urges, but they have an attitude about that instinct in general.

Example: A man, who is not only not attracted to pornography himself, but holds strong values in respecting women as equal humans, who should never be degraded in any way.

3. High instinctivity and low rationality. Such men are more animals than human, they act by instinct without reflection, and they either get into trouble or do not succeed in the pursuit of their urges.

Example: Rapists, who end in jail, because they did not think before being overwhelmed by their urges. They are dangerous, since they are also stronger than women, they should never be released again to protect women.

4. High instinctivity and rationality just a bit weaker. They are those, who are ultimately driven by their instincts, but have enough rationality to serve as a tool to enhance their success.

Example: Casanovas of any kind, who lie, manipulate and lure women into consent, and after having succeeded in fulfilling their urges, they dump the women.

5. High instinctivity and even higher rationality. They are those, who are fully aware of having instinctive urges, but have a value system, that enables them to control their urges in favor of the wish to preserve their self-respect or to avoid cognitive dissonance. Their value system is not in contradiction to having the instincts or to those instincts in general, but only in contradiction to some consequences of the instincts.

Example: Men, who do feel the wish to procreate, but refrain, because of reasons like the overpopulation of the earth or circumstances that they consider not good enough for their progeny.

6. Instinctivity higher than rationality, but lack of opportunity. They are dangerous, because they may appear, as if their rationality were higher. When there is an unforeseen opportunity, they show their real self.

Example: A man cheats after years of fidelity, because until then cheating was never triggered, while his wife wrongly assumed, that fidelity was a part of his value system.

Based on this, I would feel most comfortable with men of variety 2. Absence of instinctive urges in combination with a conscious value system in opposition of those urges creates the probability, that a relationship based on the ERCP is possible.

Men of variety 5 are an option with a hazard. There is always the luring danger, that under some circumstances they would force consequences of their acceptance of their instincts upon me.

The others are not suitable.

Gullibility and Rationality

Rationality is conscious cognition and acting by logical reasoning using evidence. Irrationality is the absence of rationality, where conclusions and the motivation to act are derived by any influence except logic.

Gullibility is a sub form of irrationality, where a need to get or avoid something causes to believe claims without evidence. The belief fulfils a need or supplies the hope to fulfill a need. Praying to a deity, buying homeopathic water as if it were medicine, avoiding risks on Friday the 13th are all behaviors to reduce anxiety and insecurity or are a form of wishful, magical thinking.

Therefore it seems that rationality excludes gullibility, and gullibility indicates the lack of rationality. Except that delusions are not explained with this simple approach.

Rationality excludes delusions as much as any other variety of irrationality, and that is, what I am looking for in a man. I will look at delusions later.

11. My Way to Atheism

My Way to Atheism

Some people experience becoming atheists as a conversion. I did not. I slowly got aware that I never was a real christian. I was an atheist behaving by imitation, as if I were a christian. I was baptised, and from their point of view, that made me irreversibly a fellow christian. But of course, that is nonsense. A handful of water on my forehead as a baby did had no impact upon the wiring of my brain.

I had the whole load of christian brain-washing, from christian kindergarten, over religious instruction at school, and for several years as a child, I attended children's church service every Sunday. It never had any personal meaning to me. By the age of 17 I had grown out of religious beliefs as I had grown out much earlier of the belief in the Easter bunny and any other fairy tales as being true. When I was a child, I liked Grimm's fairy tales, and I liked all those biblical stories about a guy walking over the water and the like as another nice fairy tale. Grimm's fairy tales were supposed to have taken place several centuries ago, the biblical fairy tales two thousand years ago, but both had nothing to do with my present life. Had it only depended upon the maturing of rationality in the brain, I should have grown out of all those beliefs at the same time. But the external influences were inconsistent. I was encouraged to stop believing in the Easter bunny, when I started school, but I was encouraged or rather manipulated to continue to believe in god, so I needed much longer to grow out of this in spite of contrary influences.

I learned the standard prayers by rote, and I repeated them hundreds of times. Standing on my feet, putting my hands together and uttering meaningless words was a ritual, that was the praying to me. The text could have been in Swahili instead of German, it could not have had any less meanings. Never, at no age, with no wish or problem did it ever occur to me to think that praying to a fairy tale figure would do any thing for me personally. Praying was a ritual like brushing my teeth. I brushed my teeth, before I had the insight that it was to keep the teeth healthy, I prayed, until I had the insight, that I made no sense to do it.

That figure walking on the water had not more to do with my personal life than had little red riding hood. Sending meaningful wishes or words to a fairy tale figure and expecting any reaction was just too far fetched to occur to me. I was an atheist then, I just did not know it yet. I was young and too gullible to doubt the truth of fairy tales of 2000 years ago, when I heard them, yet I did not believe in any impact of the fairy tales upon me personally. We learned about the Romans in history lessons and about the Jews and early Christians in religion, and it was much the same to me, stories to be stored in memory to get good grades.

I was told all those biblical fairy tales from kindergarten on, but the only time I ever started to read the bible was at the beginning of puberty, when there were rumours about naughty tales in the bible. I started to read it in search of the naughty stuff, but after about 50 pages I got so bored, that I stopped, and when I had grown out of religion at age 17, the bible went to the garbage. The paper of the pages seemed not even suitable as toilet paper, so I just threw it out.

All amount of religious brainwashing could not make me a believer, just as all the water of the pond cannot make the feathers of a duck wet.

10. Balance of Giving and Taking

The Balance of Giving and Taking

Childfree people are often attacked for being selfish. But this is not logical. Because the difference between selfishness and selfpreservation is the consideration of the baseline. In this case, the baseline is that people start into adult life without having children.

Selfpreservation is the insistence of not changing some circumstance by making a sacrifice, selfishness is the attempt, entitlement or success in getting more advantages than is conceded to the other, selfishness is exploitation.

The refusal of a rational woman to make the sacrifice to have a child is selfpreservation.

The dishonest tricking of an instinct-driven woman to get pregnant with a man, who explicitly does not want children, is selfish in favor of the compulsion of her genes. She forces sacrifices upon a man against his will.

The contrary of selfishness is usually considered as the altruism of making sacrifices. But from a logical point of view, the more important difference is between either the balance of giving and taking or behavior reducing the balance.

An egalitarian world can only function, if every body accepts the balance of giving and taking between the two parts of a couple and also between the couple and the rest of the world. That balance has to be accepted as a guidance by the own value system, by a self-restriction against taking unjust advantages, it cannot be enforced by power struggles. By a power struggle, there is only a balance, when the available powers are equal. Else the result is a hierarchy.

This means to apply all variations of the golden rule:

- Not to do to others, what one would not want to suffer oneself.

- To do to others, what they wish to have done to them.

But even better is the tit-for-tat strategy, to react by giving others the same kind of treatment as they have given themselves. If the first step in such a chain of interaction is a giving, friendly act, then this is prone to lead to a balance of giving and receiving.

There is indirect and direct selfishness. Both are based on a strong delusion, when seen from the perspective of egalitarianism, in which everybody is entitled to have the same rights.

Egalitarianism is rational in as far as it calculates that if all people by choice give as much as they take, then over a life time and with many exchanges, people probably get the balance and they do not have to fight for it.

Direct selfishness is based upon the entitlement delusion and often also the grandiosity delusions. Indirect selfishness is based upon the deity delusion that a deity in the afterlife will reward people for all sacrifices and suffering.

All instinct driven persons fight for resources, and I suspect, that this in a simplified manner leads to a hierarchy with mainly three levels. On the top level the direct selfish, who were more successful in the power struggle, the second level the direct selfish, who did not succeed against the stronger ones, and on the bottom level the indirect selfish ones, who do not attempt to fight, because they wait for their benefits in the afterlife.

Egalitarians, who also do not want to struggle, if they can avoid it, and if they are wise, just stay away from the hierarchy and keep to themselves.

In an ERCP relationship, to install a fair balance of giving and taking, it needs to know, what is fair for the two individuals concerned, by knowing the needs of each other, and the perception of the subjective value of what is exchanged. This needs a lot of communication to find an agreement upon a policy that prevents power struggles.

9. Time and Money

Time and Money

The proverb says: 'Time is money'. But it is also the other way around. Money is lifetime converted into coins. Every moment, that I invested into earning money, I could not use to do something else, that I might have enjoyed more. I am rather poor, but I am living frugally on what I have earned working.

I am not looking for a rich man to improve my material life. It would be unpleasant to feel like a beggar. I prefer the mushrooms, that I have collected myself in the forest, over the truffles paid by someone else. Only if someone were really compatible as a person, would I attempt to cope with overcoming my reluctance to such an unbalanced situation.

I prefer someone, who knows how to make ends meet and who has some skills in this and who appreciates my such skills.

In such a situation, commitment includes joining resources. If then one partner spends money, no matter from whose account or pocket it comes at that moment, he needs to be aware, that he spends the couple's money and not only his own. If he careless and selfishly wastes money, that partly is his partner's money, he wastes the partner's lifetime, and wasting a person's lifetime is an indirect form of showing disrespect and depreciation for the partner.

Therefore entering a relationship on the ERCP requires to find an agreement on a general policy how to spend money in a way that fulfill the needs of both without wasting someone's hard earned resources.

There are those men, who leave the home at 7 in the morning and are absent till 7 at night or even much later, and then they feel good about spending the money they earn this way on roses, even diamonds and take the women to expensive restaurants in the few hours, that they have for her. This does not interest me at all.

I want someone, who starts the day together with meaningful communication at the breakfast table, go to a museum or for a walk together, buy provisions in the supermarket and make it a picnic in the park.

A mind mate in an ERCP relationship values my company, so he wants to be together, to share his time with me.

If someone would want to spend money on me, but to restrict the time shared with me, this would degrade me to be a paid for utility, and such a role hurts my dignity.

Of course this does not mean that I want to cling together 24 hours every day as the focus of permanent mutual attention. But the togetherness of the couple should be the focus, the center of life. As far as two partners have hobbies and interests, that they do not share, they will need time to engage in them separately. To keep up a meaningful exchange of thoughts, time is needed to read books or stuff on the internet to add new input.

But how to organize a life between doing a lot together and not sacrificing the personal interests is a question to base upon consent. As long as for both, the relationship has priority, agreement can be reached. If a man has his priorities, his work first, his social life excluding the partner second, and then maybe a relationship, then this is a deal breaker, I am not interested to have such a low priority.

8. Miscellaneous

Risk-Taking

I do not want a hero, who risks his life. I do not want to worry about someone, who drives around on a motorcycle or climbs mountains. It is bad enough, that life expectancy for men is shorter than for women, but I prefer not to loose someone to his risky hobbies.

But I appreciate it very much, when a person has the courage to be sincere, speak the truth no matter the consequences, does no hide things.

Sports

I enjoy hiking, bicycling, swimming, and when I was younger, I have been skiing, ice skating and sailing. But this is for the fun of being active outdoors, I dislike to do any such thing to exhaustion. I like to find a partner for sharing such outdoor activities, and he might enjoy other sportive activities in moderation.

But if any sports fanatic, who defines his masculinity in shaping his body by working-out every day, is not really my intellectual mindmate. Also I expect enough of a cultural level so that any consumption of spectator sports, either in the stadium or on TV bores him as much as me.

Pictures

I never publish pictures. I am not a body to be chosen by my looks from a catalogue. After a few mails, when there is an understanding about basic compatibility, I will send picture by private email.

Formal Education

Intellectual communication and an profound exchange of thoughts is important to me. I like to discuss things on the basis of skepticism and a scientific approach. An equal partner in this is someone, who not only is intelligent, but has formed his intellect in at least a few years of university or college.

Someone without formal education could be a kind and caring companion, but if he has never heard of things like 'double blind' studies and such, then it could be very difficult to share a life based upon rational decisions.

When two partners have roughly the same level of formal education, they have a good chance to learn from each other.

I got the German equivalent of a MA.

Location

Someone compatible is difficult to find, therefore I am not restricting my search geographically. I only restrict it to having one language in common, that we both speak well enough to enable us profound communication.

With modern technical means of transport and communication, it is easier to overcome geographical distances than mental distances.

I am looking for someone, who would want to move in here with me, or as an alternative move together between two homes.

This is not an offer to sponsor men from third world countries to come to Germany for the papers.

Conformism

I am a non-conformist.    I am not an anti-conformist.   That means, I choose and decide based on my own value system and needs, based upon reasoning.   My choice is independent of how much or how little my choice is shared by others.   I am not influenced by the fact, if nobody, anybody or everybody happens to do the same.  

The Contents of the Glass

I have often heard the question, if a glass is half full or half empty.   There is a rational answer to it:  During the process of being filled, at one moment, it is half full.   During the process of being emptied, at one moment, it is half empty.  

7. Social Contacts

Social Contacts

When and as much as I want to be with other living beings, mainly my quest is to find a partner close to my age, who would also be my best friend. As far as I like to make friends, I prefer women near to my age. The younger people are, the less they interest me.

For me, emotional attachment grows together with intellectual and mental closeness, with being mind mates.

With a partner of my age, I can go to museums and exhibitions, watch movies and theater plays, read the same books, observe each other, others and the own introspection, and two mind mates can spend hours in rational communication, in rewarding exchange of thoughts and ideas about all this. A partner of my age, who brings along his maturity, his knowledge, his education, his life experience, can enhance the intellectual value of cultural activities by contributing his thoughts and comments.

Nothing of this is possible with children or pets. For me, pets are as unattractive and uninteresting as are children. Both would just bore me, and in the museums, they would probably even disturb. I cannot get attached to them, because they bore me, and all the work to care for children or pets just keeps me from doing, what really interests me. Between grown up partners, there can we a fair exchange of giving and receiving. Children and pets are a one sided drain, since they have nothing to give, that is of value to me.

I like animals in the nature, I buy free range eggs and feed the birds in winter. But if a man has a pet, it is a deal breaker, because the pet would disturb me.

This does not make me selfish. Once there is intellectual and emotional intimacy with a partner, then I do not hesitate to care for him, should he need it. But I cannot see any reason, why to invest money and care in a being, that cannot even talk, it just makes no sense. Sometimes I wonder, if people are so attracted to dogs, because there they can dominate and have power, which they cannot get with a partner.

I know, how people get attached to their pets, and I have no right to expect, that somebody would separate from his dog for me. But even if I would accept to have a dog around for a while, it is just not practically possible. I do not live in an area fit for dogs. People's well being and health should be considered as priority over animals. In densely populated area, not only the streets should be kept clean from dog feces, but the parks should be reserved and respected as places for the recreation of people and clean places for children to play, when people live in apartments without a garden.

I live in a small house in the garden behind a row of five story buildings along both sides of the street. Neighbours with dogs have to spend half an hour twice a day to walk them to the nearest park, that is abused as a dog's toilet by many other people. Short of letting the dog soil the strawberry plants in my tiny garden, there would be no alternative but to do the same abuse of the park.

I will never get involved with a man, that is more than maybe three years younger. First of all, having grown up in the same time creates some kind of similarity. Secondly, I am not Maude and little Harolds better stay away from me. With a man of my age, we are on the same level of mutually learning and growing wiser together.

I do not want to be the wise old guru to a younger man. If a man is ten years younger, that means that I have spent ten years more of learning and maturing, therefore I cannot consider him an equal.

I have no problems to make friends and acquaintances, but somehow I feel so different in a world of breeders and believers and irrationality. Sometimes I just do not know, if I even want to spent my time with people, with whom I have not enough in common. So I tend to be a maverick and a recluse, not so much, because I want to be alone but for lack of people like me.

6. Tolerance

In the ERCP, Tolerance Cannot be a Substitute for Lacking Compatibility

Many people put a lot of emphasis on tolerance as a method to cope with persons, who differ in some attribute, that they would not accept or want for themselves. It is a way to cope with the world around, with whom I have to deal as a way of surviving between predominantly irrational and selfish people.

In a relationship, tolerance is required, whenever there is not enough compatibility to value each other as persons by respecting and valuing mutually all attributes. When incompatible people get infatuated with each other's body, they attempt the shared denial of incompatibility by tolerance. They same is the case, if people are more driven by an urge to procreate than by any wish to be mentally close to each other. If a man chooses a woman for her health to bear fit offspring and the woman chooses the man as a provider, then their mutual very different roles are already a ditch, that keeps them so far apart, that differences are insignificant enough to be covered with tolerance.

This is the tolerance paradigm for people, who are mutually utilities for the joint urge to procreate. Tolerance enables incompatible partners to use each other, even though they have nothing in common.

The ERCP is a paradigm of compatibility. If people want intellectual intimacy, they need to be compatible. It is irrational to want the closeness of compatibility but choose someone with unacceptable attributes. An ERCP relationship can only be created, when there is so much compatibility, that tolerance is obsolete. As long as tolerance is needed, it would not be the ERCP.

Not all differences cause incompatibilities. Simple differences in tastes or needs as for example, one partner prefers to eat cheese and the other apples is an information to be shared and taken into account in the organisation of life, it is nothing to be tolerated.

Tolerance as an insufficient substitute for compatibility is about everything, where the attribute is an evaluation, a judgement, a conscious choice, especially when the attribute is part of the own identity and the self-esteem.

It is my identity to be a childfree atheist, because enough rationality is hard-wired into my brain.

I have to consider myself with this identity in contact with others from two different perspectives.

From the intersubjective perspective, my brain is one variety, those, whose brain is driven by instinctivity and gullibility have a different variety. I have the right to avoid such people, but not to interfere, discriminate, insult them. This is the tolerance of distance and indifference.

From the subjective perspective, I have the right to my own evaluation and judgement, that it is better to be rational and childfree than to be an irrational religious breeder. I have the right to guide my own personal life by my own judgment.

When a religious breeder contacts me, then the tolerance of distance requires to be polite. It is rational to keep away from such a man. But it is irrational to apply the socially required tolerance and consider his evaluation of religion and breeding as equally valid as mine.

If it is my identity to be proudly rational and therefore considering believing and breeding as irrational, then I might feel compassion or condescension for religious breeders, but never respect.

There cannot rationally be any tolerance of accepting a religious breeder as an equal.

I have the right to disrespect and depreciate a religious breeder, as long as I do not show it to him.

Tolerance leads to a contradiction, when my own evaluation tells me, that one attitude is better than another, while tolerance requires to declare both as equally valid. In my own life, I follow my own judgement. I cannot consider the same person with contempt as a religious believer and with respect as a partner.

I am looking for a compatible partner, where there would be no need for tolerance. I am looking for a partner, who shares the same values and the same evaluations.

Of course, outside the closeness of a relationship, I am not against other forms of tolerance, that are based on egalitarianism as a general guideline. Everybody is entitled to the same right to a decent life, it is the tolerance of mercy, compassion and benevolence instead of discrimination for those, who have had bad luck, like for example disabled people.

5. Gender Roles and External Appearance

Gender Roles and External Appearance

The two genders have different bodies, and to a lower degree hardwired some differences in the brain. Gender roles based upon any other alleged differences are irrational on a secondary level as they serve irrational instinctive urges.

Procreation has created gender roles of the provider and the homemaker, the ingroup-outgroup instinct has created the gender role of the soldiers, and more.

Gender roles are expressed by dress codes and behavioral rules.

Two partners, who want to be close and a unit under the ERCP do not need to create or enhance artificial differences by submission under roles ascribed by society. Instead they dress comfortably in jeans, t-shirts, sneakers. They have not reason to participate in the stupid game, that a man in suit and tie signals his social status and financial power, while a woman in a seductive outfit signals the availability of her body to be bought by social status. When they are alone, such people have too much self-respect to be driven into such behaviors, and when they have found each other as mind mates, they have even less reason to do so. Gender role games are struggles for power and advantages, detrimental to be a unit.

My kind of a man like myself keeps himself and his clothes clean and without holes or looking like rags, but that is roughly the amount of investment into the external appearance, that makes really sense, when people focus upon cultivating their intellect instead.

People suffer pain in getting piercings, tattoos and beauty operations, people spend horrendous sums on modifications and decorations of their bodies, they spend hours of time in front of a mirror painting their faces, ironing their clothes and shaving hair of their bodies. It does not make them any more intelligent, and I doubt, that it makes them any happier.

It just makes no sense to me and I am looking for a man, to whom it also makes no sense.

A man's beard grows everyday, and everyday again most men shave it off. Such a futile waste of time. Wise intellectuals like Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud had better things to do, they had beards and wrote books.

For two reasons I like men with beards. The first is purely my subjective taste. Men with full beards, like Santa, like a pirate, are attractive, while clean shaven men are not at all, and the visible shadow of a dark beard or stubbles are repulsive. The second is my dislike for the irrationality of wasting time and money on shaving.

A man in an ERCP relationship is someone close and similar, we are sharing our ingroup. Men in suits and ties are outgroup. They are everywhere, where I have to protect my own interests against them, be it in a shop or insurance agents attempting to sell me something. They are everywhere, where people want my money. I could never trust someone in a suit and tie.

I am looking for someone, who is as natural as I am. A man, who looks like the guy on the picture is welcome. Someone, who looks as if he wants to sell me an insurance, is not.

Also I am looking for a human being in a male body, not for a macho of any kind, nor for someone, who feels entitled to any privileges just because he is a man, and I prefer the division of chores according to skills and not gender roles. His identity is defined by being intellectual, creative, skilled, whatever talents he may have, not by being male.

Talking to a person is much more comfortable, when I can look into that person's eyes, and not at his collar or have to climb a ladder. Therefore I prefer men of the same size as myself, or not much taller, I am 5'4 or 163 cm. But size would not be an obstacle, if someone happens to be tall.    I make this remark more to encourage the guys, who fear to be rejected for being small, not to deter the tall ones.  

4. Adapting

Mutually Adapting to Each Other

A partner is a person as he is, he is not raw material to be lured into a relationship and then exposed to attempts to change him.

That has implications. Until getting involved, until the entering of commitment, it is for both the phase of discovering, if they mutually can accept each other without attempts to demand change. At the moment of entering commitment, this is the implicit acceptance of the other as he is at that moment and the conscious denouncing of attempts to change him.

But the other has also obligations. First of all is to reveal his true self sincerely and without limitations, restrictions and reservations. If one has to accept someone at a given moment as is, he has the right to know, whom he accepts.

This covers all that is the core personality of the other, values, attitudes, opinions, judgements, likes, dislikes, tastes, interests, needs, and all tendencies, that are hard-wired into the brain. It is either acceptance or a dealbreaker before getting involved.

There is one exception, and that is habits. Here both have to adapt to each other, until none has habits, that are irritating, disgusting, embarrassing, risky, destructive, wasting resources, in any way detrimental for the couple as a unit.

The process of adaptation means to give feedback concerning the perception of such habits in the form of constructive criticism. That means, the feedback is clearly limited to specific behaviors including suggestions, how to improve it and the willingness to give support in doing so. There has to be a mutual agreement, that discomfort or disagreement with specific behaviors is not a a rejection or devaluation of the person but limited to the behavior.

3. Motivation

Motivation to Enter a Relationship Based on the ERCP

I am looking for someone, whose motivation to base a relationship upon the ERCP is intrinsic. That means, he benefits from it, because it is in congruence with his personality and his needs.

Were the motivation extrinsic, then he would force himself to adopt ERCP behavior by suppressing his own contrary inclinations and impulses. I would have to fight, to barter, to reward to get the treatment, that I need. An attempt to behave as if in an ERCP is not enough to make a relationship to qualify as being based upon the ERCP, because it would not supply the save haven, if I would have to put efforts into maintaining the other's behavior. That means that I rather make efforts to be a caring partner than to make efforts to reward someone for treating me as equal, while he would prefer to dominate.

The ERCP is not a set of behaviors to decide to apply, it is a set of attitudes and capacities, that lead to specific behavioral tendencies.

Egalitarianism is a value, and so are responsibility, accountability, reliability. Some people have an ideal self, that requires to behave in accordance with that value system. As long as they do so, they feel entitled to feel self-esteem, would they behave differently, they would suffer from cognitive dissonance.

Two persons can theoretically agree on defining, what commitment means, and what behavior should be the consequence. The one with the values is intrinsically motivated to live up to his ideal-self and avoid shame and cognitive dissonance. The other only agrees on behaving the same way by extrinsic motivation. If he wants a relationship badly enough, the wish to win or the fear to loose can be very strong extrinsic motivators to repress own inclinations and instead to behave in accordance with the other's attitude.

But there is a limit to the power of extrinsic motivation. It could be as strong as can be, it does not enable someone to act rationality, when only insufficient rationality is wired into his brain. If someone is overwhelmed and compelled to behave irrationally by instinctivity or gullibility, then he is just disabled to be a partner in rational methods to find agreement and solve conflicts.

Therefore it is not my quest to find someone, who for whatever reasons agrees to base his behavior upon the ERCP, I want to find someone, who is intrinsically inclined to it by his own personality.

Important is also the strength of the motivation. Someone can have a strong intrinsic motivation to be egalitarian and responsible, when needed. But he might not be very motivated to enter such situations at all, if by avoiding a relationship, he can avoid the compulsion to be responsible.

As much as two rational and logic persons can arrive to the same conclusions, if they base the logic upon the same premises, facts and information, to do the latter can be a long and strenuous endeavour.

To solve practical problems by logic is comparatively easy. But two persons, who have lived different lives for around 60 years, need a lot of communication, until they know each other well enough. Needs and tastes are given facts, and to find a fair and just way to fulfill the needs of both, requires a lot of deep introspection and sincere disclosure. Needs not only must be known by both, but also the relative importance, to make shared decisions equally beneficial for both sides.

Every conflict has to solved in a way, of which both are convinced to be just. But on top of this, there should also be developed a more general guideline so that similar conflicts can be avoided in the future.

If people think, that all there is needed for eternal happiness is to meet and feel attracted superficially by what they call chemistry, then they are not motivated to invest the efforts needed to create a deep emotional and intellectual intimacy.

If there is not immediately perfect harmony, then at the first disagreement they take the easiest way out, dump one partner ruthlessly and try again with another.

Many dating-advice sites warn people, that they should avoid to appear lonely, needy, desperate. They advice people to pretend instead to be happy and content alone, not to need a partner, who instead would just be an addition to their life, not a necessity.

I strongly disagree, as this is not logical. The more people need and want something, the higher the price that they are willing to pay. The more a man is needy, lonely, desperate, the more time, effort, temporary strain and discomfort he is motivated to invest in creating a relationship with strong bonds.

Reader of this text, if you are attracted by my search, instead of fighting against being needy, instead of pretending not to be lonely, just admit it as a first step to do something about it.

2. More About My Quest

1.  Dealbreakers Due To Detrimental Irrational Instinctive Urges

When a person is driven by irrational urges, and his own rationality is too weak to allow him to control those urges, then a partner in a relationship is automatically the target of the consequences of irrational actions. In such a situation, a partner is helpless, because the urges are stronger than the ability to consider the issue in a rational discussion.

Here is a list of some urges, instincts, impulses, which are deal breakers as hazards and threats, if the rational self control of a man is not stronger.

1.1. The hierarchy instinct.     
It is the instinctive urge to compete and acquire a high position in a hierarchy. This in a mild degree may be a requirement in the survival in the professional field.

The dealbreaker: The urge to compete is strong, and especially when the professional experience of success reinforces it, then the partner in a relationship is also prone to be fought down into a lower position and to be dominated. For every success and won competition, there is the complementary person, who has lost. There is no winner without a loser as collateral damage. Every successful men leaves behind him a trail of unhappy persons deprived of what they might have deserved just as much as he.

My mindmate: With a low level or absence of this urge, someone cooperates and shares options and resources. He might be poor and less successful, but he has not hurt others. If he has no urge to compete, he has no urge to force a power struggle upon me as a partner.

1.2. The procreation instinct.  
This instinct determines the identity as someone perceiving himself not predominantly as an individual, but as the bearer of genes to survive.
 
The dealbreaker: The man has felt compelled to procreate, he has sacrificed his individual well being in favor of the survival of his genes.  This means that he values children as entitled to be given priority over adults.  A partner will also be automatically considered as less important than the own genes, and logically will have the sacrifices forced upon her too.

Once someone has become a breeder and accepted to make sacrifices in favor of the genes, this inclination will never end, even when the brood is out of the house. The sacrifices will also be made for the grand-children, as they also are bearer of the genes. Since raising the brood is such an act of self-damaging sacrifices, the perceived ties to and the value of the brood is gigantic and no love to a partner can compete with it, because the partner is not genetically related.

In the hypothetical situation of a catastrophe, when a man would have to decide, whom to save, most men would save their offspring and let the partner die. Being aware of this, I could never trust a man with offspring.

Men with progeny also tend to spend their time with work to amass wealth for the purpose of making them inherit it, rather than spend their time with a partner.
In short, the attachment of a parent to the child can be compared to alcoholism, it creates an irreversible craving in the brain.   While the alcoholic craves for alcohol, even though he does not drink, the parent craves to care for his brood, even when they are grown and far away.  To compete against the brood of a partner is futile.   It is a lost endeavor, even though the offspring do not even need to actively compete.   Their emotional priority is carved in stone. 

My mindmate: He is childfree, we are each other's most important person, and nobody is allowed to interfere with it. He knows, that death is the end of the individual life and there is not rational reason to be bothered about the genes.

1.3.  Male promiscuity.
Sexuality as an instinctive urge can contribute additional benefits to a bonded monogamous commitment.   Friendship is based on emotional and intellectual affinity.    When a couple sharing innate monogamy start as each other's best friends based upon intellectual and emotional intimacy, then for them adding and entering physical intimacy creates a very special bond, that can never be undone except by ending all contact.        
For a person with innate monogamy, entering physical intimacy and changing the subjective identity to feeling the commitment of being half a couple are inseparable experiences, two sides of the same coin.   But innate monogamy is a special gift and talent, that is lacking in many men and in some women.   

The dealbreaker:  Any man, for whom copulation with a female body does not automatically create committed attachment, is not suitable for me.
This includes not only men, who cheat, favor polygamy and any kind of non-monogamous arrangements, but also all men, who wish to have 'no strings fun', 'intimate encounters', 'friends with benefits' and other euphemisms used in profiles for being animals from the gutter, lacking true emotional humanity.   
This includes also men consuming pornography, as this is also an expression of the degradation of female bodies as disrespected utilities.
Continuing contact with ex-partners is another indication of a man's promiscuity.    If a man continues the contact with one or several ex-partners, and defines them as friends the same as if there had never been anything more than a platonic friendship, this clearly indicates, that for him physical intimacy is not creating a special bond.         
Would I enter a relationship with a man in persistent contact with exes as friends, I would enter a harem.    He would be one man in relationships with several intimate partners.  The only difference between them would be, how long the physical intimacy has been deactivated.   
Also I cannot trust a man, who ends the relationship with a woman, even though he still respects and considers her as qualifying to be defined as a friend.   If he ends the commitment for such trivial reasons, he is too big a risk for me.    There are jerks, who consider sexual dissatisfaction as a sufficient reason to end a relationship.    The friendship with an ex is a red flag for this.     

My mindmate offers me a symmetrical relationship as a result of his innate monogamy.   For him, I am as important as a person as he is for me.  His wish for physical intimacy derives from his own priority of wanting a companion for emotional and intellectual intimacy.   This is inseparable from his respecting me as an equal partner and as a person.  
He does not get infatuated with a mere body in defiance or oblivion of the woman's brain and personality.   For him, physical intimacy is also the symbolic bond of establishing commitment.  From then on he feels innately bound by the obligations of commitment.

He has no contact with any of his exes.   For him, women can be acquaintances, but there is a clear distinction between this and the bond of the combination of intellectual, emotional and physical intimacy.  For him, not cheating includes also not emotionally cheating.  

1.4. Gullibility or skepticism

The dealbreaker: Gullibility and credulity make people consider claims or appearances for true without any doubt. Since there is no doubt, there is no need for evidence, for verification. Gullibility in combination with strong wishful thinking due to a need, especially to reduce fear, can create beliefs and delusions strong enough to compel to very irrational actions. When there are such compulsions, the partner has no chance to discuss the matters rationally, but has to suffer the impact of the irrational actions. 

When people believe in a god, astrology, dowsing, homeopathy and such, this usually leads at least to wasting the couple's common resources of time, effort, money, if there is not worse and more direct damage. This includes also beliefs in the form of entitlement and grandiosity delusions, or the delusion of male superiority, that would make someone dominate me.
In short, such a believer is immune to be influenced by any attempts to protect myself by constructive communication.   Being with such a man is a high risk of being harmed.

My mindmate is an atheist, apistic, rational and a skeptic. He makes no claims without giving me evidence, he does not demand me to believe anything without convincing me. He has no beliefs to force the consequences thereof upon me.  He does not demand trust, he knows that trust is the calculated probability of trustworthy behavior in the future as a consequence of all his behavior in the past.

He can talk rationally about every conflict with no exception.

5. Other serious lack of self-control.

The dealbreaker: All addictions bad enough to be beyond control. That includes serious overeating with the result of obesity.  

My mindmate is rational enough to know, that self-control is important.   Obesity is detrimental to the health and makes him unattractive to most women, so he controls his eating.  He can limit indulgences to moderation.   
My mindmate is more an Epicurean than a hedonist.  I prefer the man, who does not struggle against temptations, because he is not tempted due to not being attracted to the tempting stimulus.   A man, who is by instinct attracted to other women's bodies, but who has the moral strength and willpower to never cheat, deserves admiration for the strength of his character.   But he still is a risk causing alerts and stress.  Nobody can know with certainly, if he will always be strong enough to withstand the temptation.   
Only a man, who is predominantly attracted to my brain and who does not notice other women's bodies is really someone, with whom I can feel at ease, relaxed and safe.   

2.  The Meaning Of Commitment And Marriage

Legal marriage is merely a signature in the townhall, that has legal consequences, but it has no influence on how a man treats a woman.   A man can be either a considerate, caring and responsible egalitarian partner or a cruel jerk, this is entirely independent from the difference between legal marriage and cohabitation.    
Legal marriage does not create emotional commitment.    Legal marriage in the absence of emotional commitment can be very detrimental.  If legal marriage can protect women at all, it is only against financial disaster, but it is no protection against being hurt.    In this case, it instead impedes immediate appropriate reactions.   Therefore, for two persons from the same country or the EU, legal marriage is obsolete.

The important step is consciously entering commitment as a mental change of the identity. It transforms a single person into perceiving himself as half of a couple, as part of a unit. The two partners form a special kind of ingroup against the world around as the outgroup, independently of their legal status.   Life is a struggle against inclemencies.  The partners in an ERCP-relationship can create a safe haven, where both partners can feel relaxed, secure and sharing an emotional home supplying support for each other.   

The meaning of such commitment and the behavioral dealbreakers are extensively described in many of the following posts of this blog.   The purpose of this blog is to find a partner as a wise choice.   That means especially to notice all dealbreakers before making the mistake of getting involved with the wrong man and getting hurt as a consequence of the mistake.     

Updated on December 17, 2011

1. My Quest to Find a Mindmate

My Quest to find a Mindmate for the Egalitarian Rational Commitment Paradigm

I am a woman born 1949 and my quest is to find a mindmate to grow old together in a relationship based on the egalitarian rational commitment paradigm.

This blog is in English, because in addition of the large number of native speakers, most educated people worldwide speak English as a second language. I am German, and I also correspond in French, Spanish, Italian and Dutch.   My search is worldwide.  In the time of emails, skype and air travel, geographical distances are easier to overcome than mental distance.  

I have profiles on several dating-sites, but a short profile is not enough for a careful choice.  This blog serves as a place to elaborate, what and whom I am looking for.

Should you have found this blog because of a the suggestion on a paying matchmaking site, please note, that I may not be able to read or react to your messages there.   

In this case, please contact me directly.    
My email : marulaki@hotmail.com

I admit, that I am too lonely to remain unaffected by the disappointment of the delayed discovery of serious dealbreakers.   Some serious dealbreakers do not impede to develop sympathy while corresponding.  It is painful to discover such dealbreakers only after having already started to have the false hope, that my loneliness will end soon.   Therefore it is of paramount importance to embark on the endeavor of discovering the affinities only after having first ascertained the absence of all dealbreakers.   

  
The main focus of this blog are the explicit and in depth explanations, what I personally consider as dealbreakers and as risks of future dealbreakers.   Of course a potential mate is also expected to check his own dealbreakers with the same scrutiny.   The failure of a relationship hurts equally, no matter, whose dealbreakers were discovered too late.

Someone sincere and with self-awareness, investing enough time to read at least a part of this blog should be able to evaluate rationally, if starting to get to know each other is feasible.

While the objective of this blog is to find my mindmate, I am not restricting my postings to writing only directly about what and who I am looking for.   I am looking at life and society from a view point far outside of the box of religion and procreation.  I have my own personal attitudes about other matters too, where I would wish a mindmate to think along similar lines.   So I am posting about such topics too.

Whatever I write concerns only my own personal quest, I am not making claims about general human traits. Though my world view, which is derived from evolutionary biology and evolutionary psychology may appear like claims to people, who are unfamiliar with this subject.
I am omitting to add to every sentence a 'to me', 'personally' or such.
Whoever cannot agree with my concept of the ERCP (Egalitarian Rational Commitment Paradigm) is not a potential mindmate and may peacefully move on.   I welcome comments and questions, which are supportive in helping me to make clarifications or inspire me to write about.   But I will not defend my quest against hostile disagreements.   

The ERCP means a concept for a relationship, that is based on sharing some specific traits, values and principles.  The following list is a basic list, details will be given later.

1. The shared basic trait is the hardwired predominance in the brain of rationality over instinctivity and gullibility.  This fundamental trait is completely independent from the strength of emotions.  I am very emotional and I do appreciate an emotional partner.  The contrary of rationality is irrationality.   Irrationality can be very detrimental, when it not only determines thoughts, but also actions and behavior, that have an impact upon both partners.
2. Important shared values are equality and egalitarianism, the balance of giving and receiving, innate monogamy, binding obligations upon entering commitment, and the Epicurean principle of not harming and not be harmed.
3. The perception of sharing the identity as being two halves of a unit called couple in exchange with the rest of the world.
4. The relationship is organized using constructive communication with the goal of agreement, consent, convincing.   When two egalitarian partners share all available information and facts and apply logic upon them, they can together reach a common conclusion. Both can be convinced that the solution or plan is fair for both.

I am looking for a partner, whose brain is hard-wired for feeling the most comfortable in an egalitarian commitment without any power struggles of any kind.  I am allergic to men feeling entitled to and attempting to dominate. I do not want to exhaust myself in a power struggle against someone forcing his will upon me or attempting to do so.   When men's brains are hard-wired differently, power struggles in the case of conflicts are unavoidable, even though those men are willing and motivated to be fair partners.

People like my mindmate to be found and like myself are very rare, but we do exist.   Somewhere out there my mindmate is hidden. 

So whoever reads this blog, if you yourself are not my siamese brain, you may at least know a man of my kind, some brainiac, nerd, maverick.   He may be hidden behind a pile of books, someone lonely, shy and reticent, yet dreaming of a woman like me.  He may have given up the hope to find me, having seaced to search.   Please suggest to him to read this blog and contact me.  My email :  marulaki@hotmail.com

These pages give a short overview over my quest: 

Egalitarian Rational Commitment

The Relationship Deal

What to Share

What I Offer To A Mindmate

Egalitarian Communication

Mindmate Basic Checklist

Mindmate or Jerk Questionnaire

Rationality Questionnaire

Epicurean Or Hedonist Questionnaire

 

Demisexuality 

The Importance Of Being Childfree

 You Can Help Me To Find My Hidden Mindmate

Update December 2014:

After having written more than 700 entries I have certainly sufficiently outlined the basics of my thinking.  Anybody considering himself as maybe my mindmate will find enough food for thought.  

Therefore I am shifting my focus.  

• My starting point were my own subjective experiences and observations concerning men's behavior towards women.   Some of my attempts of explanations thereof were speculative, and I am certainly prone to under- or overestimate effects and to exaggerate sometimes. 
  I am regularly reading several scientific newsletters.   While I am aware of the confirmation bias, I have found a considerable number of scientific studies having some relevance to my own ideas.   I will continue to post, whenever I get aware of any such study.
• I have started a new blog in German:
  Gehirnorientierte Frau sucht kopfgesteuerten Mann
  This means: Brain Focused Woman Looking For A Head Controlled Man.