I think SodaHead's Sexual Orientation should include Asexuals do you?

Well sure that is what the average person would do however like I said, I personally believe that sexual orientation is based on perception. There have been a number of studies conducted that show that attraction is greatly influenced by perception. People were asked to look at two people and rate them based on their appearance. Then they would tell the test subjects information about the candidate such as their height, their job, and other things that may or may not raise the rating of the person they had the test subjects looking at. In almost all cases the people kept changing their rating of the people they were looking once they received information. Attraction is based on perception, not genetics.

>But there's probably not a person who is sexually attractive to me.

This just proves what I am saying. You are drawing this conclusion based on how you perceive the human race, not based on how a person looks. You cannot not say no one attractive to you if you have not seen every face there is to see. The only way you could say this is if you mentally choose to block yourself off from anyone as being attractive. Why a person would do this varies from experience to experience.

>Is everyone who isn't sexually attractive to you 'inferior' in your mind?

It would depend on what my perception is of what I don’t find attractive. Creatures are programmed to look for certain things in a mate so that they can be passed on to their offspring. If a person is lacking a desirable trait, you will pass them because they are not suitable for mating. Humans have the ability to reason on a higher level than other animals so we tend to let factors that are completely unrelated to mating determine whether or not they are a “good match” for us. For example if an attractive man or woman possesses a trait that is a dealbreaker, your attraction to them while slowly disappear. This is why marriages fail. It is because as you live with someone you learn more about them and perceive them differently and therefore lose your attraction to them.

>This conclusion is subject to revision at any time. This is how things are done by rational thinkers.

I guess it would depend on what you deem rational.

>I haven't blocked out the possibility that I might someday be attracted to someone. You failed to read the part of my quote where I said: If I suddenly start experiencing sexual attraction, then I will probably start identifying as sexual.'

Actually I didn’t miss it. The human mind is an amazing thing, every choice you make is not always visible to your conscious mind. You don’t consciously tell yourself to breathe or your heart to beat, your brain does it subconsciously on it’s own. Is it impossible that you would make a choice subconsciously? If that were the case, would repressed memories be real?

>My sexual orientation isn't something I 'chose'. Did you choose who you're sexually attracted to?

Yes, your sexual orientation is a choice and this is what so many people don’t realize. Is it conscious choice? For the average person, No but it does not mean that it isn’t a choice. I do choose who I am sexually attracted to.

For example, there is a guy that I see every day that I have been around for the past 4 years. In the beginning I thought he was a good looking guy however I was not attracted to him. (I am sure it is the same with asexual people. You meet people who are attractive to the eye however you don’t envision yourself being in a sexual relationship with them and therefore one could say you are not attracted to them). Last year I was in a situation where I was required to be around this guy for more extensive periods of time. Because of this I noticed more things about him that I hadn’t before. I began to envision how life would be if he and I were in a relationship with each other and I liked what it looked like and therefore my sexual attraction to him increased to the point where I would totally sleep with him if we were in a committed relationship. Did my genetics change? No (I am pretty sure genetic change that extensive does not happen in 30 minutes). My perception of him changed to things that were more positive.

Thoughts About Him Before

Guy

My age

Smart

Unattainable

Thoughts About Him Now

Sweet

Hysterical

Polite

Respectful

Soft Spoken (I love soft spoken guys)

Nice Hair

Nice Smile

Smart

Hardworking

Possibly Attainable

Drastic change in my perception of him. I think this is enough to develop sexual attraction.

>As an additional note, what you are saying is true in a limited sense, but I don't think that effect could be strong enough to make me unattracted to everyone. I know for a fact that it's nothing to do with asexuality in my case.

Perhaps it is limited but if it is then, you wouldn’t mind trying a little experiment would you? Worse case scenario you will end up in the same situation you are now.

>So do you think it's rational to make conclusions that can never be questioned or revised, no matter what? Because that's pretty much the only alternative.

I just feel there is no reason to label yourself because there is no such thing as a perfect label. Labels do nothing but cause confusion and dumb down the situations at hand.

>In what sense can we say that something is a 'choice' if it's not conscious and I'm not even consciously aware of having made it? It seems to me that's the exact opposite of what a choice is.

A choice is something where there is more than one possible outcome and you can determine it should you choose to. We think we control our brains but for the most part our brains control us. Our brains control the information that we retain and what happens inside of our bodies, the only way we can prevent it from doing something is if we make a conscious effort to stop it or else it will keep on doing what it feels is best.

Ex. our brain only retains certain information to prevent itself from going into overload and if you don't purposefully choose to remember something, you will forget it because your brain will not flag it. But if you say "I need to remember this" and you do everything you can to remember it, you will.

>Which isn't a choice. Your perception changed, but you didn't just say to yourself 'I'm going to think of him in a drastically different way from now on.' It just happened. You are making my point for me. Also, even if I thought of someone in the same way you describe thinking of him, I probably still wouldn't be sexually attracted to him.

The main point that I am making out is that perception affects attraction. The only thing that changed in the situation was my perception. You are not hardwired to be asexual as some would assume, you just probably have not made a conscious effort to form a connection.

>What kind of experiment are you talking about? Having sex with someone? Because I would not be open to that type of experiment. Why would I have sex with someone I didn't find attractive? Did you have to have sex with people from different categories in order to figure out whether you were or weren't sexually attracted to them? No. That's not how attraction works.

Lol no that was not what I was going to say. xD I was just going to ask whether you would mind answering a few questions.