The Speculist

NewScientist reports that libido may soon be quantifiable through the monitoring of brainwaves:

Monitoring the change in specific brain waves could be the first quantitative method for measuring libido, new research suggests.

The technique measures attention, rather than sexual desire specifically, but Yoram Vardi, at Rambam Hospital and the Technion, both in Haifa, Israel told NewScientist: "We found that sexual stimuli are the most potent."

So far 30 people with normal sexual function have been tested, but if further tests are successful, Vardi hopes his method will have many applications. These could include quantitatively analysing the libido-lowering (or enhancing) side effects of medication or even supporting legal claims of a reduction in sex drive after an accident.

Okay, the medical side-effects and accident claims deal are important. Of course they are. But I think there are some significant implications here that NewScientist has missed. What we are talking about, after all, is the first tentative steps towards transforming Getting One's Groove On from an art to a science.

That's huge.

For example, what if it can be established that eating chocolates gives the typical woman a 10% libidinal boost in responding to a particular stimulus, where a glass of fine champagne provides an additional 6% boost? Or what if it can be shown that a particular perfume gives the average man a whopping 27% boost? It won't be long before someone creates an environment loaded with stimuli, touching all of the senses, which have been clinically proven to increase libido. The long-cherished dream of the babe lair (or male equivalent thereof) will finally be achieved.

Moreover, if a quantifiable scale of attractiveness can be established to augment the quantification of libido, some researcher will eventually introduce a formula showing how much alcohol it takes to drive the libido number up to the point that one risks compromising interactions with a partner with an unacceptably low level of attractiveness. Such a formula could help us completely eradicate the phenomenon known as beer goggles.

But it's not all good news. Should some kind of home kit become available for measuring brainwaves, men will be at unprecedented risk from perennial dangerous questions such as

"Do you like my hair this way?"

or

"Do I look fat in this?"

The libido measuring technology would at this point become a polygraph. The best defense in such a situation would be to blame some interefering factor in the environment:

"Come on, Honey, I really do like it. It's probably just those antehistimines I took yesterday. You know how those things are always messing up my brain waves."