Formula for Divorce

www.abc.net.au...

A British mathematician has devised a formula to predict whether loved-up couples are bound to spend their lives together or end their marriages in divorce.

Oxford University professor James Murray said his formula successfully predicted whether a couple would divorce 94 per cent of the time, in a study of 700 newly married couples.

"Some couples might as well get divorced right away," said Professor Murray, who was to present his findings to the Royal Society in London, after receiving one of its oldest awards.

Interesting stuff. Your future marital bliss can be predicted with a high degree of accuracy simply by having a charged conversation analyzed and then crunching the numbers.

I guess the question is, would you want to know? Would you want to have the analysis done before marriage if it were available? Or do you prefer blissful (for now) ignorance?

I'd be divorcing him.

The mathematician that is.. he can say "there's no real reason to remember your birthday because thats not part of the equation.."

[edit on 27-3-2009 by riley]

Very interesting stuff.
Glad the boyfriend and I are able to discuss subjects with affection and humor.
There's hope for us I guess.

Heck I know that formula. It can actually be broken down into two words.

I do

The formula I used to get my divorces was to stay drunk, take drugs and run around with other women. It worked everytime and fast!

There are probably lots of ways to facilitate a divorce but I'm a traditionalist and old school.



edit....to appeal for forgiveness at my lame attempt at humor.

[edit on 27-3-2009 by whaaa]

Originally posted by whaaa

edit....to appeal for forgiveness at my lame attempt at humor.

No need to apologize, it was genuinely funny.

I just wonder if anyone would actually want to know. If we could actually go in and have the analysis done before marriage, would we? Human being are so good at running from reason, I just kind of doubt anyone would ever do it.

Either they wouldnt want to know, in case it told them something they didnt want to know, like "dont marry him/her." Or if they did find out bad news, they would tell themselves, "I am going to be the 6% of the time that formula is wrong."

And, it also brings up the question of whether or not long term compatibility is even important in "hooking up." Are we really meant to stay with one other person forever? Like the monogamous ideal insists we are? Or is chemistry just supposed to bring us together long enough to make genetically good babies and then move on to the next partner so all our genetic eggs are not in one basket? (Create greater diversity in our own offspring thus maximizing the odds that ONE of them will be successful?)

Who knows. Thats probably more nerd-dom than one should bring to the relationship forum, but I just cant help myself.

[edit on 27-3-2009 by Illusionsaregrander]

Originally posted by Illusionsaregrander
Are we really meant to stay with one other person forever? Like the monogamous ideal insists we are? Or is chemistry just supposed to bring us together long enough to make genetically good babies and then move on to the next partner so all our genetic eggs are not in one basket? (Create greater diversity in our own offspring thus maximizing the odds that ONE of them will be successful?)

"Forever", in the days when death could strike with surprise/quickness, used to mean six days/months/years, for example. A man could go through several wives; a woman could pray for death to take her out of a bad marriage.

Personally, I left after 20 years, because I could see women 20 years older than me, unhappily putting up with the type of spouse I had, and I knew I didn't want to spend 20 MORE years in that marriage.

I'm sure if I had been given the professor's interview before that first marriage, I would have said, nah, I'm getting married anyway. Hey, when you're young and dumb, you even ignore family members who could probably predict as well as the prof! I've bought wedding gifts for and been to weddings of couples I could take bets on how long the marriage would last.

lol The other research presented, on brain tumors, reminded me of how I used to think that my ex's ill behavior certainly must have been due to a brain tumor. lol Thank God for divorce. Jeez, even business contracts can be broken.

My offspring turned out successful, my Life is great now, and my ex has had the opportunity to figure out his own Life.

Interesting, money and sex weren't the contentious issues for us, but maybe the prof had some other issues to discuss, or maybe he could have gleaned the negatives anyway if we had been in the experiment.

Bottom line, I think the heart will always rule the head. One couple I know had pre-marriage counseling, because of concerns about one of them, but got divorced because of something the OTHER spouse had done, not even connected with the concern of the pre-m counseling. Humans are complex.

reply to post by whaaa


Oh, gawd, whaaa, I peed my pants....wait, I'm not wearing pants...oh, oh!

The formula I used to get my divorces was to stay drunk, take drugs and run around with other women. It worked everytime and fast!

ha ha ha

I didn't know anyone had to try that hard to get divorced ?
She must have really loved you if you had to try that hard to piss her off ?

I find little stuff not coming to bed, or talking to the check out cashier is enough with some women.

Not listening, blaming and just getting lazy are enough