Authentically Plastic?

Images of and stories about this "human Barbie" have been floating around the internet for a few weeks now, but today on the quality news source Yahoo!, this article considers to what extent the individual in question used plastic surgery or Photoshop to achieve the "Barbie" look. I have discussed women falling into the Uncanny Valley before, but what I find notable about this story is not at all that a Russian model wants to look like a doll. As the Yahoo! article itself says, Valeria Lukyanova is neither the first nor the only human Barbie in the world. Interesting to me is the fact that there is somehow a difference between the falsity of makeup (a minor, hardly noteworthy one), and the falsity of computer or surgical manipulation (much more fake!). The article accuses Lukyanova of "possibly manipulating the public in the process" of showing the world her Barbie-ness, apparently because she claims to have had no plastic surgery, though "experts" are sure that she has. Perhaps her insistence has something to do with common claims that no real woman could match Mattel's Barbie's proportions. At any rate, I am led to consider the difference between "honest" artistic embellishment (makeup, airbrushing, contacts) and "fraudulent" bodily manipulation (Photoshop or plastic surgery). Does it matter which Lukyanova has undergone in order to look more like a piece of plastic? And if it does matter, why does it matter? Is your "fake" different from my "fake?" Are both different from Lukyanova's?

The Real Thing (Also The Title of a Great Story by Henry James)

A recent article in American Scientist discusses our tendency to choose a real object over a textual or digital representation of one when shopping, even if we have to pay more for the object in front of us. I suspect that this tendency has decreased significantly in the last ten years or so, but its continued presence is interesting to ponder. The article suggests that being able to "grab" the item increases its desireability in our brains, and that items (such as food) behind glass, even if instantly available, become no longer more desireable than a picture of them on the computer. Certainly there are many neurological factors at work here, but the study points to our suspicion of the two-dimensional representation. It seems we are hard-wired to not believe everything we see, and touching and tasting what's in front of us verifies its authenticity.

I wonder to what extent this phenomenon extends to people. More and more people are finding dates online, but a large group of the population still considers online dating unnatural, suspect, or even dangerous. Meeting my date in person will (probably) tell me no better that he or she is dangerous (or intelligent or attractive) than would his or her picture and "profile" online, but I would not consider a date or relationship "real" until I met the person. I also wonder whether we are willing to choose less attractive people to date if they are in front of us (much like the students who spent 50% more for physical items than for their online counterparts). It seems to me that we would forgive many more foibles (like grammar errors and bad haircuts, say) in a live, 3-D person than in an online representation of one. We want as much information as possible before making decisions, and we still believe that the real thing simply gives us more than its two-dimensional representation.