On the inefficiency of beauty contests, and a suggestion for their modernization

Rather than the subjective, whimsical evaluations that so often lead to dud Symbols of American Womanhood (1), the modern beauty pageant should take a hint from the ancient Greeks and that straightforward measure of feminine pulchritude represented by Helen of Troy, daughter of Zeus and Leda, whose face "...launched a thousand ships, and burnt the topless towers of Ilium (2)." Here we have a useful, dispassionate, scientific measure of beauty: a "helen." One helen is sufficient good looks to launch one thousand ships, and to cause the destruction by fire of an entire city. The objective standards of Ship Launching and Arson may now be used to analyze feminine beauty.

Ship Launching

Just what is meant by "launched a thousand ships"? What kind of ships are we talking about here? How can we compare modern ships to ancient?

The ships that carried the Wrath of Achilles to Troy had single banks of oars arranged symmetrically on either side, manned by up to 50 rowers. Such a vessel was called in Greek a penteconter and might have been 100 feet in length and about one-tenth that in the beam, having a displacement (3) of about 20 tons (4).

One thousand such ships makes 20,000 tons. By this measure, the woman who breaks a bottle of champagne over the brow of a ship of 20,000 tons displacement and so launches it, becomes the equal to Menelaus's wandering spouse. At least so far as maritime affairs are concerned.

If an average-sized woman were to do no more than launch herself--by getting into the bathtub, say--she would automatically get credit for about 3/1000ths of a ship launching. Larger women would do a little better.

If ships launched were the sole measure of beauty, Eleanor Roosevelt and Mamie Eisenhower would emerge, without peer, as the most desirable of women. Marilyn Monroe would not even be in the running. The pyromaniacal inclinations of the toothsome Mamie and Eleanor were, however, imperceptible. They didn't even smoke.

Arson

Arson as a measure of allure merits separate consideration. The capital of the tiny Trojan realm was the three villages of Dardania, Troy, and Ilium merged into a single fortress on the mound of Hissarlik. The "topless towers of Ilium" may well have been a fair-sized walled city of perhaps as many as 12 acres, though it is more likely that is was a fortified palace not much larger than a ballroom.

That the Troy of c. 1200 B.C. had a substantial population can be inferred from the offspring of the king alone. Priam was a mighty man who, in addition to the handsome Paris, sired on his two wives Arisba and Hecuba (5) 49 sons and 12 daughters.

By comparison, in 1871 Mrs. O'Leary's home town was a city of some 300,000 souls and the land area devastated by her careless cow was 3 1/3 square miles: 17,450 buildings were destroyed, 100,000 people were rendered homeless, and 250 lives were lost. A simple appraisal of torched acreage shows Mrs. O'Leary to be 44 times more beautiful than Helen.

In terms of speed, the Greeks needed 10 years to defeat the Trojans and destroy their city; Chicago burned in only 27 hours. By this measure, Mrs. O'Leary is 3,244 times more beautiful than Helen.

There is no record, however, of Mrs. O'Leary causing any ships to be launched, though surely she must have bathed from time to time. By the measure of 3/1000ths of a ship per ablution, a wash every Saturday night would give her the equivalent of one ship launching every six and a half years. To equal the lubricious Helen, Mrs. O'Leary would need to bathe once a week for 6,500 years.

The Beauties Compared

Although Mrs. O'Leary edges out the fair Helen in the arson category, Helen's ship launchings add up faster than Mrs. O'Leary's baths. When Paris carried off his prize, Helen was married to Menelaus. Menelaus was the brother of the powerful king Agamemnon, who went around to the princes of the country drumming up a war of revenge against the Trojans. He himself furnished 100 ships, and was chosen commander-in-chief of the combined forces. The assembled fleet at the port of Aulis in Boeotia awaited only a favorable wind. But Agamemnon had offended the goddess Artemis by slaying a hind sacred to her and by boasting himself a better hunter. As punishment, a total absence of wind prevented the fleet from departing, and the army was visited by plague. The seer Valchas announced that the anger of the goddess could only be appealed by the sacrifice of Agamemnon's daughter Iphigenia. This accomplished, the fleet set sail, though not without some hard feelings on the part of Clytemnestra, Iphigenia's mother. All this took about a year. This time factor makes Helen 6,500 times more beautiful than Mrs. O'Leary.

The Winner

Comparing the values (Mrs. O'Leary's arson factor of 3,288 against Helen's ship launching factor of 6,500) gives us Helen of Troy, selected by the goddess Aphrodite as the most beautiful woman and still the champ, by a factor of just about two to one. Even after all these years, Helen remains twice as beautiful as her closest contender.

Not every woman is hot enough to burn down a city. But taking up smoking, or cooking the evening meal will add up. Combined with regular bathing, every woman can be remembered as more beatiful. The table below will be of assistance:

Table of Helens and Equivalents

Attohelen (ah) 1E-18 helens
Light up a Lucky while strolling past a shipyard
Femtohelen (fh) 1E-15 helens
Burn a dinner candle and spit a toothpick into a water glass
Picohelen (ph) 1E-12 helens
Barbecue a couple of steaks and toss an inner tube into the pool
Nanohelen (nh) 1E-9 helens
Send the old man on a canoe trip and build a good roaring blaze in the fireplace
Microhelen (uh) 1E-6 helens
Christen a motor boat and start a grass fire
Millihelen (mh) 1E-3 helens
Launch one Homeric warship and burn down a house
Centihelen (ch) 0.01 helens
Incinerate a city block and launch Christopher Columbus's entire fleet: The "Nina" (40 tons), the "Pinta" (50 tons), and the "Santa Maria" (100 tons).
Decihelen (dh) 0.1 helens
Torch the central business district of Oakland, California, and launch the Clipper ship "Flying Cloud" (1783 tons).
Helen (h)
Raze one city and launch the WWI US Battleship "Delaware" (20,000 tons)
Dekahelen (dah) 10 helens
Oversee the incendiary bombing of ten cities and launch the aircraft carriers "Theodore Roosevelt" (91,487 tons) and "Dwight D. Eisenhower" (91,487 tons).
Hectohelen (hh) 100 helens
Instigate a major modern conflict and launch the oil platform "Stratfjord B" (with ballast, 899,360 tons), the supertanker "Seawise Giant" (624,038 deadweight tonnage), the oil/ore carrier "World Gala" (282,460 dwt tonnage), and the bulk-ore tanker "Hoei Maru" (208,000 dwt tonnage).
Kilohelen (kh) 1E3 helens
Launch the equivalent of one million Greek warships and spark a nuclear confrontation.
Megahelen (Mh) 1E6 helens
Launch the equivalent of one billion Greek warships and blow up the world.
Gigahelen (Gh) 1E9 helens
Launch the equivalent of one trillion Greek warships and destroy the Solar System.
Terahelen (Th) 1E12 helens
Launch the equivalent of one thousand trillion Greek warships and make serious inroads on the welfare of the galaxy.
It is to be hoped that beauty exceeding the Hectohelen class evades even the most ambitious.

Now, doesn't this make the selection of homecoming queen, Miss Fresno, Miss California, Miss USA, Miss World, and, capping them all, Miss Universe, just a little more orderly? More exciting, too.

NB: When computing negahelens, or sufficient ugliness to sink a thousand ships and extinguish an urban conflagration, merely convert.

Reprinted without permission from Analog, October 1992.

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