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Math Proves That Celebrity Marriages Are as Meaningless as Everyone Thought

Most of us who care at all about the celebrity world can make fairly accurate predictions about celebrity life. If you’re a pop culture nut like me, you may even make predictions so crazy accurate that you begin contemplating how sad your own life is. After I successfully predicted 2 years in advance that Demi Lovato would date Joe Jonas (may he burn in hell), whom would then go on to break her heart and send her in a tailspin of drugs and depression, I took a long, hard look at my life choices. I now leave most of my emotional investment in the well being of former Disney starlettes to Ryan Seacrest. Though I still harbor an unfounded amount of hatred for a particular Jo Bro, today I look at celebrity life as a casual interest rather than a full on hobby.

One aspect of celebrity life that people are always hit or miss on when it comes to predicting the future is how long a celebrity marriage will last. But no longer does one have to make a rough estimate on the length of celebrity marriages, now there is a formula to do that for us, and its finally been proven to work. A few years back, the New York Times published this formula:

They also made several predictions for the marital demise of Hollywood couples. I’m pretty sure Sasquatch Dave, my favorite UT campus hobo, could’ve told you that Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries weren’t going to last long, but this formula has been calling out couples that most would say they have a decent chance at surviving. In 2006 it even predicted that Tom and Katie would hit splitsville after they hit the 5-year mark (which they now have after 6 years). I know, creepy, older Scientologists and young teen stars who have spun into celebrity insignificance aren’t expected to grow old together, but this formula has been right on the money for the most part.

The main factor in the formula that is different from formulas predicting success in marriage for mere mortals is how famous the celebrity couple in question might be. Despite almost half of all marriages ending in divorce these days, celebs have it even worse. By incorporating the number of Google hits and number of provocative pictures in the wife’s first 5 Google images (who knew that sluttier women are prone to infidelity?!), the formula puts a numerical value on fame that is then incorporated into a more traditional marital success formula.

But obviously, as time has progressed, a “fame quality” variable has emerged. This is what separates the Lindsay Lohans from the Kate Middletons, so to speak. To increase the accuracy of this formula, the creators decided to add more complexity to the formula that not only gauges how famous each celebrity is, but also what kind of fame they have. They do this by taking the number of mentions in the New York Times in a given period of time and compare that to the number of mentions in the National Enquirer during the same period. My all time favorite Hollywood couple, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, are both very famous, but they are most likely going to stay together in the years to come because they possess quality fame (as compared to, say, Britney and KFed). With this new addition, Khloe Kardashian and Lamar Odom have a 0% chance of lasting 15 year. Literally. They extended the solution out to 15 decimal places and it was straight up 0.0%.

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