What makes us appreciate beauty?

I mean from a chemical and biological standpoint. What happens in our brain that we react to something as being beautiful or not. Do we base it on memories, on smells, on wavelengths, colors, what? And is it like being in love, which is basically a large quanitity of dopamine?What makes us appreciate beauty?
Recent brain studies have shown that even very young babies react to beautiful faces. It is thus assumed we are hard-wired in part to appreciate beauty, which is generally based on symmetry and balance. Perhaps it has become a matter of evolution: highly symmetrical bodies/faces tend to be healthy ones. Another study has looked at athletes and found that most are what we would consider attractive-looking. So, beauty=health? I want to mate with a beautiful specimen, because that implies our offspring will be healthier than with an ugly mate?


What happens in our brain is a question that has yet to be answered fully. In the infant studies, they were looking at pictures, so smell or wavelengths or memories did not enter in to the response. Our brain does react with a hormonal response to beauty. Ever notice your heart beating faster when you see someone attractive looking at you? And, yes. We do sort of fall in love with a pretty face. That's why most soap-opera stars are full-on 10's, and most female movie stars are fabulously good-looking. We can't keep our eyes off them.What makes us appreciate beauty?
Isn't it the golden ratio the baseline of all beauties-1:1.618? If that is the case, than we some how mathematically intrigue ourselves. Is that still chemical reaction?