Love

keu

In a previous thread, it was declared that love does not exist in reality as anything more than chemical responses. While there is truth in the matter, the ancient greeks had several values for "love".
It's a subject I haven't delved into for some time, but the definitions are interesting and I suppose questionable.

Eros, is the love between man and woman. (sexual)
Pileos is brotherly love (platonic)
agape is divine love [Greek agap e, love.]

the last one is a little harder to define, so i leave it up to you to clarify or question or debate.

chewy

but if your in a relationship with someone can you not have more then sexual love?

Fysh

I think that, in this context, "sexual" and "erotic" love are interchangeable, if that helps.

Regarding the "divine love" - its not possible to make any sense of this idea without already having a deity defined, through which this divine love will probably be defined (as in, the Old Testament God wasn't exactly a forgiving god, whereas the New Testament God is supposed to be).

That said, the Greeks believed that their gods often behaved like little more than horny aristocrats who liked drinking and trying to get into the pants of the local populace...which offers a very specific interpretation of "divine love". *snigger*

simu

From this site:

It goes into Greek conceptions of the nature of love - there are more details on the website if you're interested.

In English, the word 'love', which is derived from Germanic forms of the Sanskrit lubh (desire), is broadly defined and hence imprecise, which generates first order problems of definition and meaning, which are resolved to some extent by the reference to the Greek terms, eros, philia, and agape.

Eros:

The term eros (Greek erasthai) is used to refer to that part of love constituting a passionate, intense desire for something, it is often referred to as a sexual desire, hence the modern notion of 'erotic' (Greek erotikos). In Plato's writings however, eros is held to be a common desire that seeks transcendental beauty-the particular beauty of an individual reminds us of true beauty that exists in the world of Forms or Ideas

Philia:

In contrast to the desiring and passionate yearning of eros, philia entails a fondness and appreciation of the other. For the Greeks, the term philia incorporated not just friendship, but also loyalties to family and polis-one's political community, job, or discipline.

Agape:

Agape refers to the paternal love of God for man and for man for God but is extended to include a brotherly love for all humanity. (The Hebrew ahev has a slightly wider semantic range than agape). Agape arguably draws on elements from both eros and philia in that it seeks a perfect kind of love that is at once a fondness, a transcending of the particular, and a passion without the necessity of reciprocity.

lisa.c

if love has been declared as just a chemical response then they have proven that love exsists in theform of a chemical response. does it matter what the ancient greeks thought... love is what you feel and will feel as you what defy it to be. love is a feeling, an emotion and real even the greeks knew this hence the god of love.... what was her name again????

Capt'n Midnight

http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/love?view=uk
(The full OED entry is longer)

love

• noun 1 an intense feeling of deep affection. 2 a deep romantic or sexual attachment to someone. 3 a great interest and pleasure in something. 4 a person or thing that one loves. 5 (in tennis, squash, etc.) a score of zero. apparently from the phrase play for love (i.e. the love of the game, not for money).

• verb 1 feel love for. 2 like very much. 3 loving showing love or great care.

— PHRASES love me, love my dog proverb if you love someone, you must accept everything about them, even their faults or weaknesses. make love 1 have sexual intercourse. 2 (make love to) dated pay amorous attention to. there’s no love lost between there is mutual dislike between.

— DERIVATIVES loveless adjective lovingly adverb.

— ORIGIN Old English, related to LEAVE2 and LIEF.

see also http://www.webster-dictionary.org/definition/love

As stated above love is a very generic word.
I love TV
I love you
I love tummy rubs
I love strawberries
I love the cat etc.
I love my country
no greater love has a man etc.
Most speakers of other languages would use different words for some of those things

The concept of romantic love started in the middle ages in europe and the greeks may not have been familiar with the concept as we now use it.

The uncertainty principle - covers the grey area between fully predicting something given all the initial positions and totally random behaviour. Chocolate mimics the chemicals of love.

DadaKopf

Strangely enough, with all the current concerns over the concept/reality (whatever) of 'Evil', philosophers like Alain Badiou have been working furiously to bring Love and Evil back into philosophy - two concepts which were eradicated by both Modernism and postmodern philosophy.

But then, apparently the concept of 'Evil' is a more recent human invention. Love has a longer histoy. That's gotta be a good thing, whatever it is.

SkepticOne

Originally posted by DadaKopf
But then, apparently the concept of 'Evil' is a more recent human invention. Love has a longer histoy. That's gotta be a good thing, whatever it is.

How old is evil as a concept (roughly)?

lee_baby_simms

love is a spice of many tastes...
a dizzying array of textures...and moments.

Trip

Ok so taking the idea that love "exists" is it good or bad ? Is it worth it ? Is it a solution to live ? Is it what everyone want's ? I have a lot more questions on love but the most important i think is love worth it , what is the point of love when it only creates hassle and mistrust

People use the word love as a guise/cover up of lust or just like but i don't think there can be love

If you haven't guessed it by now i thought i was in love but i thought wrong now i'm just thinking is there such a thing , my now ex-girlfirend who said she loved me wouldn't trust me or believe me and dumped me for it so i don't believe in love anymore it's just another "feeling" which the mind creates each mind creating each feeling in it's own way like pain will never be the same for two people so love cannot exist neither can feelin , only there words exist ... Only physical entities exist imo

Trip

Originally posted by lisa.c
love is what you feel and will feel as you what defy it to be. love is a feeling, an emotion and real even the greeks knew this hence the god of love.... what was her name again????

aphrodite = her name

You said love is what you feel and will feel but what is feeling isn't that just something that was made up by man ? and who exactly wants to believe in man
but so if someone never made up the idea of pain , love , lust . Than they never would of existed so in reality what is the point of feeling ?

Capt'n Midnight

Originally posted by SkepticOne
How old is evil as a concept (roughly)?

ye old good vs. evil - an idea borrowed from Good Vs. Evil

The main belief is in a single God named Ahura Mazda, or Ohrmazd. Ahura Mazda is good, holy, supreme, and the creator of all things. But Zoroastrianism also identifies an active force of evil in the world -- a powerful spirit by the name of Angra Mainyu, or Ohriman. Within this system of opposing good and evil forces, humans must choose one side or the other. However, in the end, Ahura Mazda will triumph over evil.

lisa.c

evil probably began when it got jealous of all the good things love had.....

lee_baby_simms

Originally posted by Trip

People use the word love as a guise/cover up of lust or just like but i don't think there can be love

thats dangerous thinkin IMO. Nothing especially love is that simple. If you dont think there can be love there probably wont be love.

I think it was Rod Stewart who said "The first cut is the deepest..."

That said time is a great healer. Who knows, 12 months from now you might be steering a gondola through venice with a rose clenched in your mouth?

Trip

I doubt that but i said what i said earlier because it's kind of true who knows what love is ? to answer that question nobody ! people think they know love only to find themselves loving someone else and hating the person that they used to love i've seen this happen so many times so we can't really use the word love untill we lose the person whom we love but sayin this the feeling of "love" if it exists never goes away but is that feeling really love or is it a mirage of the mind or is it a cruel play of life ?

*Sinéad*

i'm taking that the idea behind saying 'love doesn't exist' is that what we perceived to be love was actually 'only' a chemical reaction.But has this knowledge actually changed the importance of love?Chemicals are just the technical side to something much more expansive and highly important in how we form our social percptions, attitudes and relationships.
I mean a scientist can explain to you the chemical process involved in making a spongecake, but it won't change the taste.

acous

There was a cool article about the science of love linked from slashdot a while back: http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=2424049. Much the same info in easily digestable form is available from the BBC Science website.

*Sinéad*: I don't think it's fair to say it's just the technical side it should explain love accurately albeit at a very high level with some pieces missing. I can see where you're coming from though. You can't truly understand anything without experiencing... be it love, depression, drugs or just a situation.

man... anyone else hate these smileys?