Isn't love itself a literary construct ?

[Mirae]

I can't help but ask myself a lot of questions concerning my own capacity to love someone - I keep singing that lovely song by Cole Porter "What is this thing called love ?", though it establishes the existence of love as a prerequisite.

I can't help but think love is a potpourri of everything we read in books, we see in movies - to the point it is just piled up clichés ; there's that sentence of La Rochefoucauld that says that people would never have fallen in love if they never had heard about love.

 

And here I am, talking like a book myself - or am I wrong ? Is it just pheromonal ?

In both cases, I find it sad - because it lacks spontaneity...

 

Sorry, I did not intend to make it a vast philosophical debate, but I can't get rid of these thoughts ! 

[Lord Pocky]

That's quite an interesting topic you've brought up, mate! 

 

Love is a strange thing, something we still do not really know of. But, people feel it in many ways: whether it be romantic or platonic. 

 

If love started in literature, then that'd be an interesting concept to discuss with authors and philosophers alike! 

 

Sorry, I appear to be rambling. But I do love this little topic! Gets my brain pumping with thoughts! 

[a minor triad]

I'm inclined to think that how we view love, which love we value most, and how we believe love should be expressed is a product of our cultural upbringing, and literature is very cultural.

[LadyFie]

I think "love" as a strong emotional connection to someone (may it be platonic or romantic) definitely exists.

 

But the definition of "romance" definitely includes many stereotypes and cultural traditions. For example: there is no "natural" reason for holding hands with someone and then seeing it as a special "romantic" act that you only perform with your partner, yet many people do exactly that just because they were raised to do it.

[Polygon]

I agree with @LadyFie. Love definitely exists as an innate thing, independent from culture, but there are also a bunch of social customs and signals that inform our perception of what romance (which is more or less the same as love in most people's eyes) is, which is in large part culturally driven. 

 

 

[m4rble]

In a sense every word is a construct. Words attempt to describe some aspect of reality but the word is not the thing itself. In turn, those words go on to influence the original thing they were meant to describe, especially if said thing is a thought or feeling. 

 

Love isn't purely a romantic thing, it's meant to describe any deep bonding. Most people have a lot of love for their own families or friends even if they don't do much in the way of romance. 

[Mirae]

Love as a particular phenomenon in the generality of social mimetism then ?

But even if it is cultural (i.e. specific, in principle), to quote a minor triad - isn't the mass culture pushing towards a normalisation of love's representations ?

[Guest Deus Ex Infinity]

Of course it is but still ....

 

Quote

Love is deeply biological. It pervades every aspect of our lives and has inspired countless works of art. Love also has a profound effect on our mental and physical state. A ‘broken heart' or a failed relationship can have disastrous effects; bereavement disrupts human physiology and might even precipitate death. Without loving relationships, humans fail to flourish, even if all of their other basic needs are met.

 

As such, love is clearly not ‘just' an emotion; it is a biological process that is both dynamic and bidirectional in several dimensions. Social interactions between individuals, for example, trigger cognitive and physiological processes that influence emotional and mental states. In turn, these changes influence future social interactions. Similarly, the maintenance of loving relationships requires constant feedback through sensory and cognitive systems; the body seeks love and responds constantly to interaction with loved ones or to the absence of such interaction. 

 

[ The biochemistry of love: an oxytocin hypothesis by. S. Carter ]

 

[Mirae]

15 minutes ago, Polygon said:

Love definitely exists as an innate thing, independent from culture, but there are also a bunch of social customs and signals that inform our perception of what romance (which is more or less the same as love in most people's eyes) is, which is in large part culturally driven. 

 

 

So a "natural" basis, and then a cultural form ? Like clay that would have the shape given by every culture (there are undoubted differences between the way a Japanese will interact with his/her boy/girlfriend in public and the way a French would - I can tell !), that sometimes converge in every culture (the example of holding hands is very well chosen in that case @LadyFie)...

It reminds me of that austrian film, "Amour fou" (crazy love), that makes the adjective of the title sound like "amour faux" (fake love) - the caricatural poet of this movie seems to be the least capable of love - he just ridiculously recites pompous poems and kills his "loved" one to match the cliché of the crime of passion / Werther's-like-suicide !!! 

[m4rble]

33 minutes ago, Mirae said:

Love as a particular phenomenon in the generality of social mimetism then ?

But even if it is cultural (i.e. specific, in principle), to quote a minor triad - isn't the mass culture pushing towards a normalisation of love's representations ?

"Love" is a pretty nebulous term anyway, so it depends more on what you mean specifically. There are no cultures without love, so the differences would be more in expression than presence. Not everything that is culturally universal is unlearned though. Hawks must learn to hunt, but there are no societies of Hawks which don't hunt in the wild. I don't think society could function without love in some capacity. 

[Mirae]

You're right to mention the role of hormones Deus Ex Infinity, especially oxytocin - that plays a great part in the so-called "love at first sight".

It's as if I were to distrust my body on the one side (bc of the action of hormones) and this definitely too-stuffed-with-clichés-brain-of-mine. Maybe the fact I don't really have power over it disturbs me, and I tend to be really demanding/tormented about what love could be ?

 

Nevertheless, nothing keeps me from inventing my own "standards" - like the "I wanna shampoo you" in "All I want" by Joni Mitchell, that always delighted me for its unheard freshness 

As for me, my warmest display of affection for now is a blow on the shoulder (yes, yes...)

Everybody, invent your own love codes ! 

[Mirae]

Maybe individuality can defeat or even just renew the clichés differently ?

[m4rble]

2 minutes ago, Mirae said:

You're right to mention the role of hormones Deus Ex Infinity, especially oxytocin - that plays a great part in the so-called "love at first sight".

It's as if I were to distrust my body on the one side (bc of the action of hormones) and this definitely too-stuffed-with-clichés-brain-of-mine. Maybe the fact I don't really have power over it disturbs me, and I tend to be really demanding/tormented about what love could be ?

 

Nevertheless, nothing keeps me from inventing my own "standards" - like the "I wanna shampoo you" in "All I want" by Joni Mitchell, that always delighted me for its unheard freshness 

As for me, my warmest display of affection for now is a blow on the shoulder (yes, yes...)

Everybody, invent your own love codes ! 

What are we but a mess of meat, nerves, and hormones. 

[Mirae]

In a sense, clichés ARE useful for us to differentiate from them  - for a pastiche as well as for a parody 

[Mirae]

5 minutes ago, m4rble said:

What are we but a mess of meat, nerves, and hormones. 

Well said ! Yes, I can relate to that - a nice reductionism of humans, but a sad truth ...

[m4rble]

Just now, Mirae said:

Well said ! Yes, I can relate to that - a nice reductionism of humans, but a sad truth ...

It's only sad if you undersell your own body. Hormones are not just hormones. 

[Mirae]

1 minute ago, m4rble said:

It's only sad if you undersell your own body. Hormones are not just hormones. 

I know I shouldn't, but my body and I have a... complicated relationship, based on incomprehension, feeling of estrangement and self-harm to try and feel something. I sometimes push my body to its limits (not eating enough, eating too much, depriving me of sleep, relentless sport and work) because I don't feel it, I doubt this body is mine - and yes, that is sad. (I always admired the fictional characters having congenital analgesia, though it is not my case)

I know I am involuntary part of this despicable group of "body despisers" denounced by Nietzsche. 

 

But tell me, - what are hormones if not "just hormones" ?

[Galactic Turtle]

Hormonal infatuation has always been a thing but the concept of "finding the one" is relatively new. I suppose when "hormonal infatuation" meets "person whose company I enjoy"... you get people who tend to stick together and enter into an exclusive arrangement. As far as people saying that they "feel empty" without a romantic partner I'm not sure if that's an actual natural thing or a feeling that's only there because our cultural structure emphasizes coupling up as a near necessity and inevitability. 

 

Of course there's all types of love. I'm just addressing the romantic or sexual kind. Though I do have a friend who is always angsting because she doesn't have her Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants BFF forever type of history with anyone from her childhood. That might be a cultural expectation too.

[a minor triad]

1 hour ago, Mirae said:

Love as a particular phenomenon in the generality of social mimetism then ?

But even if it is cultural (i.e. specific, in principle), to quote a minor triad - isn't the mass culture pushing towards a normalisation of love's representations ?

What do you mean by this exactly? If we are defining culture as socially learned behaviors, values, beliefs, etc., then yes, a dominant culture would normalize its views of anything. That is what a dominant culture does.

 

1 hour ago, Deus Ex Infinity said:

Of course it is but still ....

 

31 minutes ago, m4rble said:

What are we but a mess of meat, nerves, and hormones. 

I would like to point out that an emphasis of interpreting our experiences from a biological/neurological perspective is also a cultural phenomenon. Western culture favors empiricism and rationality, so we try to explain everything through those lens. There is nothing wrong with that, but there are other frameworks (mostly spiritual) that view love and everything else differently. One pitfall of Western science is that it often overlooks the importance of a person's environments and interactions because it is so focused on the biological. I'm not sure how this relates with the topic at hand, but I wanted to point that out. 

 

In regards to our own cultural definition of love (I'm going to be doing some huge generalizing of Euro-American cultures), our definition of love is based on extreme forms of individualism and pursuit of personal happiness. In reality, a majority of cultures around the world see the Western definition of love as reckless and selfish.  

[Galactic Turtle]

4 minutes ago, a minor triad said:

In regards to our own cultural definition of love (I'm going to be doing some huge generalizing of Euro-American cultures), our definition of love is based on extreme forms of individualism and pursuit of personal happiness. In reality, a majority of cultures around the world see the Western definition of love as reckless and selfish.

I think I read somewhere that it was a common thought waaaay back when that "true love" was kind of viewed like chicken pox... as in something that happens when you're young that you're glad to get out of the way mostly because it was often impractical, reckless, selfish, etc.

[a minor triad]

Just now, Galactic Turtle said:

I think I read somewhere that it was a common thought waaaay back when that "true love" was kind of viewed like chicken pox... as in something that happens when you're young that you're glad to get out of the way mostly because it was often impractical, reckless, selfish, etc.

For some cultures, that thought sill exists, especially in cultures with arranged marriages. Marriage in these cultures isn't so much about the individual, but more about group cohesion. You learn to love your spouse, and I would guess in these cultures they favor what we call companionable love.

[Groobly]

It's pretty clear it instinctively exists, as there's examples of what can only be described as "love" existing in animals, but humans always make things more complicated with our advanced societies. Love in it's purest form is a deep mutual connection between two creatures, but of course we have media warping our perceptions of things, so we find ourselves with this unrealistic expectation of what love is. People spend too much time looking for "the right one", when that's just not how things work. Also, marriage, a human construct, is deeply associated with love, and people feel pressured to get married so their love is considered official. So in this sense, yeah, love is a literary construction, and can actually be pretty unhealthy.

 

However, love is also an instinct. We see pretty much all animals have inherent desires to protect their offspring, which we humans have and it's love that drives us to feel that way. Also, it's pretty obvious our pets feel love or something very close to it when we interact with them. Also, animals have been observed mourning over their dead, which requires a bond that is likely very close to love. There are also some species of animals who mate for life, but we can't really tell if that's love, because it's in line with our socially constructed idea of love, and is very uncommon. Either way, there are observations of love outside of humanity, so love definitely exists. It's just to what extent, and how warped is our humanly concept of it at this point.

[LeChat]

Plus, to add to what others have said (about love being biologically innate), young children and babies end up feeling love (a strong emotional bond and attachment) for their parents, before they know the word or about society's stereotypes or expectations of romantic relationships.

[Mirae]

36 minutes ago, a minor triad said:

What do you mean by this exactly? If we are defining culture as socially learned behaviors, values, beliefs, etc., then yes, a dominant culture would normalize its views of anything. That is what a dominant culture does.

I just wanted to underline the tension between the different scales of the word "culture" - as a specificity, a particularity for a distinct culture and, on another scale, as a generality through the mass culture  

Sorry if it seems obvious to you, I just meant to provoke a conversation ^^ - and I'm pretty unsure about "obvious" things... Thanks for the definition ! 

[a minor triad]

No worries, actually, I have a hard time understanding what people mean most of the time, especially over the internet.  I was just guessing what you meant. But yes, culture (dominant and minority cultures alike) is a very interesting and complex topic to study. Honestly, it makes my head spin when I think about how deeply engrained cultural values are in everyone.

[Mirae]

34 minutes ago, Groobly said:

However, love is also an instinct. We see pretty much all animals have inherent desires to protect their offspring, which we humans have and it's love that drives us to feel that way. 

and it all comes back to Darwin !! instinct of survival for the species = the law ???

I wanted to ask if we love just to reproduce and maintain our species, but that very thought, defended by Schopenhauer, is so depressing... My father, who is a fanatic darwinist, keeps telling me this 

[Groobly]

3 minutes ago, Mirae said:

and it all comes back to Darwin !! instinct of survival for the species = the law ???

I wanted to ask if we love just to reproduce and maintain our species, but that very thought, defended by Schopenhauer, is so depressing... My father, who is a fanatic darwinist, keeps telling me this 

That's certainly part of it. However, like I said, humans are different because of our advanced intelligence and communication abilities. We also love for cultural reasons, hedonistic reasons, and social status. Reducing it down to simple biology isn't correct because there's many socialized aspects to it, but at the same time removing the biological and Darwinist aspect of it would be dishonest.

[m4rble]

2 hours ago, Galactic Turtle said:

Hormonal infatuation has always been a thing but the concept of "finding the one" is relatively new. I suppose when "hormonal infatuation" meets "person whose company I enjoy"... you get people who tend to stick together and enter into an exclusive arrangement. As far as people saying that they "feel empty" without a romantic partner I'm not sure if that's an actual natural thing or a feeling that's only there because our cultural structure emphasizes coupling up as a near necessity and inevitability. 

 

Of course there's all types of love. I'm just addressing the romantic or sexual kind. Though I do have a friend who is always angsting because she doesn't have her Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants BFF forever type of history with anyone from her childhood. That might be a cultural expectation too.

People could, "feel empty" from not finding the one out of simple loneliness as well. Humans are not solitary animals. 

 

2 hours ago, Mirae said:

I know I shouldn't, but my body and I have a... complicated relationship, based on incomprehension, feeling of estrangement and self-harm to try and feel something. I sometimes push my body to its limits (not eating enough, eating too much, depriving me of sleep, relentless sport and work) because I don't feel it, I doubt this body is mine - and yes, that is sad. (I always admired the fictional characters having congenital analgesia, though it is not my case)

I know I am involuntary part of this despicable group of "body despisers" denounced by Nietzsche. 

 

But tell me, - what are hormones if not "just hormones" ?

Having a complicated relationship with your body seems to be a pretty common position on this website. I was using the term "body" in a very general sense though, more to point out a more materialistic interpretation of "mind" or "self" than to point to the body that we talk about as the body. Even if you spend all day in your own mind, your mind is still within your body and in a sense your entire body is a part of your mind because the brain is in constant communication with the body. I don't think hormones are fully separate from your thinking self, so saying something is less legitimate because it was triggered by hormones isn't very different than saying a thought is less legitimate because it was triggered by a nerve impulse. People often think the material world is too mundane to create our experience of world, so there must be a second, more magical world where the self resides, but what if the material world is just that "magical" in and of itself. 

 

I am not familiar with what Nietzsche said about body despisers but I'm sure you don't need to take his word for it, or anyone else's for that matter. 

2 hours ago, a minor triad said:

What do you mean by this exactly? If we are defining culture as socially learned behaviors, values, beliefs, etc., then yes, a dominant culture would normalize its views of anything. That is what a dominant culture does.

 

 

I would like to point out that an emphasis of interpreting our experiences from a biological/neurological perspective is also a cultural phenomenon. Western culture favors empiricism and rationality, so we try to explain everything through those lens. There is nothing wrong with that, but there are other frameworks (mostly spiritual) that view love and everything else differently. One pitfall of Western science is that it often overlooks the importance of a person's environments and interactions because it is so focused on the biological. I'm not sure how this relates with the topic at hand, but I wanted to point that out. 

 

In regards to our own cultural definition of love (I'm going to be doing some huge generalizing of Euro-American cultures), our definition of love is based on extreme forms of individualism and pursuit of personal happiness. In reality, a majority of cultures around the world see the Western definition of love as reckless and selfish.  

Looking at things from a biological perspective is a cultural phenomenon as well, yes. Biology isn't always limited to the individual though. Social interactions and environmental interactions can also be viewed through a biological lens. 

1 hour ago, Groobly said:

That's certainly part of it. However, like I said, humans are different because of our advanced intelligence and communication abilities. We also love for cultural reasons, hedonistic reasons, and social status. Reducing it down to simple biology isn't correct because there's many socialized aspects to it, but at the same time removing the biological and Darwinist aspect of it would be dishonest.

 

[The Gnat (Natalie)]

4 hours ago, a minor triad said:

I'm inclined to think that how we view love, which love we value most, and how we believe love should be expressed is a product of our cultural upbringing, and literature is very cultural.

I agree. To throw in my two cents, I don't think love is a construct at all because the limited amount of romantic love/attraction that I've felt really doesn't mesh with the portrayals of love and romance I've seen in literature (including TV, film, theatre, and, music), but I still can't describe it any other way than being in love.

[Mirae]

31 minutes ago, m4rble said:

I don't think hormones are fully separate from your thinking self, so saying something is less legitimate because it was triggered by hormones isn't very different than saying a thought is less legitimate because it was triggered by a nerve impulse. People often think the material world is too mundane to create our experience of world, so there must be a second, more magical world where the self resides, but what if the material world is just that "magical" in and of itself. 

That's absolutely true - didn't consider it that way, but yes, all intellectual processes are determined by physical, neurological impulses. So I'm oversimplifying by creating an artificial dichotomy between mind and body, physical and spiritual !

(synthetical way of thinking = bad habit arrrgh)

Thus I should try to be satisfied with the immanence of the only (and yet very rich) existing layer of reality, the material world (comprising all the spiritual aspect it generates), instead of believing in the illusion of a transcendental world... - have I understood correctly ?