What Exactly Is Love?

Various ideas attempt to justify what love is and how it works, what we talk about when we talk about love. It's far more difficult to describe what love is to a hypothetical person who has never been loved or has never known love. The evolutionary theory, which considers love to be a natural selection mechanism, the psychological theory, which considers love to be a healthy act, and the theological theory, which considers love to be a gift from God, are among the theories that attempt to account for the nature of love. All of the ideas have one thing in common: love is presented as a magical experience. Love has a nature, according to the metaphysical debate. However, some argue love to be conceptually irrational. This means love cannot be described by a meaningful preposition of irrational.

Love is considered to be the most powerful emotion ever experienced by the human being. It is the most misused expression in the world. It can be used in expressing pleasure or showing affection towards a person (Osborne 13). However, philosophers argue that the purest form of love is expressed by the human virtue i.e. kindness, affection and compassion.

The love one feels for his partner is not the same to the one feels for his parents. Studies have shown even the love one feels for his partner changes with time and that one is expected to experience different emotions at different people and situations. This means one can say “I love you” to different people when the person is feeling different for each individual.

Aristotle was not really interested in love that was erotic (Eros) because he was so much into friendship (philia).for Plato he assumed that the best kind of friendship is that which love birds have for each other. This meant that erotic love could be transformed to the best kind of friendship which would lead to the opening up and understanding (Kakar 36).



It is much easier to experience love than defining it. Theology suggests that each person should love god above everything else and also religion asks us to love our neighbors as much as ourselves. This can only be achieved through acts of generosity, kindness and self-sacrifice. It is one thing that can never hurt though it may cost dearly. Love attaches human beings with bonds stronger than death and it cannot be bought or sold.

Biology states love to be a neurological condition and it is compared to thirst and hunger. It is said to be blind and unconditional and thus humans have no control over this feeling. Scientists suggest that love is a mechanism that has evolved so as to promote mutual defense, feelings of safety and promote long time relationships (Badiou 67).

Love without commitment is just an infatuation, without nurturing it can wither and die and love without passion it is just dedication (Kakar 141).

It entirely depends on how secure a person feels in a relationship, at point it can feel necessary and mundane as air that a person cannot exist without. Once deprived of the feeling of love it may feel like an all-consuming physical pain or an obsession. The greatest fallacy of love that fascinates is the point before its consummation.

It is undeniable that love does play a big and unavoidable role in many cultures.it has been a constant theme that has been nurturing life and the youth for centuries. Since the Roman and Greek times love has been a mainstay in philosophical work and thus had led to the creation of many theories. Plato concluded that love is a result of series of elevations while the religion theory give as the verdict of love to be an intense spiritual affair that when it is on its highest permits it can tap to divinity.





























Annotated Biblography

Kakar, Sudhir, and John Munder Ross. "Tales of love, sex, and danger." (2011).

The book discus on the complex nature of love and the nature of passion that is erotic. This always appears in great love poems and stories. Starting with the story based on Romeo and Juliet and the roots of European Christianity, the book covers the deep and vast ranges of love.it takes a look on romantic tails in the western world (the Greek myth of Oedipus, the drama of Hamlet and the Celtic saga of Isolade and Tristan) all this give a contemporary focus on love. This book re-evaluates the assertions of erotic and romantic love in context of modern literacy theory and contemporary psychoanalysis.

Osborne, Catherine. "Eros unveiled: Plato and the God of love." (2013).This book provides a challenge to the traditional distinction that’s between the Eros and Agape love. Eros was the love that was found by the Greeks thought while Agape was the love characteristic among the Christians. This book also gives a focus on a number of classical texts which include Aristotle ethics and Plato’s symposium. The author gives an account on Plato’s thought on Eros which was not founded on self-interest. It is in this way that the author restore the place of erotic love which is a Christian motif and goes on to unravel some longstanding confusions which exist in the discussion of philosophical love.





Badiou, Alain. "Philosophy and the Event." (2013).This book provides a perfect introduction in the thought of love.it responds on questions posed by Tarby as it takes us on a journey that explores and interrogates the conditions of philosophy. These conditions of Philosophy are science, art, politics and love. In all the mentioned domains there is occurrence of events that shed some light on the possibilities that are thought to be unthinkable or invincible; The book proposes to us that everything depend on the possibility of how one has opened up to events which are elaborated and embedded to the world. The book has described these events to be the “procedure of truth”. It winds up by providing a conclusion that gives a brief summary to Badiou philosophy which makes this book an indispensable guide to the love philosophy.