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2007-07-05 18:58:55 · 19 answers · asked by srinivasu_s s 1 in Social Science Psychology

19 answers

Love is a constellation of emotions and experiences related to a sense of strong affection or profound oneness.[1] The meaning of love varies relative to context. Romantic love is seen as an ineffable feeling of intense attraction shared in passionate or intimate attraction and intimate interpersonal and sexual relationships.[2] Though often linked to personal relations, love is often given a wider connection, a love of humanity, of nature, with life itself, or a oneness with the universe, a universal love or karma. Love can also be construed as Platonic love,[3] religious love,[4] familial love, and, more casually, great affection for anything considered strongly pleasurable, desirable, or preferred, to include activities and foods.[5][2] This diverse range of meanings in the singular word love is often contrasted with the plurality of Greek words for love, reflecting the concept's depth, versatility, and complexity.

Definitions
The definition of love is the subject of considerable debate, enduring speculation and thoughtful introspection. The difficulty of finding a universal definition for love is typically tackled by classifying it into types, such as passionate love, romantic love, and committed love. These types of love can often be generalized into a level of sexual attraction. In common use, love has two primary meanings, the first being an indication of adoration for another person or thing, and the second being a state of relational status. Love is an act of identifying with a person or thing, capable of even including oneself (cf. narcissism). Dictionaries tend to define love as deep affection or fondness.[1] In colloquial use, according to polled opinion, the most favored definitions of love involve altruism, selflessness, friendship, union, family, and bonding or connecting with another.[6]

Thomas Jay Oord has defined love in various scholarly publications as acting intentionally, in sympathetic response to others (including God), to promote overall well-being. Oord means for his definition to be sufficient for research in ethics, religion, and science.

The different aspects of love can be roughly illustrated by comparing their corollaries and opposites. As a general expression of positive sentiment (a stronger form of like), love is commonly contrasted with hate (or neutral apathy); as a less sexual and more mutual and "pure" form of romantic attachment, love is commonly contrasted with lust; and as an interpersonal relationship with romantic overtones, love is commonly contrasted with friendship, although other connotations of love may be applied to close friendships as well.

The very existence of love is sometimes subject to debate. Some categorically reject the notion as false or meaningless.[citation needed] Others call it a recently-invented abstraction, sometimes dating the "invention" to courtly Europe during or after the Middle Ages.[citation needed] Others maintain that love really exists, and is not an abstraction, but is undefinable, being essentially spiritual or metaphysical in nature.[citation needed] Some psychologists maintain that love is the action of lending one's "boundary" or "self-esteem" to another.[citation needed] Others attempt to define love by applying the definition to everyday life.[citation needed]

Cultural differences make any universal definition of love difficult to establish. Expressions of love may include the love for a soul or mind, the love of laws and organizations, love for a body, love for nature, love of food, love of money, love for learning, love of power, love of fame, love for the respect of others, etc. Different people place varying degrees of importance on the kinds of love they receive. Love is essentially an abstract concept,[citation needed] easier to experience than to explain. Because of the complex and abstract nature of love, discourse on love is commonly reduced to a thought-terminating cliché, and there are a number of common proverbs regarding love, from Virgil's "Love conquers all" to The Beatles' "All you need is love".

Scientific views
Main article: Love (scientific views)
Throughout history, philosophy and religion have done the most speculation on the phenomenon of love. In the last century, the science of psychology has written a great deal on the subject. In recent years, the sciences of evolutionary psychology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, neuroscience, and biology have added to the understanding of the nature and function of love.


Biology of love
Further information: Interpersonal chemistry
Biological models of sex tend to view love as a mammalian drive,[citation needed] much like hunger or thirst. Helen Fisher, a leading expert in the topic of love, divides the experience of love into three partly-overlapping stages: lust, attraction, and attachment. Lust exposes people to others, romantic attraction encourages people to focus their energy on mating, and attachment involves tolerating the spouse long enough to rear a child into infancy.

Lust is the initial passionate sexual desire that promotes mating, and involves the increased release of chemicals such as testosterone and estrogen. These effects rarely last more than a few weeks or months. Attraction is the more individualized and romantic desire for a specific candidate for mating, which develops out of lust as commitment to an individual mate forms. Recent studies in neuroscience have indicated that as people fall in love, the brain consistently releases a certain set of chemicals, including dopamine, pheromones, norepinephrine, and serotonin, which act similar to amphetamines, stimulating the brain's pleasure center and leading to side-effects such as an increased heart rate, loss of appetite and sleep, and an intense feeling of excitement. Research has indicated that this stage generally lasts from one and a half to three years.[7]

Since the lust and attraction stages are both considered temporary, a third stage is needed to account for long-term relationships. Attachment is the bonding which promotes relationships that last for many years, and even decades. Attachment is generally based on commitments such as marriage and children, or on mutual friendship based on things like shared interests. It has been linked to higher levels of the chemicals oxytocin and vasopressin than short-term relationships have.[7]

In 2005, Italian scientists at Pavia University found that a protein molecule known as the nerve growth factor (NGF) has high levels when people first fall in love, but these levels return to as they were after one year. Specifically, four neurotrophin levels, i.e. NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4, of 58 subjects who had recently fallen in love were compared with levels in a control group who were either single or already engaged in a long-term relationship. The results showed that NGF levels were significantly higher in the subjects in love than as compared to either of the control groups.[8]


Psychology of love
Further information: Human bonding

In modern Western culture, kissing is a common expression of affection in romantic relationships.Psychology depicts love as a cognitive and social phenomenon. Psychologist Robert Sternberg formulated a triangular theory of love and argued that love has three different components: Intimacy, Commitment, and Passion. Intimacy is a form by which two people can share secrets and various details of their personal lives. Intimacy is usually shown in friendships and romantic love affairs. Commitment, on the other hand, is the expectation that the relationship is going to last forever. The last and most common form of love is sexual attraction and passion. Passionate love is shown in infatuation as well as romantic love. This led researchers such as Yela[citation needed] to further refine the model by separating Passion into two independents components: ****** Passion and Romantic Passion.

Following developments in electrical theories, such as Coulomb's law, which showed that positive and negative charges attract, analogs in human life were developed, such as "opposites attract". Over the last century, research on the nature of human mating, such as in evolutionary psychology, agree that pairs unite or attract to each other owing to a combination of opposites attract, e.g. people with dissimilar immune systems tend to attract, and likes attract, such as similarities of personality, character, views, etc.[9] In recent years, various human bonding theories have been developed described in terms of attachments, ties, bonds, and or affinities.

Some Western authorities disaggregate into two main components, the altruistic and the narcissistic. This view is represented in the works of Scott Peck, whose works in the field of applied psychology explored the definitions of love and evil. Peck maintains that love is a combination of the"'concern for the spiritual growth of another", and simple narcissism.[10] In combination, love is an activity, not simply a feeling.


Philosophical views
People, throughout history, have often considered phenomena such as "love at first sight" or "instant friendships" to be the result of an uncontrollable force of attraction or affinity.[11] One of the first to theorize in this direction was the Greek philosopher Empedocles, who in the 4th century BC argued for the existence of two forces, love (philia) and strife (neikos), which were used to account for the causes of motion in the universe. These two forces were said to intermingle with the classical elements, i.e., earth, water, air, and fire, in such a manner that love served as the binding power linking the various parts of existence harmoniously together.

Later, Plato interpreted Empedocles' two agents as attraction and repulsion, stating that their operation is conceived in an alternate sequence.[12] From these arguments, Plato originated the concept of "likes attract", e.g., earth is attracted to earth, water to water, and fire to fire. In modern terms this is often phrased in terms of "birds of a feather flock together".

Bertrand Russell describes love as a condition of "absolute value", as opposed to relative value. Thomas Jay Oord defines love as acting intentionally, in sympathetic response to others (including God), to promote overall well-being. Oord means for his definition to be adequate for religion, philosophy, and the sciences. Robert A. Heinlein, one of the most prolific science fiction writers of the 20th century, defined love in his novel Stranger in a Strange Land as the point of emotional connection which leads to the happiness of another being essential to one's own well being. This definition ignores the ideas of religion and science and instead focuses on the meaning of love as it relates to the individual.

Also, an ancient proverb states that love is a high form of tolerance. This view is one that many philosophers and scholars have researched, and is widely accepted.

Religious views

Love in early religions was a mixture of ecstatic devotion and ritualized obligation to idealized natural forces (pagan polytheism).[citation needed] Later religions shifted emphasis towards single abstractly-oriented objects like God, law, church and state (formalized monotheism). A third view, pantheism, recognizes a state or truth distinct from (and often antagonistic to) the idea that there is a difference between the worshiping subject and the worshiped object. Love is reality, of which we, moving through time, imperfectly interpret ourselves as an isolated part.[citation needed]

The Bible speaks of love as a set of attitudes and actions that are far broader than the concept of love as an emotional attachment. Love is seen as a set of behaviors that humankind is encouraged to act out. One is encouraged not just to love one's partner, or even one's friends but also to love one's enemies. The Bible describes this type of active love in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8:

“ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. ”

Romantic love is also present in the Bible, particularly the Song of Songs. Traditionally, this book has been interpreted allegorically as a picture of God's love for Israel and the Church. When taken naturally, we see a picture of ideal human marriage:[13]

“ Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealously unyielding as the grave. It burns like a blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned. ”

The passage dodi li v'ani lo, i.e. "my beloved is mine and I am my beloved", from Song of Songs 2:16, is an example of a biblical quote commonly engraved on wedding bands.

The Bible states love is a characteristic of God. I John 4:8 states "God is Love". In essence, God is the epitomy of love - in action and relation. It is God that first loved mankind and desired a relationship. (John 3:16-17) Love is the underlying drive in most people.[citation needed] The search for love seems endless within the human race, throughout the ages.[citation needed] The Bible defines God as being the completeness of love. Love, as being defined by Him, is demonstrated in his character and personality. Another way of defining this type of love is "godly love", a love shown through the example of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. However, this "sacrificial" love can also be expressed by humans, although imperfectly. For example, the love of a mother for her child. Many mothers would sacrifice anything for their children. It is this type of love that the Bible teaches us to follow and to share with one another. Love, in the end, is truly a sacrifice, ultimately expressed in the crucifixion of Jesus as described in the New Testament. C.S. Lewis discusses Christian ideas about love in his book The Four Loves

Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, defines Love as one of 7 synonyms for God. This indicates that Deity is more than a being that has benevolent concerns for mankind, but rather that God is Love itself. Love is also synonymous with Principle, Mind, Soul, Spirit, Life, and Truth and indicate the depth and wholeness of Love.[citation needed]

In Aramaic, the language that Jesus spoke, there are six words for Unconditional Love (Kenoota, Khooba, Makikh, Abilii, Rukha and Dadcean Libhoun) which are untranslatable and are all translated as the one word “Love” in the English Bible. They are explained here

The Bhagavad Gita, a Hindu scripture, helps devotees to see that love conquers all. It says, "Sattva—pure, luminous, and free from sorrow—binds us to happiness and wisdom" (Number 6). Sattva, translated as purity, helps one to see that love evolves from selflessness.


Cultural views
Main article: Love (cultural views)

The traditional Chinese character for love (愛) consists of a heart (心, in the middle) inside of "accept", "feel", or "perceive", which shows a graceful emotion.Although there exist numerous cross-cultural unified similarities as to the nature and definition of love, as in there being a thread of commitment, tenderness, and passion common to all human existence, there are differences.

This section stub requires expansion.

How to say "I love you" in 100 languages. English - I love you

Afrikaans - Ek het jou lief

Albanian - Te dua

Arabic - Ana behibak (to male)

Arabic - Ana behibek (to female)

Armenian - Yes kez sirumem

Bambara - M'bi fe

Bengali - Ami tomake bhalobashi (pronounced: Amee toe-ma-kee bhalo-bashee)

Belarusian - Ya tabe kahayu

Bisaya - Nahigugma ako kanimo

Bulgarian - Obicham te

Cambodian - Soro lahn nhee ah

Cantonese Chinese - Ngo oiy ney a

Catalan - T'estimo

Cherokee - Tsi ge yu i

Cheyenne - Ne mohotatse

Chichewa - Ndimakukonda

Corsican - Ti tengu caru (to male)

Creol - Mi aime jou

Croatian - Volim te

Czech - Miluji te

Danish - Jeg Elsker Dig

Dutch - Ik hou van jou

Elvish - Amin mela lle (from The Lord of The Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien)

Esperanto - Mi amas vin

Estonian - Ma armastan sind

Ethiopian - Afgreki'

Faroese - Eg elski teg

Farsi - Doset daram

Filipino - Mahal kita

Finnish - Mina rakastan sinua

French - Je t'aime, Je t'adore

Frisian - Ik h�ld fan dy

Gaelic - Ta gra agam ort

Georgian - Mikvarhar

German - Ich liebe dich

Greek - S'agapo

Gujarati - Hoo thunay prem karoo choo

Hiligaynon - Palangga ko ikaw

Hawaiian - Aloha Au Ia`oe

Hebrew

Hebrew to male: "ani ohev otcha" (said by male) "Ohevet ot'cha" (said by female)

Hebrew to female: "ani ohev otach" (said by male) "ohevet Otach" (said by female) Hiligaynon - Guina higugma ko ikaw

Hindi - Hum Tumhe Pyar Karte hae

Hmong - Kuv hlub koj

Hopi - Nu' umi unangwa'ta

Hungarian - Szeretlek

Icelandic - Eg elska tig

Ilonggo - Palangga ko ikaw

Indonesian - Saya cinta padamu

Inuit - Negligevapse

Irish - Taim i' ngra leat

Italian - Ti amo

Japanese - Aishiteru

or

anata ga daisuki desu

Kannada - Naanu ninna preetisuttene

Kapampangan - Kaluguran daka

Kiswahili - Nakupenda

Konkani - Tu magel moga cho

Korean - Sarang Heyo

or

Nanun tangshinul sarang hamnida

Latin - Te amo

Latvian - Es tevi miilu

Lebanese - Bahibak

Lithuanian - Tave myliu

Luxembourgeois - Ech hun dech g�er

Macedonian - Te Sakam

Malay - Saya cintakan mu / Aku cinta padamu

Malayalam - Njan Ninne Premikunnu

Maltese - Inhobbok

Mandarin Chinese - Wo ai ni

Marathi - Me tula prem karto

Mohawk - Kanbhik

Moroccan - Ana moajaba bik

Nahuatl - Ni mits neki

Navaho - Ayor anosh'ni

Norwegian - Jeg Elsker Deg

Pandacan - Syota na kita!!

Pangasinan - Inaru Taka

Papiamento - Mi ta stimabo

Persian - Doo-set daaram

Pig Latin - Iay ovlay ouyay

Polish - Kocham Ciebie

Portuguese - Eu te amo

Romanian - Te iubesc Awexu

Russian - Ya tebya liubliu

Scot Gaelic - Tha gra\dh agam ort

Serbian - Volim te

Setswana - Ke a go rata

Sign Language - ,\,,/ (represents position of fingers when signing'I Love You')

Sindhi - Maa tokhe pyar kendo ahyan

Sioux - Techihhila

Slovak - Lu`bim ta

Slovenian - Ljubim te

Spanish - Te quiero / Te amo

Swahili - Ninapenda wewe

Swedish - Jag alskar dig

Swiss-German - Ich lieb Di

Surinam - Mi lobi joe

Tagalog - Mahal kita

Taiwanese - Wa ga ei li

Tahitian - Ua Here Vau Ia Oe

Tamil - Nan unnai kathalikaraen

Telugu - Nenu ninnu premistunnanu

Thai - Chan rak khun (to male)

Thai - Phom rak khun (to female)

Thai (informal) Rak te

Turkish - Seni Seviyorum

Ukrainian - Ya tebe kahayu

Urdu - mai aap say pyaar karta hoo

Vietnamese - Anh ye^u em (to female)

Vietnamese - Em ye^u anh (to male)

Welsh - 'Rwy'n dy garu di

Yiddish - Ikh hob dikh

Yoruba - Mo ni fe

2007-07-06 01:45:57 · answer #1 · answered by ANKIT S 4 · 0 0

Neither one. All that live do not love, although who could doubt that in order to love one must first be alive?* If life is merely defined as biological life, and "love" is defined as mere sexual procreation, even that does not permit us to say truthfully that all living things love, for not all living creatures procreate sexually. Amoebas (to permit a little pun) are always divided on the subject of procreation. If we say that we are not "spiritually alive" unless we love, your question stands on a little better ground, but it is begging the question to define a living, breathing being as "dead" just because your philosophical or religious definition of "life" includes "spirituality" and "love" as an essential ingredient of "life". Some popular songs, such as the excellent, poetically very nice song "The Rose", metaphorically style even non-living, non-conscious things as possessing the quality of love. This demonstrates only that one should never confuse a metaphor with a reality. ______________________________________... *For example, "The seed that with the sun's love in the spring becomes the rose" is a beautiful and, metaphorically-speaking, perhaps a very true statement, but the sun's warmth and heat is not love! The rose seed that has the misfortune of being shot on a spaceship to the planet Mercury will be obliterated by the sun's radiation, certainly not a very loving thing for the sun to do. You have to be 93 million miles away from the sun for the sun's nurturing warmth to become a fitting metaphor for love. This footnote, as you must have gathered, is not meant too seriously.

2016-05-19 04:55:38 · answer #2 · answered by ? 3 · 0 0

Ahhh...Love. Such an all emcompassing feeling yet so hard to describe. When I love my partner, I care for her entire being. Physical, mental and emotional. Her well being is of the utmost importance to me. It is so important that if I do not know how to help her with something, I find out. I am her mother, father brother and sister and there so she wants for nothing. Her well being--that is my love for her.

2007-07-05 19:12:35 · answer #3 · answered by Jackson D 3 · 0 0

"An intense feeling of deep affection"- that is what Oxford dictionary has, and that is pretty much what it is. The second you're willing to do anything for someone and not think about its results or defition of the love you should be abiding by, your in love. And once your in it, like I said before, the defition is really not worth going by!

2007-07-06 04:44:38 · answer #4 · answered by Kriti 2 · 0 0

A kiss on a rainy day A smile that wont go away. A safe way to run. A complicated simple truth. The bond between you and your lover. A safe place to run. -Raven Symone

2007-07-05 19:22:07 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

Love in simple terms is the one trait that most of us lack "the concern over others well being". Love among family members is always mistaken as true love.

2007-07-05 23:00:39 · answer #6 · answered by Raj 2 · 0 0

Love is a very powerful emotion.
One could live or die becoz of love.
In a less extreme form, love means you care about that someone.
That the someone matters.
In short I would put it this way:
"When you love a person, their welfare matters more than your own."

2007-07-06 05:06:27 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

Love is the condition of belonging to something or someone or some pet, or car, or drug;where as, to be taken from it, or it be taken from you then you will have sustained a loss.

2007-07-05 19:11:39 · answer #8 · answered by jemrx2 4 · 0 0

Love is caring enough about another human being that you would do without to make them happy, love is sacrafice, love is work, love is something that many people confuse with lust. Have a child then you will understand love. : )

2007-07-05 19:11:22 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

There's five types of love. Which one are you referring to?

2007-07-05 19:44:28 · answer #10 · answered by JESSICA G 4 · 0 0

i dont think nebody knows what love is .but i think love is a feeling that you get when u really like somebody a passion sort of speak

2007-07-05 19:07:09 · answer #11 · answered by Pσяschεα♥ 2 · 0 0

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