The Definition of Love

Last changed: 26 January 2007 (changelog)

Feedback can be mailed to saraid /at\ aqualgidus \dot/ org. I'd love to hear it.

Introduction

A brief, obligatory history is in order. My quest to create a definition of love began in roughly tenth grade, when I challenged myself with the question of, “Is what I feel for this girl love?” My conviction in the reducibility of things even as abstract as the concept of love motivated me to pursue and design a definition of love by which I could answer the original question.

There were two criteria for success. The first was that I had to believe it. Definitions, by their very nature, are whimsical. They cannot be proven or justified. A word, by itself, means nothing. The second criterion was that it had to be generally acceptable. Inside this criterion, I add the proviso that the definition might be poorly or at least insufficiently well worded: thus, acceptance is permissible even if I must explain it again.

That is the purpose of this document.

Assertions

The following assertions are ultimately indefensible; there is no “because” to them, though there may be musings on their necessity.

Assertion 1. There is only one kind of love. Love is love; it is the same love for a parent or sibling as for a spouse or friend. Thus, there is only one definition.

Assertion 2. Love is a function of sapience. Rudimentary sapience permits rudimentary love; advanced sapience permits advanced love. I will not define sapience here, and probably never will; the purpose of this assertion is to note that belief in a creature's sapience should be considered belief in its capacity to love.

Assertion 3. Love may be applied toward any intellectual construct. It is possible to love a cause or a nation, a people or an idea, a person or an object, an event or an emotion.

Assertion 4. Love cannot be detected, but will produce discernible results. Unfortunately, said results are interpretable.

Assertion 5. Love does not exist in a vacuum, and influence from cultural and circumstantial forces will cause its manifestation to differ in any scenario.

Assertion 6. Love is a process, not an action nor a condition. A process is demonstrated by the illustration of a person walking from point A to point B, and a meaningful duration transpires between initiation and completion.

Definition

Love, verb transitive: to become more equal with something due to understanding.

Love, noun: 1. the process of equalization through understanding; 2. the condition of feeling something to be extraordinarily intimate to oneself, as an end state to love as a process.

As is seen, the primary definition is that of a transitive verb; its definitions as a noun serve to explain its usage in a more popular context, wherein love is considered an emotion or an action. Note that it specifically excludes equalization through a vehicle other than understanding, and also excludes understanding without achieving equalization.

Compassion

Introduction

The idea of compassion was first brought up in my very first definition of love. I defined it as “universal compassion”, with little thought as to the actual meaning of that phrase. It remains, sadly, a nonsensical pairing. For years after this first idea, the word dropped out of my vocabulary, until one day, watching the trees zip by on the highway, I realized its usefulness.

The term, ownership, is an economic term that implies a motivation. It is a motivation to care for some possession and keep it safe. The concept of ownership is where the modern idea of love was sprung: wives were considered the possession of a husband, and it was his duty to care for her. I disagreed with the notion of ownership as a right of possession, yet agreed with it as a instrument of motivation; yet I lacked a meaningful alternative.

Thus, the term compassion.

Selfishness

The era of today is on disagreeable terms with selfishness; the term has been made nasty and its usage is frequently derogatory. I believe the term can be rehabilitated, and placed inside the context of compassion—an unlikely parent—to serve as an understanding of what love is.

To begin, I will assert that selfishness is not inherently wrong. To be selfish does not mean to withhold from others your possessions; it means to serve yourself first, and in many cases, only. It is thus that we wander down the avenue of what the word “yourself” means, and more importantly, can mean.

Identity

Who are you? The question of identity is one that has been puzzled over by philosophers for millennia without conclusive answer. What is the essential characteristic of a human being? What can you slice off, without changing the person? Paradoxically, the best answer is likely “Nothing, and everything.”

The essence of Self is perception by the self. Belief in uniqueness, identity, and difference is the reason we are unique, have an identity, and are different from others and other things. You can see, inherent in this claim, the echoes of assertion #2: the precondition of sapience. Self-awareness is the first step to the conception of identity, and thus to selfishness and love.

Inclusion

The next step that must be taken is that human beings frequently consider themselves as parts to a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Exemplified in the term “synergy,” the idea of being included in more than your own self is attractive. It is upon this foundation that the notions of marriage, family, community, cause, movement, nation, belief, and faith are built. It is why people introduce themselves as employees or in relation to family members, or members of some prestigious organization; it is a part of their identity: how they want to be seen. A mental exercise: if you met yourself, how would you introduce yourself?

Equality

The term “identity” permits a second entry point in our discussion through the adjective “identical”: that of equality. The traditional understanding of equality is as a relational operator. It is taken from the notion of the number line, with three ways of relating a pair of numbers: greater than, less than, or equal to. But there is a second definition of equality that I would put forward: that of assignment. In computer programming, the equal sign generally denotes the assignment of a value to a variable. Let us consider our variable to be the term “yourself”. To be compassionate, in my terms, means to create the statement:

Yourself = You + Another.

Degrees

Compassion is a condition, measured in degrees or percentages. You can be more or less compassionate at different times, but it is not an activity to participate in, but a goal to reach towards.

Compassion fits into the overall picture of love as an endstate; it may come from a multitude of sources, such as valor, mercy, upbringing, faith. Love may thus, for example, find its roots in shared interests or saviors, for the initial contact may bring compassion into view; love itself, however, demands the progression of understanding to be what it is.

Also of importance is that compassion may be increased or decreased, and that both relative positions may be goals; the definition of love specifies that only an increased degree as endstate.

Summary

Successful compassion refers to the answer to this question: that you would identify yourself as more than only yourself. Complete compassion means that “I” in truth refers to “we”, and vice versa. Neither pronoun is truly appropriate, due to the grammatical property of number. Hidden within this concept is the reason why selfishness remains the primary motivator: when your identity includes more than yourself, there is no difference in working towards your own ends and another's.

Note that this is not a matter of “Okay, now that everyone knows what it is, go and start doing it.” With the exception of backwood hermits and closeted children, every human being has a non-trivial degree of compassion already achieved; my explanations have been more reductionist and descriptive than prescriptive. Because of the incapacity of the human mind to achieve it, total compassion is generally impossible, though in some extreme cases (twins, “true love”, fanatical devotion) it is conceivably reachable.

Comprehension

Introduction

The definition states “becom[ing] equal due to understanding,” implicitly begging the question of what I mean by understanding. Comprehension was, for far too long, the missing piece of the puzzle. Until the advent of this revelation, the definition of love could not hold itself up to the first criterion; with this, all the pieces fell into place.

The key lies in assertion #2. It is the hallmark of sapience to possess the ability to know: to sense, perceive, consider, and finally, to comprehend.

Process

Comprehension is both a process and a condition. As a condition, it is best understood in its adjective form, “comprehensive.” As a process, it should be seen as the activity of moving from the condition of total ignorance to the condition of total understanding. In its own right, comprehension is a worthy goal; however, in many cases, its achievement is not possible for human beings.

In particular, it cannot be reached in the case of complex systems, most notably those we know as human beings, ourselves included, because our sapient capacity is simply insufficient.

Nature of Knowledge

Typically, we think of knowledge as the stuff of books, written wisdom passed down. But there's more to it than that. When I speak of knowledge, I do not speak merely of textbook knowledge, though this knowledge is also valid; but all that which your brain can receive, internalize, process, memorize, recall. The touch of their skin, the smell of their hair; the look on their face as they screamed down the snowboard run for the first time; the curve of their body while you're watching TV together: this, too, is knowledge.

Thus, the passionate historian who pores over archaelogical evidence of a bygone civilization may love as strongly as a religious fanatic caught up in worshipful fervor or a young lover envisioning no future without their betrothed.

Progression of Knowledge

There are three lesser stages of knowledge, and five greater ones. While I have arbitrarily named each of these, the connotations of the terms are in fact irrelevant to the discussion. The difference in the two sets of stages is that the lesser three are only noticeable when the pursuit of knowledge begins wholly with yourself.

The first is Beginnings, or Spark. There are two forms of this: sensory (through the five senses) and conceptual (through the imagination). This stage plants the seed within your mind. The second stage is Recognition, where you “know it when you see it.” The third stage is Familiarity, where you are capable of describing it, if inaccurately. Many people who have trouble describing their dream job, partner, car, whatever, have not reached this stage; show it to them, however, and they will instantly recognize it.

The fourth stage is Awareness, knowledge of its existence, or lack thereof. This stage is important because it is the first where you have the capability of acting upon the knowledge acquired. The fifth is Curiosity, taking on the dual role of recognizing one's own ignorance on the subject and the desire to rectify that ignorance. Curiosity represents the last point of facile discovery: beyond curiosity, understanding becomes more difficult to garner.

The sixth stage is Sophistication, sufficient knowledge to convince oneself of complete knowledge. In relationships, this is often the point of collapse. In academic fields, this is the point where jargon is used for a purpose other than further pursuit. In management systems—business or governmental, this is the point of corruption, stemming from arrogance. In parenting, this is often the root of arguments with teenagers.

The seventh stage, Knowledge, is the moment of transcendence, to use a mystical term. Until this point, one would be considered a student, even sophisticated and advanced. At this point, it is permissible to be regarded as an expert on the subject. Understanding is incomplete, but ignorance is known and acknowledged. Only through this stage is the eighth stage, Comprehension, possible.

Mapping the Progression

The most common understanding of the term “love” today refers to one human being loving another. Using this understanding, I will now implement the higher level concept onto the practical domain of this relationship called Romance.

Spark: This takes the form of a “dream man” or “perfect woman”. This is typically an amalgamation of various attractive persons (not necessarily only their appearance) of the appropriate sex idealized by one's imagination.

Recognition:Simply put, this is “love at first sight”. It is, of course, identical to Awareness.

Familiarity: This stage manifests in social conversation. In male dominant groups, it comes in the form of comparison and evaluation; in female dominant groups, in public fantasizing and culminations of description.

Awareness: See Recognition. Also noted as seeing a friend in a new light.

Curiosity: Not the first date, but usually the first conversation. Depending on circumstance, it may involve information gathering, using indirect tactics such as gossip, stalking, or subterfuge. This stage persists across prolonged social contact (clearly, if the interest cools, the process stops, so we assume it does not) into companionship, shared participation in mutual interests, and sexual exploration. Rituals, such as dates, engagement, meeting the parents, and marriage, are not in and of themselves relevant to the progression of knowledge, though they can be.

Sophistication: Typically a seed of mistrust, this is most obvious as a couple's first argument or separation. It is imagined knowledge proven false, for instance, one partner may have children from a previous relationship, or one partner's ethical standards may be realized as unacceptable. This is also signaled by the statement, “I thought I knew you.”

Knowledge: The extent to which you know one another has heightened to the point at which is colloquially described in the following ways: finishing each other's sentences, knowing what is meant without explanation, reading each other's minds, etc.

Note that the stages of Curiosity, Sophistication, and Knowledge overlap and are not sequential. This is most easily explained as a result of the complexity of human beings; there is always something new (curiosity), you can always be mistaken (sophistication), but you know this other person better than even her parents (knowledge). In a subject such as classical physics, the progression is linear, since the body of knowledge is linear and knowable. (Indeed, when the subject matter narrowed, the three stages almost come as if parading forth, one after the other.)

Comprehension: Impossible, as human beings, as noted before.

Simplification

While complex systems cannot be accurately reduced, other things can be simplified. It is necessary to point out, here, that comprehension does not refer to the scope of knowledge, only the quantity. You may be able to recite an actor's lines in every movie he has ever played in (comprehensive knowledge), yet never know the actual person (incomprehensible). In the era of today, the comprehension, and indeed the love, of non-complex systems is often seen as shallow. This is a judgment made outside the context of what these two terms actually refer to in my book, and is thus irrelevant.

Extensions

Introduction

The intent of this essay has been to explicate and enunciate a term that I feel has been widely overused and is well on its way towards meaninglessness. In the process of writing this, I have wished to save it from modern idea of mere romance and present it as a viable founding idea for my own philosophy. The result has been a good deal of description, and an effort to withhold advice or judgment. The remainder of this document touches on a bit of the valuations I have squelched, and extends some previous ideas from past versions into updates in the now current edition.

“Love Thyself”

This command is well-known in the era of today as an instrument of self-help, often coupled with the statement that you cannot love another without loving yourself. (A false statement, by the way, but good advice nonetheless.) From it, we can come to a greater understanding of what love is. On first glance, it seems the idea of Compassion does not have anything to offer; your self is your self, is it not? Naturally, the answer is not simple.

There are two sides to identity: the first is self-perception, but the second is equality. When one considers a part of herself to be less than another part, there is a disintegration internal to one's self-perception, a self-rejection. The command is colloquially taken to refer to self-acceptance, and in this way, we see that it is a good command.

Yet love requires a specific process by which you achieve compassion for yourself: comprehension. Thus it is that inside the command to love yourself, we see two: Accept thyself, and Know thyself. Of course, in the words of Augustine, “The mind is not large enough to contain itself.” But we can try.

Creation

One of the most awe-inspiring, yet infuriatingly frustrating, aspects of the human being is his complexity. Consider, for instance, two lovers. As one comes to a greater understanding of her partner, she changes, hopefully for the better. At this moment, her partner's comprehension of her has fluttered away like a butterfly, and if he remains curious (well, actually, the progression quickly brings him back up to speed to curiosity), he will learn of her anew and himself change as a result. This back-and-forth is an eternally renewable resource, until the strength of their minds deteriorates with age and death takes them, stagnation finally providing the possibly of completion.