Love; is it Compared with anything?
One of the most fundamental questions in
philosophy – and psychology – is the question: “Compared to what?” When I say
that a proposition is “true,” then I mean that it is true compared to something
else – falsehood, or inconsistency with internal logic or empirical validation.
Similarly, when we look at the question
of love, clearly love is an expression of a preference. Naturally, we must then
ask, “A preference – compared to what?”
If I say that I love honesty, then
clearly I love it compared to dishonesty.
If I say that I love virtue, then clearly
I love virtue compared to vice or corruption.
Now, since we can only determine the
traits of another human being through empirical observation, our experience of
“love” must involve the actions of another (said actions can include words, of
course). Just as our conception of “tall” is derived from the objective (i.e.
measurable) characteristics of a man – and “tall” is valid relative to the
average height of a human male – just so is our experience of “love” derived
from the objective characteristics (words and actions) of another human being.
Thus “love” must be valid relative to an
objective and external standard, which we shall work to define shortly.
No comments: