From: Matt the Enraged Endorphin (mpkundert@students.wisc.edu)
Date: Fri Jan 24 2003 - 00:10:22 GMT
Willy,
I think, in general, love as a concept is too personal to develop any sort
of philosophy around, at least any philosophical explanation of it. I
think your first thesis ("love equals quality") is probably the closest
thing to something Pirsig says. I'm thinking of Pirsig's discussion of
"care," (from ZMM) particularly as he describes it as the opposite side of
the coin from Quality: two sides of the same thing.
Other reflections: I love your second thesis. I think "love is
imagination" is a wonderful metaphor that would take a long time to mine
the depths of. I doubt its too SOM, but more to the point, I'm sure the
metaphor could be redescribed into value-terms, making the metaphor
commensurate with describing everything as values.
On your third thesis ("love is like a person's free will; you believe in it
but it doesn't actually exist"), most followers of Pirsig will throw
Pirsig's conception of free will (if you follow Dynamic Quality, then you
are following free will) at you as a rebuttal. For my part, I wouldn't,
but that's because I don't think the debate on whether free will exists or
not is one we should take part in. Of course, this has nothing to do with
the substance of your third thesis. On that, I don't think most people
here would interpret love as purely biological. In fact, to offer a
tentative interpretation, I would distinguish between Platonic love and
sexual love. Sex would be biological and the Platonic side might be
social, but both would have to be there in some respects for a monogamous
relationship to fall under what we might term "normal" or "ideal."
Matt
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