With the previous about feelings, satisfactions, and ethics as prologue, I will try to show that it is plausible to mean by "A loves B" that:
(1) A has strong feelings of attraction in general, or to some reasonable extent, for B,
(2) A, in general or to some reasonable extent, enjoys B (that is, A in general or to some reasonable extent is satisfied by B and by the things B does), particularly in areas of psychological importance (or meaningfulness) to A, and without particular disappointment or dissatisfaction in other such psychologically important (meaningful) areas, and
(3) B is good for (or to) A; that is, the things B does are good for A.
[This last condition will be stated more correctly after the section on ethics, but for now, this is a sufficient statement of the ethical content of a love relationship.]
To say then that A and B love each other is to say that 1, 2, and 3 are reciprocal -- that A and B both have strong feelings of attraction for each other in general, that in general they satisfy (or enjoy) each other, and that they are good for each other.
Some remarks about the analysis:Notice that the criteria are stated in terms of what actually is the case, not in terms of what A or B, or anyone else, believes to be the case. Insofar as one believes A and B are attracted to each other, satisfy each other, and are good for each other, one will believe A and B love each other; but if one is wrong in any of those beliefs, one is then also wrong about their loving each other. This is true even if the believer is A or B themself. Certainly people can be mistaken about whether the above conditions actually are met and whether they are in love; and many times people have said things like: "I thought I loved him, but I know now I was just infatuated." One easy way someone might mistakenly believe they are in love is to incorrectly think the other person is good for them just because they enjoy that person's company and are deeply attracted to them. Hence, in the kind of case mentioned earlier where a parent and child disagree about whether the child really is in love with someone or not, a parent might point out specifically why he or she thinks the other person is not good for the child. Or the child may be unknowingly neglecting things important to its well-being because of the relationship. The parent would have to point out what this is specifically and hope the child will understand it and believe it in order to see the point. This, of course, is not always easily accomplished; but it at least gives better focus to the disagreement than just continually simply disagreeing about whether it is "really love" or not. In such a case, there is not a disagreement about what love is; there is a disagreement about whether it exists -- whether the conditions that constitute it all apply. The child believes the conditions (1-3 above) for love are met; the parent believes not all of them are. The discussion should be focused on the particular condition that is the center of disagreement. Just (incorrectly) believing the conditions are met does not make them so, and does not mean you are in love; it only means you (incorrectly) think you are.
The analysis puts love on a continuous scale or on many different continuous scales -- one scale for the amount of each kind of attraction-aversion, satisfaction-dissatisfaction, and benefit-harm, with "sums" or overall balancing points or impressions in each of these areas; and I think love is that way. We do think in terms of loving one person more than another, of love growing, of love becoming stronger or weaker or fading or dying out. By my analysis or criteria, "A loves B more than A loves C" any time that:
(1) A has stronger feelings for B than for C (and/or, more strong feelings),
(2) any time that A is satisfied more by B than by C (and more in areas of psychological importance to A), and/or
(3) B is better for (to) A than C is; the things B does are better for A than the things C does,
[as long, of course, as there is not some equal or greater loss in one or both of the other two areas].
Likewise, A's love for B can grow or diminish in time as there is growth or diminution in the feelings of attraction, satisfaction, and goodness of the relationship.
When one aspect of the relationship increases and another decreases, it is then perhaps difficult to say whether the love has grown or not. For example, A might have stronger feelings of attraction toward B than before, but might find fewer satisfactions in the relationship or might find fewer things good for himself or herself than before. Just in the area of satisfaction alone, A might become more deeply satisfied in some areas over time, but have fewer different areas of satisfaction than before. By my criteria or definition then it might be difficult to say whether the love is stronger or weaker; but this is all right since it reflects the difficulty one has in ordinary usage of the term love as well anyway in such cases. Yet even then my criteria or analysis has the benefit of allowing specific ideas and communication about how the relationship has changed (or how different relationships differ). And it also allows for greater specific description in comparing relationships (to others, or to themselves through time) as to which is more loving when one person loves the other more but the other loves the first less.
In such cases nothing is lost by my use of the word love but much is gained by conceiving and communicating about relationships in these primary aspects of feelings, joys, and benefits, since one can say precisely how a relationship has changed or how two relationships differ (for example, more or stronger attraction of a certain specified sort, but less joy of a certain specified sort) and thereby use that to point out why it is difficult or impossible to say whether love has grown or diminished or in which relationship it is greater. In many cases of marriage, for example, certain kinds of sexual attraction may diminish over time for one partner while emotional attraction or a different kind of sexual attraction may increase.
In the analysis I use the word strong and the phrases "in general" and "to some reasonable extent". It is difficult, if not impossible, to say how much attraction, satisfaction, and/or good there must be. Certainly there has to be more than just a slight attraction, slight satisfaction, and slight goodness (and the more, the better) for saying there is love. There are other concepts in ordinary language that are like love in this regard of becoming less well defined in borderline cases -- how much money is required to be rich, how little hair does one need to be bald, how little dirt does laundry need in order to be clean. It is easy to distinguish the very rich from the very poor, the very hairy from the very bald, the very loving from the very hateful. In many areas of classification, borderline cases may be difficult to distinguish or classify, but not all cases are borderline, and so distinction and classification are often possible and useful. But more useful than classification in cases, such as the amount of love in a relationship, is being able to specify in what ways love exists or what more is needed or is important to improve the relationship or make it more loving, perhaps particularly if some purpose like marriage, living together, sex, child-bearing, or divorce is under consideration.
Love changing: There are a number of ways to satisfy a person more -- (1) doing more things that are satisfying, (2) doing the same (number of) things but in a more satisfying way, or (3) satisfying them in more areas of psychological significance or importance (meaningfulness) to them, (4) satisfying them more deeply in such areas, or (5) any combination of the above, without some equal or greater decrease in one or more of them. (Similar, but opposite, with regard to less satisfaction.) My analysis does not make any distinctions for comparing amount of change or amount of difference in love when comparing couples, or one couple at different times, when the depth of satisfactions is different from the number of satisfactions; but I do not think this is any different from our inability to make intuitive comparisons in such cases ordinarily. If there are two couples, one of which enjoys doing more kinds of things together, but the other of which, though doing fewer things, enjoys them more, we do not often find it necessary or even possible to describe one as therefore being more loving than the other. Or the same if one couple through time changes in a way that has them doing fewer satisfactory things together but has them enjoying more the things they do together.
Likewise with regard to improving or impairing (the goodness of) a relationship or in comparing the goodness of two relationships. It is difficult or impossible to say whether one relationship at different times is better or worse, or whether one relationship is better or worse than another, when the difference is between doing more good things that are each less valuable or fewer good things that are each better. At least this analysis lets you describe the differences quite specifically, even if you cannot use the simplistic general label "better" or "worse".
With regard to the change of feelings, one may develop deeper (or less intense) feelings of one sort toward another, or one may develop more (or fewer) kinds of feelings of attraction (such as intellectual, emotional, magically romantic, sexual, brotherly, maternal, paternal,...). Or some sorts of attraction may grow in intensity while others diminish. As in the cases of joys and other benefits, when changes occur in opposite directions at the same time, for example, more emotional attraction but less enchantingly romantic attraction, it is not particularly easy or possible to compare, simply in terms of the word love alone, whether love has grown or diminished. Similarly, it is difficult or impossible to compare which is more loving of two different relationships where the only difference is that one contains deeper feelings than another which contains more different kinds of feelings of attraction.
Still it is in this area of love's changing -- or in comparing how a relationship is with how it could be better or with how it should be -- that the analysis is the most fruitful, I believe. It is not so important that we are able to identify a relationship as one of love or not as it to be able to tell how to improve a relationship or how to make it more loving. It is important that we are able to perceive in what areas (goodness, joy, attraction) our relationships are strong and in what areas they are flawed or weak. And it is important that we are able to understand in each of these areas what specific kinds and quantities of attractions, joys, and benefits exist, especially ones that are important, and which ones are missing, especially ones that are important.
In writing before of being attracted "in general", of being satisfying "in general" or "to some reasonable extent", and of being good to one another, it was certainly difficult or impossible to specify how frequent or intense attraction and satisfaction should be or how much dissatisfaction or bad can be in a relationship for us to (still) call it love. I think there are extremes we would clearly want to call loving or unloving relationships. Some of the middle regions we might hesitate to characterize. The idea then of the continuous scales for each kind or area of satisfaction-dissatisfaction, attraction- aversion, benefit-harm is more important here. For it is usually not too difficult to point out how a relationship could be more loving -- could be better for the partners and/or more satisfying and/or more full of feelings of attractions. It is easier to specify what there is and what there could be and what there should be in terms of the kinds, quantity, and balance of satisfaction, attraction, and goodness than it is to specify whether there is sufficient satisfaction, goodness, and attraction to call it love. Labeling a relationship as being a loving one or not is not as accurate or as meaningful in many cases as pointing out what kinds, frequency, and depth of attractions, satisfactions, and goodness it has and what kinds it lacks, and how important this is. Simply to label a relationship as one of love or not is not to be as clear as one could be about it, nor really to provide much specific information about it at all. It is less likely to point out problem areas or areas of potential improvement; and it is not likely to help people be able to make a relationship become more loving when they want it to be. It is generally better simply to state where on the different ladders or continuous scales of satisfaction, attraction, and goodness the relationship is, where it is going, and where it should be or where you would like it to be. This framework for viewing relationships and thinking about love will allow problem areas or areas of disagreement to be more easily spotted, communicated, discussed, and, where necessary, debated.
No longer need there be unproductive, idle disputes over whether she loves him or not; loves him enough or not; or whether their love is strong enough to get them through some difficult time or other. One will not have simply to introspect about how one feels to answer such questions. There will be more valid, more easily answered, more fruitful questions to ask; for example, how strong are the feelings of attraction; in what areas; in what areas (sexual, intellectual, physical, etc.) are they lacking; what kinds of pleasure or joys does each lover get; how strong are they; how important are they to them; which kinds are lacking or weak; how reciprocal is the relationship in these terms; what areas of joy are likely to dwindle or increase with time and probable circumstances; how is each person good for the other, or bad; how is that likely to change in time or different likely circumstances. These are the more important kinds of questions and yet are also more easily answered than "Do I love him/her?" especially for determining such things as marriage, child bearing, continued dating, steady dating, living together, having sex, etc.
The question of whether to marry or not can be asked, not just in terms of "Do we love each other enough?" but in the more realistic and fruitful questions of, are we good enough to each other, do we make each other happy enough, and would we under the conditions of living together or having children or spending all the time together married people often do. What would we need to improve along those lines? Could we improve that? Are we attracted enough, satisfying enough, and good enough to each other on a day-to-mundane-day basis to make marrying worthwhile? How important is it to get married versus continuing unmarried, or continuing to wait to find someone with whom one might have a better or more loving relationship? What are the odds of finding such a better relationship at this time in one's life? Are the odds worth the wait? Would a possibly temporary and/or childless marriage be beneficial at this time given our goals, wants, and the quality of the relationship? What are the legal differences concerning things like estate inheritance, etc. between being married and living together? The emotional differences? Etc., etc., etc.
I have two friends, now married who, lived together for four or five years before that. At first they were both afraid of marriage for different reasons. Later, she wanted to be married, but only if he wanted to. He sort of did; but inertia seemed to keep him putting it off. They both made fairly good salaries and had a number of joint assets, yet those assets were not in joint names, and neither had a will or agreement listing who owned what or in what proportions. Luckily nothing happened to either of them before they married; but it seemed to me that their situation is one that marriage simply made better -- not in terms of joy or emotions, but in terms of doing things that were right for each other in purely legal terms. They probably could have effected this sort of change through contracts, wills, and accurate record and receipt keeping, but marriage was an easier way and there was no particular reason in this case other than inertia and the unwarranted fear that the relationship would somehow change in other ways if it were legalized. I suspect that there are not even hospital family visiting privileges or decision-making rights for long time lovers not married. In their particular case, because they had, after the first few years of living together at least, every intention of living just like married people for as far in the future as they could see, it seemed better and simply easier from a legal and societal viewpoint for them to marry. Here was a case where just talking about "love" would not have been particularly helpful in deciding what they should do; they knew how they felt about each other and how much they enjoyed each other; what they needed to consider was how fair they were being toward each other, particularly in case of accident, illness, or death.
Universality of this analysisThis analysis is meant to apply to all relationships and all loving relationships, not just ones that are romantic (in the general sense). Certainly there are appropriate and right or wrong ways for parents to treat children, children to treat parents or brothers and sisters, for people to treat friends or even strangers, employers, employees, customers, sales people, doctors, patients, clients, etc.
Ethics concerns some of this; emotions do also, for how we feel about people often determines some of the appropriate behavior toward them and some of the kinds of joys we can derive. It is a legal and/or biological link that makes someone, say, our child, but it is a kind of feeling we have about a person that makes us feel about them in some maternal or paternal way, or not, whether they are our child or not. Being a spouse is a legal designation that may or may not coincide with being in love. Marriage and love can each be a contributing factor toward determining what is proper behavior. One has obligations toward even a spouse one may not love; and loving someone in some cases justifies treating them in a special way that would otherwise be unfair to others. Even incest prohibition involves both an ethical or societal and legal component as well as an emotional component; and it seems to me that the legal or cultural prohibitions against incest (which are different in different cultures to some extent) do not prevent it as significantly as the fact that it is normally very difficult to be sexually attracted to someone whose diaper you used to change and whose nose you had to keep wiping, or to someone who made you eat peas, come in when you wanted to stay out, go to bed when you wanted to stay up and get up when you wanted to sleep in, or with a sibling who provided, as you grew up together, numerous disagreements and disappointments. That so many of the stories in literature which deal with romantic or marital incest, such as Oedipus, concern partners who do not know their biological relationship because of early separation, is probably not accidental.
At any rate, all relationships can be analyzed in terms of feelings, joys, and ethics, so though I will be dealing in many cases with romantic relationships, what I have to say will often not be limited to them. There are right and wrong ways to treat people whatever your (lack of) relationship to them (and some of these ways are common to all relationships) and certainly there are joys and satisfactions or dissatisfactions and grievances or grief that people can give each other no matter what their legal, biological, or social relationships are. Most of the kinds of things I will have to say will be generalizable or transferrable though many of the particulars will concern relationships where the feeling of attraction is primarily romantic (in general) in nature.
And by romantic in general, I do not necessarily mean to imply nor to deny the existence of feelings that are passionate, magical, or stirring, but simply to distinguish the kind of love people have that is not parental, brotherly, etc. Romantic love in this (general) sense may involve attractions that are emotional and/or sexual and/or intellectual. They may be of great excitement and passion or they may not be. It is meant to embrace passionate lovers as well as those people whose love for each other is of a more sedate or quiet nature. All are the kinds of relationships with which so many magazine articles, romantic movies, plays, stories, and advice columns are concerned.
W. Newton-Smith, in an article called "A Conceptual Investigation of Love" in Alan Montefiore's Philosophy and Personal Relations, talks of paradigm cases such as Romeo and Juliet, Abelard and Heloise, and Caesar and Cleopatra to describe the kinds of love relationships he is talking about. I am not that sure I know how these people felt or acted toward each other but I think Newton-Smith gets the point across that he means to talk about the kind of relationships that I call "romantic" in the general sense. However, he goes on to make what I think is an error in trying further to describe this kind of love in order to make clear he is not speaking of cases of parental or other sorts of non-romantic love. I think his paradigm cases perhaps mislead him to this error, but it is an error many people make without that excuse. He writes "... so attention will be confined to cases of love which involve sexuality ... sexual feelings, desires, acts and so on. Thus the stipulation excludes from ... consideration cases of fraternal love, paternal love and other cases not involving sexuality." He later says that sexuality can serve as a criterial mark for distinguishing the sorts of paradigm cases he mentioned earlier.
Even with his later refinements of this criteria, I think he has made an error, has eliminated too many of the kinds of relationships he has wanted to discuss, and has injected sex into the analysis of relationships far too early and made it far more important than it needs to be or is. Certainly I do not mean by romance all those or just those attractions which are sexual in nature. Some romantic feelings may include some sort of sexual desire, but not all do; and even of those that do, the desire may not be for intercourse but perhaps simply kissing, hugging, or holding hands.
For example, most "young love" or first love may involve wanting to be around the other person or to be with them, but may not involve necessarily wanting to be in physical embrace, and certainly does not always involve wanting to have intercourse or genital stimulation. Such a thought may even be frightening or seem stupid or repulsive to many young people. And it was not long ago (if we are even past it yet) that many people thought that people they did not love were more properly the object of sexual advances than those they did, which if even a wrong, perverse, or perverted value, nevertheless helps show there is a difference between romantic attraction and sexual attraction.
Further, certainly one can have a sexual attraction for a person one cares little about romantically or in any other way. And the attraction can be a real one or just a fantasy one. By a fantasy one I mean one that one knows is obviously better just to think about than actually to want to fulfill -- one that is more fun to think about thinking about than to think about actually enacting. Sexual attractions or fantasies could be about almost anyone -- a movie star, a teacher, a person seen walking down the street. They do not have to be about someone you know personally or someone with whom you would like to become romantically involved. Sexual attraction and/or lust are not always indications of love.
And, conversely, there are numerous relationships that seem to me fully romantic loving ones where two people perhaps like to cuddle closely without any need or desire to have (further) sexual stimulation. In some cases that might even spoil things, or may just be a temporary desire that, once fulfilled, allows them to get back to the primary fulfillment of just holding each other and perhaps talking and cuddling. Cuddling in this case seems emotional in some way without seeming to be properly described or thought of as sexual. The desire is not even sexual. Some older people with lowered sexual drive, some young people with low sexual drive to begin with, some perhaps handicapped or impotent or even frigid people may certainly love others romantically and/or even want some close cuddling without in any way having sex as a primary desire or sexual play as a primary goal or pleasure.
Again, intellectual stimulation and attraction or artistic stimulation and attraction might be the primary attraction between two people without sex being that important or even necessary. Yet such people might have full, romantic, loving relationships.
Finally, even in a loving relationship where sex is an important attraction, goal, or feeling, still there might be quite loving, romantic, tender, wonderful feelings and attractions other than sexual desires, or after the fullest of sexual experiences so that these feelings are themselves not feelings of sexual desire. After one has fulfilled all the physical or sexual urges one can possibly tolerate (assuming for most people there is some satiating limit, at least at a particular time), if one still wants to be close to the loved one and one still wants to touch, cuddle, talk, go to a movie, have dinner, go for a walk on the beach with, or write a poem to, the loved one, than the primary or paradigmatic feeling then is not one of sexual attraction.
I will say more about sex later. At this point I only want it understood again that by romance or romantic feelings or romantic attraction, I am in no way necessarily implying or necessarily meaning sexual attractions, feelings, or desires. I am not ruling them out, of course; but I certainly do not think they are (always) a precondition for, or "criterial mark" of, love or romance, or even of infatuation.Ethical Principles and Spontaneity
Since many people mistakenly equate having principles with the inability to act spontaneously, I would like to share one way in which spontaneity and principles can coincide. In many cases I see ethics as, in a sense, establishing boundaries of behavior, and it is within those boundaries that one is then free to be spontaneous. It is like childproofing a room or a fenced in yard so that a child may be put into that room or yard to play freely without hurting himself. You have taken out of those places any things that may harm the child, so he may freely do as he wants within those places. It is also like when, knowing that you deserve a peaceful and joyful vacation, you set aside certain "time boundaries" in which you are allowed to have a good time without having to be constantly on guard or in reflection about your otherwise normal occupational obligations.
A couple of examples with regard to ethics:There are limitations on how much force (and how it is applied) one is allowed in disciplining one's children. Excesses to this are unwarranted abuse. Yet within those limits one may be free to spank a child if and when the child's behavior and or attitude warrant it.
A couple may make a correct decision that sexual intercourse is justified for them. This does not mean that upon rationally making that decision they must therefore immediately become sexually active; they may not be in the mood. What the decision means is that (barring any future reason not to have intercourse) they may do so without qualms or hesitation when passion arises. Whereas if a couple correctly believes that it is wrong for them to have intercourse, but not wrong for them to kiss, pet, etc., then they are free to do spontaneously what is right for them within those boundaries.
Being ethical or having principles does not mean one must always be considering justifying those principles. Generally one works out many principles before applicable situations arise. When those situations then do arise, one acts accordingly and spontaneously within those principles and guidelines. Further, doing whatever one feels like at the time without regard to forethought and principles, and then having to accept the consequences for such impulsive behavior later, seems to me no desirable kind of spontaneity anyway if indeed it is any sort of spontaneity at all. Certainly the moth who flies to the flames is not doing so spontaneously but compulsively; likewise in many cases the person who impulsively and compulsively seeks a good time in ways that are unwarrantedly thoughtless and risky to himself or dangerous to others. The spontaneity of a drunk driver who kills himself and/or others on the highway seems a spontaneity better uncultivated. Doing what one's nature mindlessly compels is no more spontaneous than is always avoiding what one's nature desires. Spontaneity is only an enviable trait when it makes doing what is right also interesting, fun and desirable, not when it makes a mindless fool a slave to impulse. And ethical principles correctly allow spontaneity when they allow the satisfaction of the right desires, stifle the wrong ones, and when they do not require untimely deliberation thatitself destroys the desires when they arise -- untimely deliberation that should have been done previously.
Ethics then, instead of being an impediment to spontaneity, can actually make spontaneity more enjoyable by making it less compulsive and by permitting spontaneity that is unlikely to lead to later disaster or regret.
Further, it is not difficult to keep in mind major ethical principles. There are not all that many if the analysis in the previous chapter is anywhere near as correct as I believe it is. The only difficult parts of doing ethics are not so much the moral reasoning part but knowing the factual parts, and having the will power to do what you determine you should on those occasions when your obligations are not in your own self interest or are not particularly enjoyable. The difficult parts, I think, are (1) trying to get all the facts in a situation to determine what kind of situation it is and thus to know which ethical principles apply, (2) knowing what the actual consequences of different alternative actions are likely to be, (3) knowing, in order to take it into consideration, what other people want or do not want and what pleases them or displeases them, particularly when they are the kind of people who will not or cannot tell you (and who only complain or ignore and reject you afterward, even when you have tried to do what you thought they wanted, let alone when you believed there was reason to override their wishes), and (4) having the courage and/or will power to do those things you should which are not in your own best interest or the best interest of a loved one or which are simply difficult for whatever the reason. Love and Marriage
For most people, the notion of marriage involves mainly the idea of being able to live together legally and being able legally to have sexual intercourse. Marriage is a kind of sanctioned social relationship. However, it is important to remember that marriage is a legal relationship that entails other legal rights (such as next of kin rights), duties, forfeitures, and consequences in general, that may differ from state to state, country to country, and time to time. I do not wish to concern myself with these other consequences except to mention about them, and I will touch only briefly on the sexual aspect. It is the nature of the living together aspect that I am most interested in here; so many of the ideas will equally pertain to people who are living together without being married.
First, sex: suffice it to say here that a legal right to sexual intercourse is not thereby a blanket moral right. In the section on moral aspects (that is, right- and wrong-making aspects) of sex, considerations are discussed which justify whether sex at a particular time is right or rational or not. For example, if one's spouse is not in the mood or there is some other reason not to have sex, then just being married by itself does not override that reason. Marriage allows sex legally, it does not mandate sex morally. Coercive or forced sexual behavior in marriage may be legally permissible, but it is not thereby morally right.
Living togetherI have already mentioned a friend of mine's puzzlement over why people wanted to live together without being married, or why they would want to live together if they were not married. Certainly living in the same house can be economical, efficient, and convenient in many ways, he knew, (you don't have to drive back and forth to see each other, use the telephone to talk with each other, pay two sets of household bills, etc.) but he believed that continually being together without much choice about it was the hardest part of being married.
Certainly there can be problems. Living alone may sometimes be lonely, but it also allows privacy when the mood or situation warrants. (One can be lonely in marriage or a crowd too, when others do not share the moods or interests one has at the time; one comedienne, Joan Rivers if I remember correctly, once said you have not really known what it was like to be lonely until you have been in bed with her husband. In fact, when all is not well in a relationship, or when the partners are apart for whatever reason, then because one is not totally free to seek other companionship, marriage can sometimes even be lonelier than when one is single or not going with someone.) Privacy in the sense I am speaking of it is being able to be alone when you want or need to be. Not all the moments of our lives are ones which we wish to share with others. One does not want to have to be well groomed or well-dressed, pretty or handsome, cheerful, serious, appropriately behaved or appropriately conversational all the time; yet one also does not wish to have a loved one endure one's foul moods or unkempt manners and appearance, even if they do not mind. In daily living together you do not always see someone at their best, nor do they see you at yours. Often that does not really matter; but sometimes it does, and privacy would be nice. This may also be true to some extent when you live apart and simply date. But then at least there is the opportunity to prepare yourself mentally, emotionally, and fashionably to be in your partner's company when otherwise you are not feeling quite up to it or are not in the right frame of mind. Dating, as opposed to marriage, tends to allow time for preparation for, and recuperation from, each others' company.
Different people require different amounts of privacy or private time (for example I need to be alone to read, and sometimes to write or just to think) and some couples can work out times of privacy for each mate without making it a time of privation for the other. They may have a place of their own at home where they are not likely to be disturbed -- a small den, workshop, or sewing room; one may be able to escape to an office; they may have a second home on the beach, in the mountains, or in the country that can serve as a retreat. As long as each understands the other's need for some private times, as long as one partner is not unfairly neglecting the other, and as long as each can tactfully seek private time without the other thereby feeling neglected, some problems that arise from not having enough time or space for oneself can be avoided.
However, people who want or need some privacy are not always fortunate enough to be able to get it. Not everyone has a room for solitude, a second house, an office of their own at work, or a mate who understands the need for private time; and not everyone has the time to spare from other responsibilities for the privacy they might desire. Children at home can decrease even further the amount of time (and energy) parents have for each other and for themselves.
Besides just needing some private time, there will be times when you would like to be together but your moods and/or interests conflict; and there will probably be times when one or both of you are unhappy, angry, or disappointed with the other and do not want to interact. One of you may be interested in a sporting event on television when the other wants to have a serious conversation about something; one may have had a melancholy day and be in the mood for viewing deep drama while the other is in a giddy mood and wants to attend a light musical comedy. One may be in the mood for sex; the other, not. One may be wide awake and in the mood for conversation or going out while the other is exhausted and ready to turn in for the night. There are better and worse, and more and less understanding, ways of resolving these differences in moods and desires. I will discuss some of them later in the ethics section. In terms of anger or disappointment, it is amazing how many different things a person can do that can be upsetting if you are not in the frame of mind to find them cute, overlook them, or ignore them. Some days that frame of mind is difficult to attain. In any roommate situation -- sibling, college, camp, army, marriage, or whatever -- friction can occur over almost anything at any time. One partner is compulsively early for appointments or social engagements; the other late. One believes in scrupulous sanitation, the other lets the cat eat out of their plate at the dinner table. One person seems to always find some reason to be busy with church work, civic tasks, career, or friends when the other feels it is time to spend some time together or with the whole family. One person seems to the other to spend too much time and energy on their mother or father. One partner tampers with, moves, or puts away the other's fragile treasures in a manner that the other does not consider careful enough. Etc., etc. Many of these things are not important when all else in life is well; but unfortunately all else is not always well, and so sometimes even minor irritations can take on monumental proportions to even the most forgiving, tolerant, and patient partner. And many partners, not being so patient nor forgiving, do not require much cause to become annoyed. Until you live with someone over a period of time, it is difficult to imagine both how many different things about them could please you and how many could irritate you. (I know one man who, when he meets unmarried adults asks them since they are not married what they do for aggravation.)
Differences in mood and disagreements of any sort can arise at any time, particularly when there are outside forces that pressure and provoke one or both of you and that drain your energy, sap your strength, and weaken your ability to cope with minor, even otherwise unnoticeable, irritations. If both partners face such pressures, say at school or at work, chances for at least temporary conflict, irritability, and/or disenchantment may multiply. Some partners or couples can find their homes a haven from external daily problems and can grow even closer in the face of workaday vexations; but others cannot prevent, sometimes even with a sense of resolve and commitment, those outside irritations from intruding into their home lives and undermining or eroding its foundation.
The point of this is that living together, whether legally or not, can be, and too often is, not necessarily as glorious and as unremittingly romantic as some would think, so there are things to consider before marrying or moving in together that are just as important as, and perhaps even moreso than, simply considerations of how you feel about each other. Love in terms of feelings may be unconditional, but living together is not. It may be easier to love from a distance than it is to love in unrelenting proximity when you cannot get the distance you need to let loving feelings override the other person's bothersome or bad behavior.
Living together allows for the companionship, closeness, convenience, and spontaneity one wants in a loving relationship, but there are other things in life just as important as (and at times even more important than) convenience, spontaneity, closeness, and sheer physical companionship. Even loving feelings, particularly when they cause inappropriate jealous behavior or inordinate domineering behavior for the loved one's supposed "own good" (that is, paternalism), cannot overcome all problems and may even contribute to them.
The point when considering marriage or living together -- especially if one is planning to make a firm commitment (rather than a trial arrangement of a short term, optionally renewable contract) is to at least ask the question of whether the two of you will be satisfying enough and good enough for each other under such circumstances that the relationship is likely to stay a good one. Apart from sex and romance, just how well will the two of you likely get along as roommates? What kinds of things do you really like to do and what kinds of things do you really hate to have roommates do? If there are differences in life styles, how will you accommodate each other so as to cause the least friction and the least disappointment? Do you see people with different ideas and values as therefore inferior, bad, or weird, or do you just see them as interestingly different? How well are each of you able to say something pleasantly or tactfully about a disturbing matter before it builds into a problem out of proportion that provokes an undeserved attack? (I know of two separate couples who each had a terrible fight over one of the partner's casually changing a dinner seating arrangement in order to better accommodate guests. Their spouses felt slighted and instead of calmly saying they would also like to change their seats so they could remain next to their mates, they took their partner's seat change as a sign of dislike for them, let it fester, and really blew up in anger later, totally surprising their mates who hadn't meant anything at all by the seating rearrangement other than to improve the evening's comfort and companionship for everyone.)
And in terms not just of immediate daily living, but of longer range attraction, satisfaction, and good, it is important to ask, not do you love the other person enough (in terms of feelings alone) to get married now, but are there enough other elements in the relationship to make it likely to stay a satisfying and good relationship. What kinds of interests, goals, and dreams do you each have that you want to work to achieve? Does your partner share those desires? If not, will they come between you? If so, will you be a help to each other or not? If not, will that matter? Are you at a place in life where you are likely soon to meet someone with whom marriage could be better and more satisfying? Or have you looked around sufficiently to know there is unlikely to be a better mate for you; and are you philosophical enough and comfortable enough with yourself and your partner that, if by chance, someone does show up who might have been a (slightly) more suitable mate for you, you will not have regrets or have to pursue the new relationship at the expense of this one? Is this relationship strong enough and good enough, not just romantic enough, so that even if someone else terrific were to come along, there would be no need to break the commitment to your mate. One may trade in one's car for another that one sees and likes better, but it is not fair to treat people that way. Even if one does not have the perfect marriage, one should not treat one's partner unfairly or be uncommitted to him or her and shopping around for someone better for you. That is to treat people callously as if they had no feelings and required no consideration. And it is to make a mockery of commitment and obligation.
Commitment demands at least the reasonable attempt to make one's marriage better by improving the relationship, not by changing partners. Commitment does not mean keeping a marriage of poor or mediocre quality that resists improvement, but it does, I think, mean not abandoning, or at least not readily abandoning, one above a certain quality just because a potentially better one seems to come along. How high a level the quality of the original marriage should be to maintain it is not easy to say and it depends in part upon whether there are children or others who might be affected, and a great deal on how one's present mate might be effected. It is easy to imagine circumstances in which both would be better off separating or divorcing, but that is a separate issue from the one of just one partner's being better off outside the marriage; one can understand and sympathize with someone who wants out because a relationship is irreparably detrimental, but there is justifiably little sympathy for a person who hurts his or partner by leaving a good relationship just because he or she thinks they can form a better one. The time to wonder whether you can do better -- that is, have a better relationship, more loving feelings, better satisfaction, and be better for each other -- with someone else is before you get committed to someone, whether the commitment is marriage, serious living together, becoming engaged, pinned or going steady. These last three are progressively weaker commitments that require progressively less reason to dissolve, but even the last requires some good reason to end, otherwise there is no point to being a part of it in the first place -- why go steady if there is no commitment at all involved in it.
Also one must consider whether there is any need or rush to marry or live with someone at all instead of continuing to live alone. One need not compare a present relationship with the probability of some better future one, but can compare marrying the present mate with living alone instead. Particularly if one is likely to find a more suitable mate soon enough for one's desires, there would be no need to get involved in a temporary or somewhat undesirable relationship if living alone is not that terrible in the first place. There are plenty of fish in the sea, and though you will not find them all attractive, nor they you, and though not all of them and you will be enjoyable for or good for each other, generally there are sufficient numbers you can meet who you will like, who will like you, and with whom you can have an enduring, satisfactory and good relationship so that you need not take on a commitment you are not certain will be sufficiently romantic, satisfying, and good to want to keep -- particularly if living alone is good enough that there is no good reason to take on such a commitment in the first place.
what love isIf you are looking for love, would you recognize it if you found it?Can you tell the difference between love and infatuation?Between love and attraction?Between love and sexual desire?Between love and friendship?Between sex and intimacy?Between a good relationship and one that is only pleasurable?
The Meaning of Love offers and explains a definition of love in a way that is interesting, intense, clear, logical, and meaningful. All relationships --love, infatuation, friendship, dating, marriage, family, community, and professional-- involve three key elements:
Emotions --how we feel about each otherEthics --how good or bad we are for each otherJoys --how much we satisfy or dissatisfy each otherThese determine the quality of our relationships; and The Meaning of Love explains how they interrelate, and why attraction --the normally considered most important emotional element and conventional hallmark of love-- is not sufficient to signify a relationship as one of love, no matter how strong or how enduring that attraction may be.The Three Important Aspects of Relationships
Every relationship has the potential to involve (1) emotional or feeling aspects, (2) satisfaction or dissatisfaction aspects, and (3) good or bad (that is, ethical) aspects.
There is an overlap here since satisfactions, to the extent they are pleasurable sensations, are both feelings and good things; dissatisfactions are feelings and bad things. But I want to make and use these distinctions because I want to be able to talk about the ethical aspects of relationships over and above their joys and dissatisfactions since many things may be both enjoyable and harmful, enjoyable in terms of pleasurable sensations but harmful in terms of side-effects, consequences, or some other relevant factor. For example, satisfying sex that results in an unwanted pregnancy or disease. Similarly some very unpleasant things may result in great good, such as ill-tasting medicine. (This is not to say that all ethics involves only harm and benefit, but that will be explained in detail in the ethics chapter. A sufficient example of that for now is the nature of the obligation to keep a promise or appointment even though doing so might not cause as much pleasure as breaking it would.) I want to keep the above distinctions also because I want to give ample consideration to satisfactions and dissatisfactions since they form perhaps the most noticeable or visible part of ethics, relationships, and life. Finally I want to make the distinction between joys and other kinds of feelings because I am especially interested in some of those other kinds, particularly feelings of attraction.
I believe that these three categories--feelings, satisfactions, and ethics--can profitably be considered separately, even though often they do not occur separately in life. I further believe that these categories involve most, if not all, the significant aspects of any relationship and that most of the important things concerning relationships will involve one, two, or all three of these categories.
I believe the clearest, most useful, most helpful way of speaking and thinking about relationships is to separate talking about those (1) between people who have feelings (of attraction) for each other, (2) between people who satisfy or give (significant) joy to each other, and (3) between people who are good for each other. This way of speaking separates relationships on the basis of the above three categories and allows more clarity of communication. For example, a parent might be able to explain more clearly to his daughter why he disapproves of her going with or becoming engaged to a particular boy by saying, "I know you are attracted to each other and enjoy each other a lot, but I do not believe that you satisfy each other in enough areas that the relationship will stay a happy one very long because...." This is a far preferable basis for discussion of the situation than "You don't really love that boy; you just think you do; you're too young to even know what love is," where the father might be referring to a beneficial aspect or to some concern there will be lack of (significant) mutual satisfactions as they grow older but where the girl might than easily take him to be simply questioning her feelings for the boy, or the boy's feelings for her. In which case she would probably reply, "But we do love each other." And thus most likely would the idle and unproductive disagreement end with anger and/or hurt feelings, and with each side believing they are right and the other blind and obstinate.
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