Love (Humans)

by dhw, Sunday, June 16, 2013, 20:44 (4176 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Tony and I are discussing the nature of love, which Tony regards as an action, whereas I in my conventionality see it as an emotion. Tony in his previous post wrote: "The emotion may be the catalyst for the ACT, but the ACT would DEMONSTRATE the emotion in a concrete way."-dhw: I see absolutely no difference between us, other than your insistence that love is an action and not a feeling. You wrote that "feelings are flighty things which often waver in their strength, while action can be resolute". I would argue that if the feeling is flighty (love her on Monday, hate her on Tuesday), the action will express the flightiness (flowers on Monday, door-slamming on Tuesday), and that is exactly the same as saying "the ACT would DEMONSTRATE the emotion in a concrete way." Emotion first, then action. Therefore love is the emotion, and action is the demonstration of the emotion, or "love is a feeling which expresses itself when you say (action) or do (action) things that will help, comfort, bring happiness to those you love."-TONY: But which comes first?-In my commonsense world, as opposed to the quantum world, cause precedes effect, motive precedes action, and so love the emotion precedes the actions that express or demonstrate it. I still can't see how, using your own terms, the fact that an ACT DEMONSTRATES the emotion of love makes love an action and not an emotion!