Ah, romantic love - beautiful and intoxicating, heartbreaking and soul-crushing, often all at the same time. Why do we choose to put ourselves through its emotional wringer? Does love make our lives meaningful, or is it an escape from our loneliness and suffering? Is love a disguise for our sexual desire, or a trick of biology to make us procreate? Is it all we need? Do we need it at all? If romantic love has a purpose, neither science nor psychology has discovered it yet. But over the course of history, some of our most respected philosophers have put forward some intriguing theories. Love makes us whole, again. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato explored the idea that we love in order to become complete. In his "Symposium", he wrote about a dinner party, at which Aristophanes, a comic playwright, regales the guests with the following story: humans were once creatures with four arms, four legs, and two faces. One day, they angered the gods, and Zeus sliced them all in two. Since then, every person has been missing half of him or herself. Love is the longing to find a soulmate who'll make us feel whole again, or, at least, that's what Plato believed a drunken comedian would say at a party. Love tricks us into having babies. Much, much later, German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer maintained that love based in sexual desire was a voluptuous illusion. He suggested that we love because our desires lead us to believe that another person will make us happy, but we are sorely mistaken. Nature is tricking us into procreating, and the loving fusion we seek is consummated in our children. When our sexual desires are satisfied, we are thrown back into our tormented existences, and we succeed only in maintaining the species and perpetuating the cycle of human drudgery. Sounds like somebody needs a hug. Love is escape from our loneliness. According to the Nobel Prize-winning British philosopher Bertrand Russell, we love in order to quench our physical and psychological desires. Humans are designed to procreate, but without the ecstasy of passionate love, sex is unsatisfying. Our fear of the cold, cruel world tempts us to build hard shells to protect and isolate ourselves. Love's delight, intimacy, and warmth helps us overcome our fear of the world, escape our lonely shells, and engage more abundantly in life. Love enriches our whole being, making it the best thing in life. Love is a misleading affliction. Siddhārtha Gautama, who became known as the Buddha, or the Enlightened One, probably would have had some interesting arguments with Russell. Buddha proposed that we love because we are trying to satisfy our base desires. Yet, our passionate cravings are defects, and attachments, even romantic love, are a great source of suffering. Luckily, Buddha discovered the eight-fold path, a sort of program for extinguishing the fires of desire so that we can reach Nirvana, an enlightened state of peace, clarity, wisdom, and compassion. The novelist Cao Xueqin illustrated this Buddhist sentiment that romantic love is folly in one of China's greatest classical novels, "Dream of the Red Chamber." In a subplot, Jia Rui falls in love with Xi-feng who tricks and humiliates him. Conflicting emotions of love and hate tear him apart, so a Taoist gives him a magic mirror that can cure him as long as he doesn't look at the front of it. But of course, he looks at the front of it. He sees Xi-feng. His soul enters the mirror and he is dragged away in iron chains to die. Not all Buddhists think this way about romantic and erotic love, but the moral of this story is that such attachments spell tragedy, and should, along with magic mirrors, be avoided. Love lets us reach beyond ourselves. Let's end on a slightly more positive note. The French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir proposed that love is the desire to integrate with another and that it infuses our lives with meaning. However, she was less concerned with why we love and more interested in how we can love better. She saw that the problem with traditional romantic love is it can be so captivating, that we are tempted to make it our only reason for being. Yet, dependence on another to justify our existence easily leads to boredom and power games. To avoid this trap, Beauvoir advised loving authentically, which is more like a great friendship. Lovers support each other in discovering themselves, reaching beyond themselves, and enriching their lives and the world together. Though we might never know why we fall in love, we can be certain that it will be an emotional rollercoaster ride. It's scary and exhilarating. It makes us suffer and makes us soar. Maybe we lose ourselves. Maybe we find ourselves. It might be heartbreaking, or it might just be the best thing in life. Will you dare to find out?
啊!浪漫的愛情── 美麗又醉人, 令人傷心又斷魂, 它們經常同時發生。 為什麼我們會選擇 這感情套環來折磨自己呢? 是愛情使我們生命有意義? 或者它是擺脫孤單和痛苦的方式? 愛情是用來掩飾我們對性的慾望嗎? 或它是一種 讓我們能繁衍的生物技倆? 愛情是我們所需的嗎? 我們真的需要它嗎? 如果戀愛是有目的, 科學和心理學都尚未發掘這目的。 但在歷史的過程中, 一些最受敬重的哲學家 曾提出了一些有趣的理論。 【愛情使我們再次變得完整】 古希臘哲學家柏拉圖, 探索了『戀愛是為了 讓我們變得完整』這個想法。 在他的《會飲篇》中, 寫了在一個晚宴上, 一位喜劇作家 阿里斯托芬 用下面的故事來取悅客人: 人類曾是擁有四隻手臂, 四條腿和兩張臉的生物。 有一天,他們激怒了眾神, 然後宙斯將他們切成兩半。 從此之後,每個人都 缺少了自己的另一半。 愛是渴望找到一個 讓我們再次感到完整的心靈伴侶, 或至少,那是 柏拉圖 相信 一位喝醉的喜劇作家在派對上講的話。 【愛情誘使我們有寶寶】 很久很久之後,德國哲學家 亞瑟·叔本華(禁欲主義者) 主張:基於性慾的愛情 是一種緃情享樂的幻覺。 他提出:「我們相愛 是因為我們的欲望讓我們相信 另一個人能使我們快樂── 但這是大錯特錯。」 「本性誘使我們繁衍後代, 我們所尋找的愛情融合 最後得到的就是孩子。 當性慾得到滿足後, 我們回到了痛苦的現實, 而我們所成就的只是延續物種, 之後繼續循環這人類苦差事。」 聽起來像是有人需要抱抱了。 【愛情讓我們擺脫孤獨】 根據諾貝爾獲獎者 英國哲學家 伯特蘭·羅素 所說的, 我們相愛是為了 消除我們身體和心理上的欲望。 人類生來就是為了繁衍, 若沒有的熱戀的喜悅, 性愛是無法令人滿足的。 我們對冰冷殘酷世界的恐懼 誘使我們築起堅硬的外殼, 來保護並孤立我們自己。 愛情的愉悅、親密和溫暖 幫助我們克服對這世界的恐懼, 掙脫我們孤獨的外殼, 讓我們更投入人生。 愛情豐富我們整個人生, 它是生命中最美好的事物。 【愛情是一種誤導的痛苦】 悉達多·喬達摩 是眾人皆知的佛陀,也就是開悟者, 或許能和羅素有一段很有趣的爭論。 佛陀說,我們相愛是為了 試圖滿足最基本的欲望。 但是,我們激情的渴望是種缺陷, 依戀,即使是浪漫愛情, 都是痛苦的主要來源。 幸運的是,佛陀領悟到「八正道」, 一種能消除欲望之火的修行之道, 讓我們能達到「極樂世界」, 一種寂靜、清涼、 智慧與慈悲的覺悟境界。 小說家 曹雪芹 闡述了佛教 「浪漫愛情是愚昧的」的觀點 在中國最偉大的古典小說之一, 《紅樓夢》。 在次要情節裡提到,賈瑞愛上了 一位調戲又羞辱他的女人──熙鳳。 愛與恨的矛盾情緒,讓他生不如死, 後來一位道士給他一面 可以治癒他的魔鏡── 只要他不看鏡子的正面。 但當然,他看了鏡子的正面。 他看見熙鳳。 他的靈魂進入了鏡子, 最後被挷上鐵鍊,並被拖走而死亡。 並非所有佛教徒 都以這樣觀點看待浪漫和性愛, 但這個故事的寓意 指出這種依戀會招致不幸, 應該要避免,連同魔鏡也是。 【愛情讓我們超越自己】 讓我們用一個較正面的方式來做結尾。 法國哲學家 西蒙娜·德·波伏娃 指出 愛情是渴望與另一個人結合, 而它讓我們的生命更有意義。 然而,她比較不管戀愛的原因, 而更熱衷於「如何能愛得更好」。 她了解傳統浪漫愛情的問題 是因為它如此迷人, 我們會情不自禁地 把愛情視為人生的唯一目的。 但依賴另一人來證明自己的存在, 會容易導致厭倦感及權力遊戲。 為了避免這個陷阱, 波伏娃 建議要真誠地相愛, 這比較像很好的友誼。 戀人們彼此協助對方找到自我, 來超越他們自己, 並一起豐富他們的生命及世界。 雖然我們也許永遠不知道 為什麼我們會戀愛, 我們可以肯定,這將會是 一趟情感的雲霄飛車之旅, 令人既害怕又興奮。 愛情讓我們受苦 讓我們飄飄欲仙。 也許我們會迷失自己。 也許我們會找到真正的自己。 愛情也許會令我們心碎, 又或許它就是生命中最美好的事物。 你敢探索愛情嗎?