What is the point of love?

• Published in: International journal of philosophical studies : IJPS Vol. 20; no. 2; pp. 217 - 237
• Main Author: Price, Carolyn
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 01.05.2012; Taylor & Francis; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: belief; Belief & doubt; Beliefs; emotion; Emotions; Evaluation; Interpersonal relations; justification; Love; Motivation; Personal relationships; Philosophical logics. Philosophy of language; Philosophy; evaluation; love; emotion; Analytical Philosophy; motivation; justification; belief
• ISSN: 0967-2559; 1466-4542
• DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2011.629367

Why should we love the people we do and why does love motivate us to act as it does? In this paper, I explore the idea that these questions can be answered by appealing to the idea that love has to do with close personal relationships (the 'relationship claim'). Niko Kolodny ( 2003 ) has already developed a relationship theory of love: according to Kolodny, love centres on the belief that the subject shares a valuable personal relationship with the beloved. However, this account has some implausible consequences. I shall develop an alternative account, discarding the assumption that love centres on a belief, and beginning instead from a conception of love as an emotional attitude - which, I suggest, involves a form of evaluation that is not belief. As I explain, adopting this view allows us to interpret the relationship claim, not as a claim about the subject's beliefs, but as a claim about the function of love. This approach allows us to answer the questions above, while avoiding the difficulties that confront Kolodny's account. I end by exploring a case that might be thought to raise some difficulties for my account.