Evolution and Love

Can love be explained in evolutionary terms? Discuss.

Ok, this is totally out of the blue (no reference). People like things that will benifit them, edible food, a sturdy shelter, means of transportation, etc. Love is a subset of like. We love those things which will greatly benifit us. I'm not sure how a dog fits into my scenario. I'm making this up as I go. More enlightened comments are greatly appreciated.

[ZeeJustin]

Warm fuzzy feelings that accompany sex lead to reproduction. A species would die out if it never wanted to reproduce.

Hi Zeejustin,
I understand what you're saying, but why does a dog, or the color blue, or the sound of a wave in the ocean give us a warm fuzzy feeling?

[atrifix]

Why do we have warm fuzzy feelings of love even when no sex is involved (ex: long distance relationships)? Why do homosexuals find gay sex pleasant? Why don't we get those warm fuzzy feelings during rape?

[NobodysFreak]

I think we should start with where our definition of what love is came from. Romantic love as its portrayed in popular american culture is a socially constructed system. Our ideas of love aren't very old. Maybe around 400-500 years or so. Coupled with short life expectancies and hard lifestyles for much of humanity's existence, I'd go out on a limb and say that love as we know it had very little to do with human evolution. If anything, it's more of a product of our evolution.

The pleasure associated with sex, on the other hand, is a biological/evolutionary response. If evolution can make sex feel good, people will continue to populate the planet.

I think it has to do with childrearing.

Mammals have live young which require specialised attention and protection (often for many months), so it's natural that strong emotional bonds would evolve. Parents who can pay close attention to their infant's needs and emotional state - and are motivated to respond to them via the brain's pleasure pathways - have a huge evolutionary advantage over those that don't. Thus an underlying brain architecture evolves, which when combined with social experiences and sexual/mating urges, enables this thing we call 'love'.

That said, you should be careful when trying to explain psychology via evolution. It's not science and very easily becomes a shoehorning of poorly understood concepts to 'explain' what's observed. For example, some academics say that we're social animals because we had to learn to cooperate and hunt together in tough times - those that couldn't died out. While this may be partly true, it's a weak explanation with no evidence. Many animals that never hunted have highly advanced social skills, and animals like Orang Utans aren't that different from a human child in terms of social intelligence. An increase in the length of childhood, a change in how females selected mates, or a series of mutations increasing brain size (and thus the capacity to grasp concepts such as Theory Of Mind), can have similar effects, so be careful. Just because an evolutionary explanation 'makes sense' doesn't mean it is that way.

[ QUOTE ]
Mammals have live young which require specialised attention and protection (often for many months), so it's natural that strong emotional bonds would evolve. Parents who can pay close attention to their infant's needs and emotional state - and are motivated to respond to them via the brain's pleasure pathways - have a huge evolutionary advantage over those that don't. Thus an underlying brain architecture evolves, which when combined with social experiences and sexual/mating urges, enables this thing we call 'love'.


[/ QUOTE ]
Ok, this explains why we love little beings with big eyes and smiling mouths, but like Atrifix mentioned, why do homosexuals love each other and like I mentioned, why do we love certain colors and sounds, etc. What is the evolution of psychology?
P.S. In your second paragraph, you mentioned: "Just because an evolutionary explanation 'makes sense' doesn't mean it is that way".
I haven't yet seen an evotionary explanation that made sense (regarding love). Can you please elaborate?

Hi Phil,
You did mention that we should be very careful trying to explain psychology via evolution.
Does this mean that Love can not be explained ( in its many forms ) through evolution?
This is what I was asking elaboration on. I thought that evolution, ultimately, could explain all our behaviors.

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
Can love be explained in evolutionary terms? Discuss.

[/ QUOTE ]
Is love anything different to morality (morality and evolution (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=3979617&an=0&page=0#Post 3979617))?

Maybe love is just an extreme case of caring about someone else.

chez

Thanks for the link. I missed this one.

Ok Chezlaw,
I've read your link and it seems to have unresolved issues. 1) Atrifix asks - Can evolution explain morality?
2) Lestat asks: I thought behavioral patterns indeed played a part in our evolutionary process as a whole?

These questions were not resolved on the earlier thread. Unless I missed something.

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok Chezlaw,
I've read your link and it seems to have unresolved issues. Hence, this is why Evolvedform has opened a new thread.
1) Atrifix asks - Can evolution explain morality?
2) Lestat asks: I thought behavioral patterns indeed played a part in our evolutionary process as a whole?

These questions were not resolved on the earlier thread. Unless I missed something.

[/ QUOTE ]
I gave a possible answer, extremely plausible me thinks, resolutions cost extra.

maybe love is the same unresolved question.

chez

Hi Chez,
Here's your possible answer:
"It seems intuitively obvious that cooperation with those who carry the same genes is to the advantage of the gene"

Can you please explain how this causes me to love dogs, to love Mozart, to love the color blue, and to love the sound of waves crashing in the ocean. Also, can you explain the love of a homosexual man for another?

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
Hi Chez,
Here's your possible answer:
"It seems intuitively obvious that cooperation with those who carry the same genes is to the advantage of the gene"

Can you please explain how this causes me to love dogs, to love Mozart, to love the color blue, and to love the sound of waves crashing in the ocean. Also, can you explain the love of a homosexual man for another?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think this post was clearer. [ QUOTE ]
Realising that cooperation is beneficial is very hard for evolution so the evolved stratagy that results in cooperation is to care about other people.

We get pleasure/pain type stimuli (I think that is morality) from how we treat others so that we will behave in a cooperative manner. In the same way we get pleasure from sex so that we will behave in a reproductive manner.

[/ QUOTE ]
Too many uses of the word love. Love of music etc is an extreme case of liking something. Wasn't talking about that though there was a thread ages ago.

[censored]-sexuality isn't a problem, its the same thing. Just because love/morality/sexual attraction may all be due to the same basic reproductive advantage, it doesn't follow that they will manifest themselves directly for that advantage.

chez

[Lestat]

I do think there are different types of love for spousal, friendship, paternal, relative, offspring, and relationship or companionship (I'm omitting things like love of the arts, etc.).

I suspect most altruistic motivations are based on some anticipated form of reciprocation in some way even if it's not an entirely even one.

[ QUOTE ]
Hi Zeejustin,
I understand what you're saying, but why does a dog, or the color blue, or the sound of a wave in the ocean give us a warm fuzzy feeling?

[/ QUOTE ]

Could be the mind's tendency to associate one feeling with another. Possibly a sublimated sexual urge.

[Lestat]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Hi Zeejustin,
I understand what you're saying, but why does a dog, or the color blue, or the sound of a wave in the ocean give us a warm fuzzy feeling?

[/ QUOTE ]

Could be the mind's tendency to associate one feeling with another. Possibly a sublimated sexual urge.

[/ QUOTE ]

Do you really think that love and sex are interelated?

Even if they are, sex has little to do with love in other areas.

[ QUOTE ]


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Hi Zeejustin,
I understand what you're saying, but why does a dog, or the color blue, or the sound of a wave in the ocean give us a warm fuzzy feeling?


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Could be the mind's tendency to associate one feeling with another. Possibly a sublimated sexual urge.


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Do you really think that love and sex are interelated?

Even if they are, sex has little to do with love in other areas.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, what we call romantic love and sex are more than interrelated. I believe this love is dependent on sex and is could not even exist without it, without it being programmed into our brains as a species.

As to your second statement, non-romantic love, such as friendship or love of a thing, may be related to sex in that the urge we feel for sex is transferred to this other thing. How else can we evolutionarily explain an intense love for a bike, for instance? The warm fuzzies we get when we think about this bike are sexual feelings thus transferred.

[Lestat]

<font color="blue"> without it being programmed into our brains as a species. </font>

I would still disagree love has much to do with sex. We do not need love to have sex. We do however, need sex in order to advance our genes. If love IS hard-wired into our brains it is much more likely for this reason:

We need to LOVE our wife not to have sex, but because she bears our children. She noursishes them and raises them. It is in our best interest to love and protect the woman who sees to it that our children thrive so that they can go grow up and advance our genes again.

Also consider that a female knows for certain that the child she bears is her own, while a male can never be certain. I believe this also plays a big role in the protectiveness a man displays for his woman.

[ QUOTE ]
I would still disagree love has much to do with sex. We do not need love to have sex.

[/ QUOTE ]

I said the corollary: There must be sex for there to be love. The opposite is definitely not the case IMO.

[Lestat]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I would still disagree love has much to do with sex. We do not need love to have sex.

[/ QUOTE ]

I said the corollary: There must be sex for there to be love. The opposite is definitely not the case IMO.

[/ QUOTE ]

Then how would you explain a man who loves his sister or mother?

In fact, I just read something interesting. It is somewhat of a mystery why teenage boys who hasvereached puberty and have raging hormones for the opposite sex will almost NEVER sexually desire a sister! No matter how physically appealing she may be, the thought of sex with her is repugnant.

It is impossible for men without sisters to be able to relate to this feeling of being repulsed by any beautiful sexually desirable girl. Only guys with sisters can experience this feeling.

[ QUOTE ]
Then how would you explain a man who loves his sister or mother?

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, I'm having a hard time explaining this. Let me try it again:

Without the existence of sex there cannot be love. That doesn't mean a love relationship needs sex. I'm talking about man as an animal that evolved from apes. At some point the pleasurable feeling of sex became wired into man's brain. Now it is always there, to be used on anything from a bike to a sister. But love's origin is sex and the pleasurable feeling that comes with it.

[ QUOTE ]

In fact, I just read something interesting. It is somewhat of a mystery why teenage boys who hasvereached puberty and have raging hormones for the opposite sex will almost NEVER sexually desire a sister! No matter how physically appealing she may be, the thought of sex with her is repugnant.


[/ QUOTE ]

??? /images/graemlins/confused.gif I guess that is why in nearly all civilisations (never mind how under developped) there is some form of taboo or legislation against it. Wake up!

OTOH it was obligatory for some in some cultures.

[Lestat]

<font color="blue"> ??? I guess that is why in nearly all civilisations (never mind how under developped) there is some form of taboo or legislation against it. Wake up! </font>

It is nevertheless somewhat interesting how nature hard-wired sibling's brains not to desire each other as to instinctively avoid passing on recessed genes, etc.

[Lestat]

I see what you're saying now. Sorry, shouldn't be posting while 6-tabling 30-60. /images/graemlins/confused.gif

Wow. Shouldn't you be paying close attention to players at that level?

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
Can love be explained in evolutionary terms? Discuss.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes.

There is absolutely nothing evolutionary wrong with love. Seriously. I don't even see why it requires to be discussed as an evolutionary adaption, when it so clearly can be one.

Just look at examples of how people unable to display love/affection or who do not receive it fare. Love is necessary to succeed socially and to pass on your genes.

I guess some take this as belittling love, or lovering it to something below their standards. Well...evolutionary adaptions, _especially_ our social (intelligence, language, love you name it) adaptions are what makes humans stand apart as a species, it is what defines us.

It doesn't get any better than that.