What's your thoughts on this? Is love entirely selfish in nature? Or is it unselfish?

Feel free to narrow it down to specific types of love or situations.

The way I think of it - romantic love is selfish in general. But it leads to selfless behavior. For example - I give my girlfriend a flower, she gives me a kiss in return. Now this could be considered selfish behavior - me wanting a kiss being selfish. But what if at random, because you are in love, you just happen to go "hey, this would look nice tucked behind her ear" and you get a flower to give to her, expecting nothing in return. In that case, the flower-giving would be selfless as a result of loving her.

You get the idea - Discuss!

I think the "selfless"behavior is really just a cover up. You tell yourself that you expect nothing in return but you know, from previous experience, that you will get the kiss anyway. It's all a matter of how honest you are with yourself.

There is no such thing as unconditional love. And there is no such thing as selfless love either. Apparently selfless acts within a relationship simply help to maintain the relationship, and help meet the conditions of the love involved. This doesn't make love less good, or the acts less wonderful, nor does the fact that they aren't genuinely selfless tarnish the idealized nature of romance, but that is the way it is.

I've read that nothing is truly selfless, because eventhe most selfless acts have motives. You might do wonderful acts of charity to releive your feelings of guilt, to get into heaven, to feel nice about having done something nice, or so that you can feel superior for having done something others wont do. But in the end, the wonderful act has been done, so go you.

Sounds like this is coming down to an argument involving psychological egoism (because we derive pleasure from our actions, no action is truly selfless).

It's both, end of story.

Well to continue, basically it is selfish but we also do things for our loves that they expect from us, it's basically you scratch my back, I'll stratch yours, with the ocassional sex which can be counted as scratching each other's backs at the same time. All relationships are based on give and take, it is selfish but you have to be selfish and then let them be selfish too.

Selfish actions aren't wrong per say, but if only one person get's something out of it (IE the guy gets sex and teh woman doesn't enjoy sex and that's all that happens in their relationship) then it is more selfish that only one person benifits from the relationship.

Agreed. I think love at a basic level is selfish, but it works out pretty well in the end because, if it's mutual, it's selfish for the other person involved too. You want something from the other person and you give something to them in return.

After a while, you can even get to a point where doing something nice for the other person feels pretty good in itself, simply because you like the other person well enough that their feeling good enhances your own good feelings.

What about people who risk their lives to save strangers? Like the Rwandan hotelier who sheltered Tutsis during the massacres? Doesn't that indicate that there's something a little more complicated going on there? Generally when people are being selfish, they want to be around to enjoy the reward.

But since this is a thread about love, how about when somebody is willing to die for their partner? Or their child?

I think the act of giving one's life for another is pretty much the only truly selfless deed. I mean, I guess one could feel that the sum total of happiness they'll derive from the rest of their life would be less than the happiness they get from saving that person's life, or that they'd rather die than watch their loved one die in front of their eyes. But in life-or-death situations like that, I personally doubt people really have the time to play the numbers game with their utility.

giving your life for someone else shows you have a sense of love for them or you feel you have an obligation to do it.

For example, your wife is going to be shot and you see that, so you want her to life no matter what, since you made a commitment to her to be her partner, and in most people's minds, to protect her when she needed it, since she would have done teh same for you, as well if your child is in danger, you want to protect them because they came from you, there is a major bond there for most people and people will protect them no amtter what.

It's done because it's an obligation to them as part of your love for them you get thigns back from them and they would probally do it for you. It's apart of the scratching back part, except it's like scratchign their back, giving them a massage, and pampering them excessivly, and then not being able to do anymore scratching, it's the ultimate scratch.

If I die for someone, I expect play whenever I want it for ALL eternity.



And with S&M, it's "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours, only really hard."


As for dying for others, what about people who are willing to die for complete strangers?

YOu get a satisfaction that you did something right for a stranger, it's scratching your own back after scratching theirs first, even if you don't get any money or reward it's a good feeling, and actually selfish, not a bad thing though.

But you'd be dead. Even if you did feel good about yourself, you wouldn't be feeling it for long. You'd think that would be a major deterrent to those who would seek personal satisfaction by risking their own lives.

Me? I put the happiness of others before the happiness of myself. Yes, I suppose this is because helping people makes me feel good, but the happiness of others is more important to me than doing things that benefit none.

All this scratching makes me itch.