..why do you appear to equate atheism with "lefties"..
DrPhil,
I didn't think I did. I stated that one group i.e. the religious are just slightly less indoctrinated then the Lefties but not by much.

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Dear Yuyutsu,

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"Hate' needs no reference, it's an objectless, intransitive verb ... "

According to my Oxford English Dictionary, both "hate" and "love" are transitive verbs.

In the French language, modern young hoodlums and hooligans employ an expression they seem to have invented: "J'ai la haine" (I have hate). This is an intransitive innovation which, to my knowledge, has no equivalent in the English language. It has spread by word-of-mouth but has not yet received official recognition as a colloquial expression by any of the French dictionaries.

Apart from this ethnolinguistic innovation, the definition of "hate" does not pose any particular problem: "intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury".

Sigmund Freud defined hate as "an ego state that wishes to destroy the source of its unhappiness".

Whereas, there does not appear to be any universally accepted definition of the word "love".

I, personally, like the definition of that well-known Australian biologist, Jeremy Griffith: "unconditional selflessness", of which I am sure Peter Sells is aware.

This, to me, is the essence of the word - to which all sorts of lace and frills and other fioritura may be added.

I also like Aristotle's definition, which was later adopted by Thomas Aquinas: "to will the good of another", though it lacks the notion of "selflessness" which, to me is an indispensable feature of "love".

Perhaps it is a vestige of my Christian education, but I cannot conceive of "love" without some form of personal engagement, the "giving of oneself", an element of self-sacrifice.

I should add that either love is or is not and if it is not, then it has never been. In my mind, there is no such thing as temporary or partial love. Either it is total, eternal and indestructible or it is not.

The biological anthropologist, Helen Fisher, suggested that " Love may be understood as part of the survival instinct, a function to keep human beings together against menaces and to facilitate the continuation of the species".

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"...there is no such thing as temporary or partial love. Either it is total, eternal and indestructible or it is not."

What pluckin' nonsense, Banjo! In our disposable world, there is little or no love that is total, eternal and indestructible. Love is a state of mind which, like the weather, is always in a state of flux. Time erodes it as it does with everything else.

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Dear David G

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"In our disposable world, there is little or no love that is total, eternal and indestructible."

I agree but I suspect it has always been like that. I think it is quite remarkable that we human beings are capable of love at all. We seem to be fairly unique as a living species in that respect.

I am not aware of any ethological studies having revealed that other animal species are capable of love defined as "unconditional selflessness" (Jeremy Griffith) or "to will the good of another" (Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas).

My brother and I adopted a stray puppy that wandered through the front gate one day and we grew up with him. He was like a third brother. We went through all sorts of battles and adventures together. He defended us against our cousins and saved the chickens from drowning during a flood by swimming around and picking them up in his mouth and putting them on the roof of the fowl house.

Nobody asked him to do that and he got no reward for it. Does that qualify for love, "unconditional selflessness"? My uncle took him to the vet when he was fifteen, half blind and could hardly walk and had him put out of his misery.

That was about half a century ago now. I don't think time will change that much.

I met my wife in Paris and we have been through many years of stormy weather but we somehow both managed to cling to the mast and survive. Now the fire in me is no more than a gentle simmer and it's all smooth sailing. Nothing and nobody could come between us now. We are on our way to oblivion, hand in hand, headed for eternity.

In my humble opinion, most of those who think they love somebody do not. They mistake love for feelings, affection, sentiments, sex, liking, sympathy, admiration or some other basic impulse or self-serving urge.

Some seem to fall in love with their own image. They even look alike.

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Dear Banjo,

As I have just happened to read today in a commentary on the Narada Bhakti Sutras (http://www.sankaracharya.org/narada_bhakti_sutras.php, a condensed treatise on how to achieve devotion, or pure love to God), there is love - and there is supreme love, which is unconditional selflessness.

Ordinary love still includes a measure of selfishness. Ordinary love also is directed towards transient objects, thus depends on them to continue (just as David wrote: "In our disposable world, there is little or no love that is total, eternal and indestructible."). Supreme love is directed towards God with no selfish expectations, thus is eternal and indestructible.

Since there is nothing but God, there is no need to look far into the heavens.
I wish you and your wife, building on the love you already have, to find God in each other, so that your love will last forever, even beyond oblivion. Peace.

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Dear Yuyutsu,

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I read the 84 Narada Bhakti Sutras which you indicated but found no reference to "unconditional selflessness".

Also, in the same manner that I consider there is no such thing as temporary or partial love, I do not consider there are different degrees or qualities of love allowing it to be classified like slices of ham in different categories such as "ordinary" and "superior".

Love defined as "unconditional selflessness" does not come in different categories or different slices.

The Hindu world is, of course, mired in a complex pyramidal system of classification by casts. The Christian world also has never really succeeded in freeing itself completely from the shackles of monarchial hierarchy despite the advent of democracy.

In both religions, deity is always placed at the top of the hierarchy, never at the bottom, despite all the moralising propaganda about the so-called modesty and simplicity of the deity however it may be conceived and by whoever.

Love is either total, eternal and indestructible or it is not. It is available to everybody, irrespective of their "cast" or place in society.

You write:

" I wish you and your wife, building on the love you already have, to find God in each other, so that your love will last forever, even beyond oblivion ...".

I am sure you mean well, Yuyutsu, and I thank you for your kind wishes but if either my dear wife or I had, at any point in our lives, counted on anything from some hypothetical god, we would not be the individuals we are today, with our personalities, concepts and values. We would be different persons with different life styles and trajectories.

We made it this far together and will be happy to continue on alone. Come what may.

You obviously have a very different outlook on life and I respect your difference.

I trust that you will respect mine.

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