Replying to LO30272 --
Greetings At and group,
At said:
> I have explained to Andrew that for me that the emergence of love depends
> on the 7Es rather being the 8th one. You consider it as a "higher
> category".
My comment:
By higher I meant less complex and more abstract. By complex I mean
something like "composed", by abstract I mean subtle features of things.
For example, a hammer is less complex than a car, but both are attributed
with "steel." Steel is in this case more abstract and less complex than a
car.
I can say that Person A's love has such and such wholeness, sureness, etc.
but not the other way around. If the 7Es were bricks, love could be a
building, for lack of a better example of how I see it. They are more
elementary/abstract/subtle as they apply to any system in isolation.
Originally I suggested this order from the most abstract to the more complex
(now with a little more detail:)
1. Events (anything with a beginning). It is impossible to have evolution
without a beginning or beginnings (change is a collection of sequential
beginnings). Bodies and their attributes can't exist without being events,
but events are more elementary since all bodies are events, but not all
events are bodies.
2. Bodies and other events that are related to bodies (attributes such as
qualities, actions and relations). Bodies are more elementary than their
attributes since different attributes can come and go in the same body, but
bodies always have attributes.
3. The 7Es. You can have events or bodies with attributes without evolution,
but according to the theory, you can't have evolution without the 7Es.
I think this is the most concrete reason why I don't consider love to be
among the 7Es: the bottom line: you CAN have evolution in a system without
saying that it is attributed with love so and so. Moreover, I can describe
love in terms of the 7E's. E.g. for example, if you said "both his
children are good to him, but he only loves one of them." In this case I
would say that person is probably lacking in sureness and openness for
one.
At said:
> Some people say that love is an emotion. I think that love is more complex
> than being a mere emotion.
My comment:
I have to agree with that. I think love is extremely difficult to define
because it applies to so many things. I stuck to the "feeling" part of the
concept of love to avoid the abyss of trying to define love ;-) Sometimes
love refers to a feeling. I tried to make a short cut, but you didn't let
me get away with it ;-)
At said:
> Should that person die, we will grieve (which is an emotion) for him/her.
> But should that person excell in performance, we will have joy (another
> emotion) for him/her. Or should that person be in danger, we will have
> anxiety (also an emotion) for him/her. It is possible to think of love as
> the
> combination of all the emotions which it elicits. But i think it rather
> connects
> with all of them. Thus, although love can generate various emotions, this
> does not make love an emotion.
My comment:
I don't think the word has a single meaning. I think it can mean an
emotion at times. Other times it may refer to an act towards another, or a
wish to be near, or a wish for someone to succeed, or be happy .... I may
be wrong but I don't think we can succeed in arriving at a single meaning.
I remember when I was young there was a single picture cartoon series
called "Love is ...." Every week they'd put a new example or "definition"
in a weekly magazine. Moreover I think it means different things to
different people. Love is a cocktail of definitions in other words.
> The 7Es are not emotions. Love is not an emotion.
My comment:
I would say: the word love is not used ONLY for an emotion. The 7Es are
not emotions, but love CAN be an emotion. Love could also be referring to
affinities, or specific kinds of them. For example you said:
>For example, two persons
> who find each other attractive may eventually fall in love with each
> other.
My comment:
Yes, and in this particular example perhaps love would be attraction +
desire + friendship = deep attraction = love. I mean, if those three were
found, the person would say "I love you to the other." On the other hand,
some may feel attraction + desire would be love.
At said:
> But your viewpoint, which I agree with, does not
> exclude the one that love may emerge through affinities. In other words,
> there is a complex, two-way relationship between love and the affinities.
My comment:
At this point I'd like to digress slightly, because it seems we are
approaching the search for a definition in different ways. I have never
formally studied linguistics or philosophy, but done a fair bit of
language learning, and I think there are at least 4 approaches towards
definitions:
1. The approach that simply says that the definition of a word is the
collection of situations it applies to. This approach downplays the idea
of finding exact definitions. I like this way in most cases, because it
keeps you open minded about what people are trying to say rather than
picking on words. It explicitly recognizes that definitions have a tacit
dimension and are abstract symbols referring to meanings, not the meaning
itself.
2. To find one or more formal definitions that applies to all cases of the
word. This is the way of dictionaries.
3. To set artificial formal definitions for the sake of clarity. This is
the role of operational definitions and jargon in research and science.
4. To try to find a subtle idea that is shared in all meanings of a word,
and consider the other meanings as derived from it. This is close to
etymology, but it is not as concerned about history.
It seems to me that there is yet another way which you are hinting at: to
search for the meaning of a word in terms of it being a force or a flux.
This would be closely related to approach number 4, but a more specific
methodology. Actually, this 5th method can be applied to the 3rd also.
Looking back it seems that not only did I apply other meanings than "a
feeling," in the manner of the first approach, I also changed approach
(without being aware) and started talking about love with the fifth
approach to definition.
Regarding my comment:
> >I see a hierarchy of created things, starting with the most
> >elementary, as follows:
> >
> > 1. Events (anything with a beginning)
> > 2. Bodies and events that are related to bodies (such as
> > attributes and relations)
> > 3. The 7Es.
At said:
As for the "explicit awareness", i can put it at level 3 as you did, but as
for the "implicit operation" i cannot do so.
My comment:
I am not sure I quite understand you here. Did my expansion on what I
meant change anything?
At said:
> For me the 7Es cannot be destructive.
My comment:
I meant for example that letting a mad rapist into ones house would be too
much openness. Or one could say it is too little sureness. Perhaps it is a
"the glass is half empty or half full" issue?
Terje
--"Terje A. Tonsberg" <tatonsberg@hotmail.com>
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