Philosophy Love&Sex

In this passage of The Erotic Phenomenon, from a chapter called “Concerning a Rational Reduction,” Jean-Luc Marion is critiquing the idea of certainty. This chapter overall considers the question of certainty, picking up where Descartes left off when he famously said that he could be certain of his own existence “I think, therefore I am.” Basically, Descartes means we can be certain of our own existence because we’re able to think. If we doubt our own existence, it would be proof that we’re thinking and therefore proof that we exist. Descartes concludes that we can be certain of our existence in this way. In this passage, Marion begins by asking whether that certainty is still in a way dependent on something else because it requires the person doing the thinking to produce the certainty. He explains that either the certainty comes from the person doing the thinking in which case it’s a circular argument because it’s not based on anything more than the person’s own insistence that he or she exists or, it has its source in something outside of the person, which would make that person’s existence contingent on something else. Either way, certainty depends on something else, and therefore, the person cannot be assured that the certainty is correct. In the overall structure of Marion’s argument, he’s trying to express that there is something more fundamental than certainty, even the certainty that a person exists. For him, the main question is “Does anybody love me?” Being assured of being loved (or even the possibility of being loved) comes first for Marion. When a person is confronted by the question “What’s the use?” it helps expose the futility of asking about whether a person is certain that the self exists. What would the point be of existing without love or the possibility of love? Thinking of these questions opposes the vanity and egotism of being obsessed with the self by making the person consider the other (the lover), and provides assurance that comes to the self from the outside (rather than the ego justifying itself with a circular argument). Overall, Marion extends Descartes argument by thinking more deeply about it, and offers a new answer to Descartes’ epistemic reduction, which just gets down to a self: he offers erotic reduction, which reduces the most important issue to the question of whether we can be assured that we are loved.

Solomon’s “identity theory of love” revolves around the idea that the self is defined by our relationships with others. He says the self is “Defined with and through others.” (Solomon 197). Normally we think that we determine who we are or discover who we are by ourselves. Solomon argues that others help establish who we are. Their opinions and ideas become parti of our idea of the self. Essentially, “We are the persons we think ourselves to be and become through the eyes and opinions of the people around us” (Solomon 202). The people we choose to associate with come to define who we are, and this is especially true of our lovers. For Solomon, love is “a redefinition of oneself in terms of goodness” (Solomon 206). because we want to be loved not only for who we are but for an ideal self that we try to become by being loved by the other person. Beauvoir, on the other hand, takes a different view of love from a feminist perspective. To her, romantic love can only be true if it is based on mutual freedom for both partners. But in many relationships, women experience “idolatrous love,” where they give up their own self for the sake of their partner. (Beauvoir 691). While Solomon thinks a person’s self depends on other people, Beauvoir sees self-transcendence as a kind of trap for women. It leads them to abandon themselves and allow themselves to be basically enslaved to a man. The way she describes the idea of being defined by someone else sounds sinister: “the woman first wants to serve; she will feel necessary in responding to her lover’s demands; she will be integrated into his existence, she will be a part of his value, she will be justified…The more demands the man makes, the more fulfilled the woman feels” (Beauvoir 691). For this reason, marriage tends to be a loveless prison for women because it’s something women are expected to do more than men, and it forces them to become basically servants for their husbands. On top of that, it has bad psychological effects, as the woman turns on herself. “The slide from generous enthusiasm to masochistic rage is easy. The woman in love who finds herself before her lover in the same situation as the child before his parents also recovers the feeling of guilt she experienced around them; she does not choose to revolt against him as long as she loves him: she revolts against herself” (Beauvoir 692). Overall, Beauvoir treats the selfless love that Solomon celebrates as a way for women to be oppressed.I agree with aspects of each of these philosophies of love. While it is true that love involves going out of yourself and connecting with other people, as Solomon argues, it is important not to completely lose yourself in a relationship, which Beauvoir points out is more common for women. I would claim that the self is neither entirely dependent on others or entirely independent. We have individual qualities that different people and relationships can bring out of us, but we can also develop these qualities on our own. It’s important to strike a balance between trying to be a better person in a relationship and not losing sight of who you are outside of the relationship.

Martha Nussbaum’s work challenges many traditional ideas, especially the notion that love and knowledge are opposed to each other. In the first place, Nussbaum points out that emotions like love are often discounted from rational analysis because they are viewed as instinctual or appetites. Yet, love differs from an instinct like hunger in many key ways. Most important, there are epistemic ideas that are built into love, while hunger is nothing more than a sensation in the body. For example, love involves the assumption that the other person has great value and the idea of wanting to do well for the other person. Hunger does not have these assumptions. It is true that there are irrational emotions, but there are also irrational beliefs this is not a reason to discount belief or emotions, just to recognize that there are rational versions. Furthermore, Nussbaum argues that we all admit that emotions have the power to persuade. We know that appeals to emotion because, emotions must have something to do with our beliefs and knowledge. Therefore, it’s inconsistent to argue that they have nothing to do with knowledge. As she puts it, “Knowledge of the heart must come from the heart”(Nussbaum 262). Western philosophy has tried to separate emotion from knowledge, even though emotion is important to knowledge. As a result, philosophers tend to think of knowledge as involving a “cataleptic impression”, having an impression arise in the mind that allows a person to comprehend something about reality ,Nussbaum explains, “It is essential to notice that the cataleptic impressions of love are still the unchallenged foundation of Knowledge (Nussbaum 273). Basically, many philosophers see knowledge as not involving emotions but involving an impression of comprehension. A person can just see and verify that something is true without emotions at all. But because emotions do have epistemic values built into them, this is a false view. As Nussbaum explains, we don’t just have impressions of emotions the emotions often actually lead us to impressions. “The love is not some separate fact about us that is signaled by the impression; the impression reveals the love by constituting it. Love is not a structure in the heart waiting to be discovered; it is embodied in, made up out of, experiences of suffering.” Nussbaum 267). This is where the value of literature is important. For Nussbaum, literature is a way to expand our experience by imagining new situations. Through literature we imagine new experiences and suffer with characters. These experiences produce emotions that can help us increase our emotional lives and lead us to greater knowledge of the world, especially moral knowledge. In this way, Nussbaum argues that knowledge is so much more than dry analysis of evidence, but something passionate that can be fed by reading, feeling, and experiencing. I would agree with Nussbaum that love has a place in philosophy and philosophy has a place in love. Too often, philosophy seems like a dry academic subject, but by taking Nussbaum’s view, we can see philosophy as passionate and involved in our emotions. Similarly, we often see love and relationships as frivolous, but Nussbaum shows how they can be part of our intellectual lives.