What is the opposite of love?

[tar]

Ten Oz,

 

Well yes. The simple definition of love does not address every situation. It is just meant as a starting point, to understand oneself and one's assessment of others. The team thing is an offshoot, and just one team is not expected to be that case, in the overall theory. A person can be on all sorts of teams. To all sorts of different degrees. As Ed Earl has in his signature, if you are not confused, you don't understand the situation. I am in no way considering this a black and white answer to every human emotion and situation. Just a starting point. Taking good, neutral and bad, and associating those thoughts with first person, second person and third person. And assuming that those things you think of as good, are those things you associate with, and that you associate with your own self image and generally, with exceptions, things framed in the first person are good, second person neutral and third person negative. I use Pinker's example of the same thought framed in the three persons. I am exploring my sexuality, you are loose, she is a whore. Same exact sexual conduct, framed in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd persons.

 

You know, from the politics thread it is obvious that people tend to demonize some group of people or another that they have decided is composed of evil people. Hate groups are on the rise in the U.S. Polarized politics, where if you are Democrat and block a conservative judge you are doing a wonderful thing, whereas if you are a Democrat and someone is trying to block a progressive Judge, you are incensed.

 

This theory of mine is not meant to tell anyone who is right and who is wrong. It is just meant to share the insight, that we all naturally back the folks who we consider like us, part of the family, part of the tribe, and naturally relegate the other tribe to the status of resource stealing interlopers. There are any number of alterations to this plan. People can on purpose root for the other team...to make it fair, or as part of a greater strategy, or as a member of a greater team...but the principle I think is clear, evolutionarily based, and consistent not only with my own actions, and desires, but often recognizable and understandable, when viewing the actions of others.

 

Like professional team sports. If you are from the N.Y. area the chances are really good that you are a Yankee or a Met or Jet or Giant or Flyer or Ranger or Devils fan. Unless you like soccer and then you might root for Barcelona...but that makes the Red Sox the enemy, if you are a Yankee fan, and chances are, objectively speaking, the players on the Red Sox will have approximately the same amount of good, neutral and bad traits, that the players on the Yankees will have. But when a player's Mom watches the game, I am pretty sure I can guess how she would like to see her son do.

 

Regards, TAR

But forgiving people for a bad thing they did, because somebody did a bad thing to them is allowed.

 

We even forgive ourselves for bad stuff we do, if we can come up with a rationalization and a reason for why we did the thing. Justifiable homicide. Our presidents in the last 20 years, whether Republican or Democrat, have signed the order to send a cruise missile or a drone to kill someone.

 

It is quite natural to say...well that was needed, AND it is quite natural for the brother of the guy at the other end of gun, to seek revenge.

Ok, Ten Oz,

 

I see your point again. I am not answering the question. Hate is not the opposite.

 

How about the opposite of love is not love.

 

Or using my definition, the opposite of love is when you exclude (passively or actively) an other entity from your feeling of self.

 

Regards, TAR

Edited February 17, 2016 by tar

[Ten oz]

Ok, Ten Oz,

 

I see your point again. I am not answering the question. Hate is not the opposite.

 

How about the opposite of love is not love.

 

Or using my definition, the opposite of love is when you exclude (passively or actively) an other entity from your feeling of self.

 

Regards, TAR

That was all I have been saying. I do not claim to know the answer. I don't think there is a singular one.

 

As for tribes they too are subjective. While you were in Germany I speculate that people who spoke American english to you as opposed to German or even english with an accent of somekind felt more your tribe. An American born black or latino was more your tribe than the Germans even though the Germans may have appeared more like you genetically? At a crowded ballpark which team jersey a person is wearing more so than their race may make you feel they are with your tribe. It is greatly influenced by ones own perspective.

[tar]

Ten Oz,

 

Well I would expect human emotion to be a subjective thing. After all, in this society, if your are not in Utah, you marry one person. 8 billion people in the world, and you pick one to partner with. Purely subjective, no right or wrong objectively attached to your decision. Your choice need not please me, my choice need not please you. But our society puts an objective limit on the amount of life partners you should have. Everybody knows this, and knows the benefits accrued to two people facing life together, as opposed to one. These type of morays and morals and rituals and such have historical and genetic reasons to be the case. Not only religious prescriptions, but legal prescriptions and family prescriptions dictate to a person, or at least highly affect a person's choice, in terms of who he or she will "love" as a mate or life partner.

 

So not only are the genes involved, and the hormones and the pheromones and the dopamine, but society is involved as well. Family and friends, and government and church and business, all have their say, in terms of who and what you include in your feeling of self.

 

No one answer to what is the opposite of love, because there is no one answer to what is love in the first place.

 

That is why I formulated a definition. So one could parse everything in terms of whether the entity in question was one you included in your feeling of self.

 

When I was in Germany, I walked across the street from my Kaserne into a graveyard where I saw several grave stones with my family name on them. While on alert on several occasions I had live ammunition to protect secure equipment, and would muse about what I would do, if people, who could be my relatives, would want to take it. I would go out to bars in town by myself in civilian clothes to purposefully learn German, and invariably the people I sat with knew English, better than I knew German and they used the situation to practice their English. My dad was wounded in Germany during the battle of the Bulge, we visited the hill he was shot on, we saw the spot on the Saar where the 94th crossed on a pontoon bridge. I have a book with a picture of my dad being carried by German Prisoners across that bridge. I also have stories my dad told me about his time on that hill. I was in Germany to protect West Germany from Soviet Tank Invasion. I was on the side of the Germans. I fell in love with a German girl for several months. I am on the German team, as I am on the American team, as I am on the human team. The choice of teams may be subjective, but it is also not an exclusive choice. And it is not a choice that someone else can make for you, based on appearances or statistics. The teams you are on, and the teams you want to support and the people you want to please, is a calculation made, subconsciously and consciously by an individual, and can not be properly assessed from the outside. This makes it subjective, yes. But it does not make it arbitrary. We are on the teams we are on, for reasons. Objectively true reasons. Be they chemical, genetic, or societal in origin.

 

So, in terms of the thread, if we are to figure what the opposite of love is, should we not first agree upon a definition that we can negate, to reach the opposite?

 

Regards, TAR

or perhaps simply state that the opposite of love, is unlove if a verb and out of love, if its a condition

Edited February 18, 2016 by tar

[Ten oz]

@TAR, of course it is arbitrary; to imply otherwise is to say there is an ultimate reason or good. Culture is a human creation and not a force of nature. We could choose to all speak one language or become one race (does race even exists) if we chose. There was an East and West German and not there is just German. We can decide to divide or unite. It is all just choice and the only motivating factors generally are ones centered around emotions like trust, fear, pride, greed, etc. It is absolutely arbitrary. You post a lot about picking sides and teams but one controls the conditions of their birth. we have some contol over our choices but nothing else; not really.

 

As for love and people picking one partner out of 8 billion; I don't believe that either. Selecting a mate is a lot more like fishing than it is shopping. There may be 8 billion fish in the water but the avaerage person on the pier with a pole is lucky to catch anything much less have a selection. All the fish are not equally in play. Often people take what they can get. Our biology helps. Sex is still sex and the chance to reproduce is still a chance our biology wants. So any fish is better than no fish. Most people would want the healthiest most attractive mate they can catch. That is how our biology works. Family and friends, and government and church and business, all have their say, but dam near no one is turning down a perfect 10 and committing to a 5 just to please someone else. Of course this gets into the question of control and how much conscious control we actually have over our lives.

 

Anyways it appears that we agree 100% of the threads question:"No one answer to what is the opposite of love, because there is no one answer to what is love in the first place.'

[tar]

Ten Oz,

 

Agreed.

 

 

Regards, TAR

[Velocity_Boy]

You are going to get a lot of replies here that will tell us that the opposite of love is Hate.

 

This of course, is wrong.

 

Why?

 

Easy.

 

In order to hate something or somebody you must have a passion in regards to some form or tangent of that person. Or thing. Or situation. Whatever.

 

Hate and love are two different points on a linear graph of human emotions that can be inspired. Key word here, folks.....inspired.

 

Thus...we need a word for the opposite of love that requires no inspiration of fervent feeling that emanaated from the person who caused it.

 

Apathy.

 

That is the opposite of love.

 

Uncaring, unfeeling, non caring total apathy.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Thanks.

[LilyBonaparte]

A simple analogy would be to let the number 1 represent love; this means that if you take away the emotion, you're left with indifference, which would be represented by the number 0. Anyone who's gone to school knows that 0 is not the opposite of 1, which by extension means that indifference cannot be the opposite of love. The opposite of love would have to be represented by the number -1, which in my mind would clearly be hate.If I'm missing something here, please fill me in, because I absolutely know for a fact that lack of is not the same thing as opposite of.

You can both love and hate someone simultaneously therefore they clearly can't be opposites, you can't walk backwards and forwards at the same time, because they are opposites. If you Love someone you can't also have apathy for them, hence why indifference is the opposite of love. And while we're at it; the opposite of a number isnt another number, its no number at all; zero. Just like how the opposite of an emotion isnt another emotion, its no emotion at all.

Edited September 2, 2016 by LilyBonaparte

[Strange]

You can both love and hate someone simultaneously therefore they clearly can't be opposites, you can't walk backwards and forwards at the same time, because they are opposites.

 

 

You can wear a black and white striped coat; does that mean that black and white are not opposites?

 

And while we're at it; the opposite of a number isnt another number, its no number at all; zero.

 

 

Er, zero is a number.

[Ten oz]

Love is an emotion experience by individuals differently and by some not at all. Asking what is the opposite of love is akin to asking what is the opposite to the shape of a cloud.

[blue89]

Maybe somebody could explain this to me; I read somewhere that the generally accepted opposite of the emotion 'love' is 'indifference', But this makes absolutely no sense to me. To me, the clear-cut opposite of love is hate. And that makes perfect sense.

 

Indifference cannot be the opposite of love because indifference by definition means that you don't feel anything for the person, you neither love nor hate the person. This means that in effect, indifference is simply the lack of both love and hate.

 

A simple analogy would be to let the number 1 represent love; this means that if you take away the emotion, you're left with indifference, which would be represented by the number 0. Anyone who's gone to school knows that 0 is not the opposite of 1, which by extension means that indifference cannot be the opposite of love. The opposite of love would have to be represented by the number -1, which in my mind would clearly be hate.

 

If I'm missing something here, please fill me in, because I absolutely know for a fact that lack of is not the same thing as opposite of.

 

sorry ,I cancelled my this comment. this was containing some instructions about private life.

apologies.according to my principles ,this will not be useful to share our private life's events.

but I may clearly say that ,I don't agree religious rules. (both christianity & islamic)

My opinion is to comply SCIENTIFIC DATUMS or your own principles.

 

Regards

Edited September 2, 2016 by blue89

[LilyBonaparte]

You can wear a black and white striped coat; does that mean that black and white are not opposites?

 

 

 

Er, zero is a number.

Exaclty, they are separate stripes... You can't have white and black as one just like you can't have apathy and love as one... But you can have love and hate as one, so they obviously aren't opposites.

 

So what's your logic here? You can make a coat that has different stripes saying Love and Indifference, does that mean that you can have indifference towards someone and love them? No, because then you clearly aren't being indifferent. Wether you paint something on a coat or not has nothing to do with anything but fashion.

 

And if numbers are labels for emotions as put forth by the original poster, then one assumes zero is the equivalent of zero emotion aka indifference. Why do you think we invented the number 0? To be able to represent; as an answer, nothing, nought, a zero sum. So I said Zero as the representation of apathy and also as the embodiment of nothing. You can't have 1 and -1 simultaneously, it comes to zero. Which as I just said in this analogy zero would be apathy, but in reality you can love and hate someone and it doesn't equate to nothing and it certainly doesnt equate to indifference, which is why this is a terrible analogy.

Love is an emotion experience by individuals differently and by some not at all. Asking what is the opposite of love is akin to asking what is the opposite to the shape of a cloud.

Exactly Love is an emotion, so whats the opposite of an emotion? Apathy, indifference, no emotion.

 

Whats the opposite of a shape? No shape.

Whats the opposite to a cloud? No cloud.

Edited September 2, 2016 by LilyBonaparte

[MigL]

Have to agree with Ten oz.

Even opposite is a subjective definition, so this OP is pointless as it becomes an exercise in subjective beliefs.

 

And some people would say you can have black and white together.

Its called 'gray'. But again, it depends on whether you use the 'light' definition of colour or the 'paint' definition.

[tar]

MigL,

 

Well then maybe black and white is a good analogy, either definition you use.

 

White is all colors, black is no colors.

White is no pigments and all wavelengths of light are reflected, black is all pigments or enough that all wavelengths of light are absorbed.

 

Either way half black and half white make gray.

 

Regards, TAR

[Strange]

Exaclty, they are separate stripes... You can't have white and black as one just like you can't have apathy and love as one... But you can have love and hate as one, so they obviously aren't opposites.

 

 

Can you? I would have thought that the emotions alternated, rather than happening at the same time. But I am only guessing as I have never been in a position to know...

[tar]

Thread,

 

I agree with Strange. The striped shirt alternates. The black pixels on the page alternate to allow the white on the page to show and make gray. The screen has red blue and green pixel on to make white alternating with off pixels to make grey. The love and hate alternate, because sometimes you include the other in your feeling of self and sometimes you don't. Or sometimes you love the other entity and sometimes you don't and sometimes you actively don't, or you actively exclude the other from your feeling of self.

 

So to speak.

 

Regards, TAR

Edited September 2, 2016 by tar

[Itoero]

I think the opposite of loving a person is not being aware of that person's existence.

Edited September 18, 2016 by Itoero

[MinyChip]

You see, the problem is you're not considering how these two emotions/feeling/whatever else you want to call them fit together. If you think about it, you only love something or someone because you hate the opposite of what that thing or person is. However, that is not to say that they are opposite. Why? Because hate and love can only exist based on each other. If you didn't know what love was, how could you know what hate was.

 

Now you may use the number analogy again, to say that 1 is the opposite of -1 and 0 is the middle ground, however you have proven yourself wrong by using that analogy. If 1 represents love, and 0 represents indifference or lack of feeling, then -1 would represent an even more intense lack of feeling, which is very very different than feeling hate.

 

The only way to not experience love or hate is to be completely indifferent to both feelings, to completely have no feeling at all. You can only love if you hate, and you can only hate if you love, and a lot of times we do both at the same time. If you are indifferent, you feel neither...

Edited January 28, 2017 by MinyChip

[Schell]

Love is a positive emotion, indifference is a neutral emotion, and hate is a negative emotion.

 

I think your reasoning is faulty, Hypercube.

 

Assigning an emotional value to the labels we use for emotions, doesn't make the question easier for you to answer. It actually confuses the issue. A label is simply a label, neither positive or negative. What you are describing is the physiological response you feel when you love or hate, and you're doing it in keeping with the conventional view that hate is a negative response. From that point you have assigned it a mathematical value by assuming that "more than" and "less than" are opposites (which of course they are in mathematics).

 

What you are ignoring is that emotions are not quantifiable using mathematics. So more than '0' is a positive whether we are talking about love or hate, whereas '-1' is an impossibility with respect to emotion, you either have some or not. You cannot have less than no emotion, so the opposite of both positive emotional responses, love and hate - is indifference.

[Zinalu]

I don't think there is an opposite of any emotion but the opposite of strong emotions would be no emotion at all, also depends what love, love for a partner might be lonelyness, love for a hobby might be discouraged, like if you don't feel you are good at anything and therefor don't have a hobby.

[DanTrentfield]

You are going to get a lot of replies here that will tell us that the opposite of love is Hate.

 

This of course, is wrong.

 

Why?

 

Easy.

 

In order to hate something or somebody you must have a passion in regards to some form or tangent of that person. Or thing. Or situation. Whatever.

 

Hate and love are two different points on a linear graph of human emotions that can be inspired. Key word here, folks.....inspired.

 

Thus...we need a word for the opposite of love that requires no inspiration of fervent feeling that emanaated from the person who caused it.

 

Apathy.

 

That is the opposite of love.

 

Uncaring, unfeeling, non caring total apathy.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Thanks.

You dirty little word thief..... I was going to say that.....

[Raider5678]

Here is the catch: You can not hate anything you are not in someway in love with.

I can.

[Velocity_Boy]

Deleted......vb

Edited March 15, 2017 by Velocity_Boy

[mikeco]

There are many opposites of love. But hate, apathy, indifference, arrogance, conceit, self-importance...are all attitudes that develop out of one basic thing. And that thing, is the primary opposite of love. By understanding what that thing is, one can begin to understand what love really is...because it is not what we might think.

[Area54]

20 hours ago, mikeco said:

There are many opposites of love. But hate, apathy, indifference, arrogance, conceit, self-importance...are all attitudes that develop out of one basic thing. And that thing, is the primary opposite of love. By understanding what that thing is, one can begin to understand what love really is...because it is not what we might think.

I shall take the bait. What is that "one basic thing"?

[mikeco]

3 hours ago, Area54 said:

I shall take the bait. What is that "one basic thing"?

Lol...I was wondering if anyone would. First, I would be interested as to what you think it might be. Any ideas?