10 June 06 - 02:44The science of love

Stumbled upon this excellent article on the Cornell University website describing the science behind love. It starts off with "OVER the course of history it has been artists, poets and playwrights who have made the greatest progress in humanity's understanding of love. Romance has seemed as inexplicable as the beauty of a rainbow. But these days scientists are challenging that notion, and they have rather a lot to say about how and why people love each other."

And further down "Scanning the brains of people in love is also helping to refine science's grasp of love's various forms. Helen Fisher, a researcher at Rutgers University, and the author of a new book on love*, suggests it comes in three flavours: lust, romantic love and long-term attachment. There is some overlap but, in essence, these are separate phenomena, with their own emotional and motivational systems, and accompanying chemicals. These systems have evolved to enable, respectively, mating, pair-bonding and parenting."

After reading the article, what is placed before you in a rather cut & dried fashion is that there really is no such thing as romance or love, we are all just hooked onto the pleasure that these chemicals in our brain give us and you/ your girlfriend/ boyfriend/ spouse/ partner/ mate/ or what have you are NOT in love at all - its all just a form of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)! They speculate that doctors might someday even figure out ways to make people fall in and out of love, without the associated pain! Gee wow! Isn't science simply wonderful... I recall once being told by someone that no one falls in love unless they want to... wonder if that person was talking about the same damn thing...

Anyhow, check it out here and form your own opinions

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