Love and oxytosin

We evolved as social animals -- the chimpanzees and gorillas and especially the bonobos are also social animals, and the "love" they show is like the love in a pack of wolves -- a boon to survival of the pack and hence its members, excluding outsiders.

I don't think much of western "love." It is largely a Hollywood fantasy evolved from Western European romances.

When we see a child, especially our own, we fall in love with that baby because of a flood of a certain chemical (oxytosin) that floods our brain. It is all there to perpetuate the survival of our genes through that baby and be sure we care for it in spite of the problems and disruption to our lives it causes.

If you have ever tried oxytosin you realize how the emotion of love is just chemistry. For a short time one experiences delightful emotions of belonging and love for everyone around.

There is another emotion, compassion, that has a more interesting and puzzling source. We can learn compassion, and I think it is one of the foundations of morality. Still, it, too, and the altruism that accompanies it are closely associated with brain chemistry we evolved to help the species get on.

One other problem with "love" is that is seems to be so selective. We grieve when those close to us die, note the death of a celebrity with a certain regret, and don't even think about others in that regard. The dismissal I see from some characters who think themselves good people on this board of suffering of even children around the world,(in threads on global warming and on immigration and displaced people) is a good example of how essentially selfish the emotion of "love" generally is. It evolved that way and it takes getting above our animal natures for there to be true enlightened compassion, or "love" is one insists on that loaded word.