Love In-Between

Abstract

In this paper, we introduce an enactive account of loving as participatory sense-making inspired by the “I love to you” of the feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray. Emancipating from the fusionist concept of romantic love, which understands love as unity, we conceptualise loving as an existential engagement in a dialectic of encounter, in continuous processes of becoming-in-relation. In these processes, desire acquires a certain prominence as the need to know (the other, the relation, oneself) more. We build on Irigaray’s account of love to present a phenomenology of loving interactions and then our enactive account. Finally, we draw some implications for ethics. These concern language, difference, vulnerability, desire, and self-transformation.

Grief, Continuing Bonds, and Unreciprocated Love

“…Søren Kierkegaard ([1847] 1995) sees reciprocity as one of the components of friendship, but one that makes friendship problematic and lesser than the love for God, while Simone de Beauvoir ([1949] 1956) thinks that reciprocity is an element of loving relationships that needs to be based on mutual, equal recognition. In the philosophy of cognitive science, dynamic interaction has been taken to be central to our relationships with others (e.g., McGann and De Jaegher 2009; Candiotto and De Jaegher 2021) and empirical work has emphasized the involvement of mutual bodily regulation in our relationships (Hofer 1984; Atzil and Barrett 2017). Elsewhere within contemporary analytic philosophy, some form of reciprocity has been treated as a requirement for, or at least a very important element of, relationships like friendships or romantic partnerships (Rorty 1987; Nozick 1989; Cocking and Kennett 1998; Kolodny 2003; Foster 2008; Helm 2010; Krebs 2014; Bagley 2015; Nehamas 2016).…”

“…With his view, mutual affection and shared decisions-in essence, a shared life-are necessary conditions for such friendship (see Sherman [1987] for an analysis of Aristotle's approach to friendship and shared life, which also uncovers similar claims on reciprocity in Kant's work). philosophy of cognitive science, dynamic interaction has been taken to be central to our relationships with others (e.g., McGann and De Jaegher 2009;Candiotto and De Jaegher 2021) and empirical work has emphasized the involvement of mutual bodily regulation in our relationships (Hofer 1984;Atzil and Barrett 2017). Elsewhere within contemporary analytic philosophy, some form of reciprocity has been treated as a requirement for, or at least a very important element of, relationships like friendships or romantic partnerships (Rorty 1987;Nozick 1989;Cocking and Kennett 1998;Kolodny 2003;Foster 2008;Helm 2010;Krebs 2014;Bagley 2015;Nehamas 2016).…”

Communing with the Dead Online: Chatbots, Grief, and Continuing Bonds

“…The need for mutual and reciprocal engagement is also emphasized in literature on loving relationships (e.g. Anderson, 2019;Candiotto and De Jaegher, 2021;Millar and Lopez-Cantero, 2022). Continuing bonds with someone after they have died, then, necessitates a change in our relationship with a loved one, as this can no longer be a relationship founded on reciprocity.…”

Emotions in knowledge production

“…In dialogue with other colleagues and traditions of thought, especially Pragmatism and Feminism, for example in Candiotto and Piredda (2019),Candiotto and De Jaegher (2021) andCandiotto and Dreon (2021).5 This approach is quite common in the psychological literature on emotion, and it has recently been brought to the attention of philosophers, for example byBrady (2019).…”