Love is NOT a Human Need (page 3)

BluesBrother

Dave said

LOVE IS A HUMAN NEED if the human wants the best life possible.

True, but what if you do not have it and one were not going to have a family now - perhaps one of those people in a loveless marriage that is noted only by its mediocrity and arguments - or a bachelor/spinster/ divorcee that may never now marry or find someone due to advancing years . What is one supposed to do? Descend into depression?

Or rather follow an assertive course. Find happiness wherever it may be found and believe in oneself . Love is wonderful, whether it is the type found in a family, or that of a relationship. But if it is not there, life can still be enjoyable and worthwhile. Put simply , one has to get on with life, and appreciate every day of the threescore and ten that we are allotted

I have a book by Dr W Dyer in which he said he would re write song titles such as "People who need people are the luckiest people in the world" He suggested something like "People who are not dependant on others for their personal happiness, but enjoy the company and sharing of love as a bonus, are the most balanced people in the world"

Sara Annie

One certainly can exist with only the basic physical 'needs' you listed.

But we, as creatures, really do NEED loving interaction with others as well. There have been countless cases of children who were provided with food, shelter, air and water--and deprived of kind and loving interaction with other people, sometimes ANY interaction--and they irrevocably lost their ability to develop emotionally, their brains simply no longer capable of becoming the people they might have been had somone cared for them beyond what was necessary to keep breathing. There have been tests on lower mammals, monkeys in particular, where a totally isolated creature was offered the choice between a hard wire and metal 'mom' with milk readily available, or a soft, warm 'mom' with no food. Almost without exception, they would choose the warm and soft surrogate regardless of the fact that other met their physical need for food.

So while in a rigid, completely academic sense your premise may indeed be true--I still don't buy it.

Are there some people who can live happily without ever experiencing the love of someone, anyone, else? I suppose there are. But you get weirdos in every breed...

Big Dog

Last call for the Starship Stoic non-stop to Vulcan where they play Paul Simon's "I am a Rock, I am an Island" over and over again for your enjoyment.

Rabbit

Logan's Run
But, does losing loved ones really need to be so terrible?
No, it doesn't. One of the reasons for this is that love, contrary to popular belief, is not a human need. It's a human want, but not a need. Humans have an innate biological tendency to have a strong desire for love, but no adult need ever died from a lack of it. Human needs are actually very minimal: air, water, a certain amount of food and general safety and security. That's it. That's all that is required to live.

Well, maybe in YOUR life it's not, but, in mine and many others it IS a need. So speak for yourself !

There have been enough JW shunning related suicides, that most people can draw accurate conclusions about whether "love" is only a want. Our brains need love and human contact to be mentally healthy.

Anything else is a simple, cold, sterile existence. My cats & dogs thrive on love. Have you ever seen a zoo animal that is caged...without any contact from it's own kind ? For an extreme example, look at what damage 'sensory deprivation' does to a person's mind.

Rabbit

blondie

All I could think of was a show about children warehoused in an orphanage in an Eastern European country. Not enough staff to do more than make sure they were fed, given liquids, and kept clean. But minimal touching and holding, no time. They even had a way to prop the bottle so the children could feed themselves. Then they talked about the psychological effects they saw in many of these children and other children in severely abusive situations. It seems to me that at some point humans do need touch, affection, caring. Fortunately for most of us, we received it somehow, if not from our parents, perhaps grandparents, uncles, aunts, a foster parent, etc. On the basis of this early foundation, as adults we know that love can be found and what it really is.

http://www.aacap.org/publications/factsfam/85.htm

REACTIVE ATTACHMENT DISORDER
#85	(11/02)

Reactive Attachment Disorder is a complex psychiatric illness that can affect young children. It is characterized by serious problems in emotional attachments to others and usually presents by age 5. A parent, daycare provider or physician may notice that a child has problems with emotional attachment by their first birthday. Often, a parent brings an infant or very young child to the doctor with one or more of the following concerns:

severe colic and/or feeding difficulties
failure to gain weight
detached and unresponsive behavior
difficulty being comforted
preoccupied and/or defiant behavior
inhibition or hesitancy in social interactions

Some children with Reactive Attachment Disorder may also be overly or inappropriately social or familiar with strangers. The physical, emotional and social problems associated with Reactive Attachment Disorder may persist as the child grows older.

The cause of Reactive Attachment Disorder is not known. Most children with this disorder have had severe problems or disruptions in their early relationships. Many have been physically or emotionally abused or neglected. Some have experienced inadequate care in an institutional setting or other out-of-home placement (for example a hospital, residential program, foster care or orphanage). Others have had multiple or traumatic losses or changes in their primary caregiver.

Blondie (happy she had a caring nanny in her early years while mom and pop partied the days and nights away.)

ohiocowboy

Love definately IS a human need. Studies have shown that babies born with different illnesses have a much higher recovery rate when they are shown love by the nurses and the parents, and the mortality rate is much higher in infants who are not shown love. In addition, many Elderly people are known to live longer lives, when they have pets as companions, as they are able to give love to their pets, and the pets likewise return the love to the owners.

ballistic

I wouldn't have thought such a complex emotional system would have evolved without purpose. Sure, you can live without it, but so can you loads of other emotions, some people manage to survive after loosing their sense of touch - they get lots of injuries - but you could argue it's not a need. Just to add that love probably evolved as a means to protect ones offspring (I haven't done any research) but you must accept that that would give a benefit in terms of "survival of the fittest". ... and if the poster meant receiving love and not feeling it - I would argue you cannot seperate the two concepts in this example.

Terry

True, but what if you do not have it and one were not going to have a family now - perhaps one of those people in a loveless marriage that is noted only by its mediocrity and arguments - or a bachelor/spinster/ divorcee that may never now marry or find someone due to advancing years . What is one supposed to do? Descend into depression?

You can love somebody or something without having to marry them and have a family or possess the object of your desire, can you not?

Planning for a future is a long term investment. As I mentioned in my post. Short term is gambling.

Each person chooses (if they have the ability to exercise choice) what is the highest value by the appraisal them make according to their own standards.

Surely this includes choosing NOT to have a family or to enter a loveless one.

T.

ballistic

Terry, I was talking about human needs in terms of evolution, I don't think you can consider this in terms of sociological needs? Or we could be here all day.

hamsterbait

The socialisation of love is bound up with our prehistory.

By forming bonds with others, we ensured that if parents died, any offspring would be cared for by others in the group, on the basis of a lingering emotional attachment. Look at other primates where babies are killed by other mothers or dominant males.

In our case this meant that more intelligent adults preserved the next generation of more intelligent children.

In the prehistoric world a weakling like Homo would very quickly have been preyed on to extinction unless they cooperated. The pleasure we feel at being accepted and loved is built in to ensure we seek out healthy social patterns, just as the pleasure of sex ensures we seek out copulation.

By your argument sex is NOT a Human need as nobody ever died because they didn't get their rocks off. Our survival as a species is now threatened, because we have lost the ability to see the starving or the poor as our siblings. Now the attitude seems to be "feed them or blow them up - what's the difference? It's not in my back yard..."

HB

Love is NOT a Human Need

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