Lucy Vincent
Where Has Love Gone? Publication date : June 7, 2007
Could love be the sign of the vast chasm that separates men and women rather than the expression of their desire to be closer? This is the question that Lucy Vincent asks here.
What is the use of the neuronal fireworks that characterise the madness of love if males and females were naturally destined to live together? Would it have been necessary for evolution to produce so much upheaval simply to oblige men and women to reproduce, if the differences between them were not so great greater even than the generally accepted differences of a sexual nature?
It is known that when we fall in love our brains initiate and nourish our dependence on the love-object, making him or her extremely attractive and seductive, and even irresistible, for a limited amount of time the time required for reproduction to take place. Until now, this biological fact has been used to draw a number of conclusions that have helped us improve our understanding of the pleasures and difficulties inherent in living with a partner. But, in a wider sense, what does it compel us to conclude concerning the nature of male-female relations?
Why does love come to an end and, usually, to such an unhappy end? Is it because once the magic of love has faded, men and women revert to their initial status: that of two strangers?
Could sexual attraction for the opposite sex merely be one of natures ruses to ensure the survival of the species? From this perspective, what does the absence of heterosexual desire or attraction mean?
Nevertheless, there are heterosexual couples who do stay together. What is the explanation? Is it because they have a reciprocal, non-verbal acceptance of their sexually related differences, and that this acceptance makes them better adapted to outlast the three-year lifespan that seems to be the lot of most relationships?
Lucy Vincent is the author of the best-selling Comment devient-on amoureux? and Petits arrangements avec lamour. Her new book, Où est passé lamour? continues and, perhaps, concludes the arguments presented in the earlier works.
What is the use of the neuronal fireworks that characterise the madness of love if males and females were naturally destined to live together? Would it have been necessary for evolution to produce so much upheaval simply to oblige men and women to reproduce, if the differences between them were not so great greater even than the generally accepted differences of a sexual nature?
It is known that when we fall in love our brains initiate and nourish our dependence on the love-object, making him or her extremely attractive and seductive, and even irresistible, for a limited amount of time the time required for reproduction to take place. Until now, this biological fact has been used to draw a number of conclusions that have helped us improve our understanding of the pleasures and difficulties inherent in living with a partner. But, in a wider sense, what does it compel us to conclude concerning the nature of male-female relations?
Why does love come to an end and, usually, to such an unhappy end? Is it because once the magic of love has faded, men and women revert to their initial status: that of two strangers?
Could sexual attraction for the opposite sex merely be one of natures ruses to ensure the survival of the species? From this perspective, what does the absence of heterosexual desire or attraction mean?
Nevertheless, there are heterosexual couples who do stay together. What is the explanation? Is it because they have a reciprocal, non-verbal acceptance of their sexually related differences, and that this acceptance makes them better adapted to outlast the three-year lifespan that seems to be the lot of most relationships?
Lucy Vincent is the author of the best-selling Comment devient-on amoureux? and Petits arrangements avec lamour. Her new book, Où est passé lamour? continues and, perhaps, concludes the arguments presented in the earlier works.