Logical reason we are still in love when we aren't thinking about love?

[Thomas_Jennings]

In an argument for the existence of our values existing even when our brain is not conscious of them (not thinking about them), I have asked ‘do you still love a person/thing even when you are not thinking about that person/thing?’

Basically, does something matter if you’re not (and no one is…) thinking/feeling how it matters? I basically want a really logical answer. Please no ‘because I feel as though I do’ answers- because if you feel something you’re feeling it: and the question is about what happens to the value when you’re NOT feeling it and no one is.

I don’t want a ‘because God exists and He upholds these values’ answer as well, please, because the purpose of the question is as part of another argument for God…it’s no good using God as an argument for God’s existence because you’d have to proove God exists first as an axium!

Cheers.

 

[seagal]

Does your memory of an event still exist in your brain even if you’re not actively remembering it? Of course, because you can access that memory at any time. Applying that analogy to love for another person, if that love disappeared when I wasn’t consciously thinking about it, wouldn’t that mean it would have to be recreated every time I see that person? But that’s not what happens. I see my loved one and my feelings continue seamlessly from the last time I saw him or her (I’m thinking of my children since my husband is deceased). That love is stored somewhere in my brain until I need to access it, but it doesn’t disappear.

 

[JohnGerard]

Even though you asked for a really logical answer…I thought I’d give mine anyways. Tough question, I think. I’ll try two answers. First, yes…things matter even if we aren’t actively thinking about them. For example, the greatest commandment is to love God with all of our heart, all of our mind, all of our soul, and all of our strength. However, we may not always be thinking of God (at least not directly) especially when we turn our thoughts and energy towards fulfilling the second part of that commandment to “love our neighbor as ourselves”. We must focus some time and energy on loving others but that doesn’t mean we don’t still love God.

Second, I think love is primarily an act of the will, not a feeling. If we have chosen to love someone (a child for example), we can love that person even when we aren’t feeling like it or actively thinking of them. I don’t stop loving my children when I’m asleep at night and not actively thinking of them. I wonder if I can’t love someone until I make the decision (an act of the will) to stop loving them. So my love for a child still matters even if I am not actively thinking about it or “feeling” it. It especially matters to them.

I’m sorry, I may have misunderstood what you were asking a bit.

 

[Ignatius]

I
Basically, does something matter if you’re not (and no one is…) feeling how it matters?.

Actually, feelings have very little to do with it. Love is wanting the ultimate good for the other person. So, you love them even when you aren’t feeling it or thinking about it. You love them even when you are upset with them. You love them when you do what will bring them the ultimate good even if it means telling them something they don’t want to hear in order to bring them the that Eternal Joy. The is actually the ultimate good and the most loving thing you can do for them.

 

[Rhubarb]

Why would it be the case that things stopped matter in to us when said thing wasn’t salient to us? We’re not really salient of anything when we sleep, but we all know things matter to us even when we sleep.

 

[fhansen]

It’s inherent in human nature. We don’t stop being who we are just because we’re not capable of total consciousness of every memory and every like or dislike and every political position and every aspect of our lives all at one and the same time. I don’t stop being a father simply because I’m not presently conscious of my children. I don’t wake up each morning with a clean slate, as if my past had no affect on who I am now, or else I’d suddenly change or lose my tastes, my personality, my values, my love for another, every time I lost immediate consciousness of them.

Instead humans are very consistent in these areas, and as a result we can predict their behavior. Observance of these consistent patterns means that not retaining consciousness of any traits or aspect of our lives doesn’t mean we cease to possess them. IOW, there must be a continous link, of necessity, between my love for a person today and my love for them yesterday, or else it would not even be possible to still love them today.

 

[Mintaka]

Amazingly enough, you don’t have to have conscious thoughts of breathing in order to keep breathing.

Continuity. You don’t have to look at rocks for them to continue existing, either.

 

[Thomas_Jennings]

Amazingly enough, you don’t have to have conscious thoughts of breathing in order to keep breathing.

Continuity. You don’t have to look at rocks for them to continue existing, either.

True enough- but is consciousness like that? Things seem to pop in and out of my head…and, whilst it takes no more than a fraction of a moment to recall a thought or emotion, I cannot say I am aware of thoughts still existing when I’m not thinking them for the obvious reason that, should I be aware, I would be thinking of them!

 

[polytropos]

In an argument for the existence of our values existing even when our brain is not conscious of them (not thinking about them), I have asked ‘do you still love a person/thing even when you are not thinking about that person/thing?’

Basically, does something matter if you’re not (and no one is…) thinking/feeling how it matters? I basically want a really logical answer. Please no ‘because I feel as though I do’ answers- because if you feel something you’re feeling it: and the question is about what happens to the value when you’re NOT feeling it and no one is.

Well, I’m not sure what the question has to do with love and value per se. Philosophers have said a lot about the so-called propositional attitudes (believe, desire, fear, etc.). It is widely recognized that they are only necessarily dispositional, not occurrent, mental states. That you are not thinking about how the Eiffel Tower is in France does not at all undermine the fact that you believe the Eiffel Tower is in France. Likewise, I see no problem with loving someone about whom you are not thinking.

Regarding love and value, though, I find it interesting that you take the question of loving someone about whom you aren’t thinking as being basically equivalent to the question of the objectivity of value. For the reason I’ve just given, I think those are definitely different questions; all value and loving could be subjective even though such attitudes toward things are dispositional.

But I do think value is objective and we have good reasons for saying so. I don’t think value is essentially linked to evaluation, because I think the goodness of things is a matter of their success as members of their natural kinds. Insofar as they succeed in that respect, they flourish and are good. That’d be the case even if there were no minds around to evaluate (say) good and bad trees. (I guess God would always be ‘around’. But the point stands: Their goodness depends on their being sustained as *these * sorts of things, not on anyone’s approving of them.)