A while ago someone posted, I think on this site, “what is the opposite of love?” It was meant to be a trick question because they said the answer is not the obvious “hate” but rather “loneliness” or something like that.
At first I agreed, but the more I think about it I think the opposite of love really is hate.
In physics the opposite of any force is another force that, when applied to the first, causes zero. For example the opposite of a 50 mph north wind would be a 50 mph south wind so anyone standing where they meet would feel nothing.
So back to the question, the opposite of love is whatever force cancels it out. Loneliness doesn’t cancel out love, in fact it often intensifies it. But if you once loved someone and then you end up hating them just as much, it should cancel out (if in truly equal amounts) and when you think of that person again you’ll feel nothing.
Why am I bringing this up? Because someone I once loved hurt me very badly. It made me hate the person. And now I feel nothing.
And this feeling I have now, this feeling of “nothing”, neither love nor hate, nor happiness nor sadness, nor hope nor fear, is what I want to feel when the chemicals go through my veins and reach my heart and make it stop.
The opposite of love is hate. The opposite of birth is death. The end result is glorious zero.
16 comments
I’ve always thought that the opposite of love is apathy. With hate you’re still feeling something, with apathy you feel nothing. Hate requires effort, whereas with apathy you simply don’t care.
I think of apathy as the absence of love or hate, sort of a “glorious zero”.
🙂
i think the argument can go both ways.
It could also be argued that love and hate are opposite ends of the spectrum, whereas apathy would be the zero center. Or you could even see it as a triangle, where apathy is just as far from both love and hate, as love and hate are from each other.
Yeah, I get that. Love and hate both require an expenditure of effort.
What’s the opposite of anger? I’ve never been able to figure that one out. Peace, tolerance, acceptance, etc.? I’ve read different peoples answers but none of them rang true for me.
also, it’s entirely feasible for love and hate to share space, or overlap. But i don’t think they ever “cancel each other out” and cause a null sum. I think when you both love and hate someone, it’s still a huge mess of intense conflicting emotions.
So i’d have to say it’s not linear, and that the triangle would be the better representation… except that it doesn’t really account for the overlap. Maybe put a circle inside the triangle, and say that any overlap must be contained within. If you totally hate someone, you’d be on that corner, outside the circle… the same as if you totally don’t care, or totally love them.
However, the mixed feelings circle would also represent the constraints of mixed feelings, in which “complete” love, or hate, or apathy, cannot be reached, from within that circle.
ah, anger has its own triangle, with “sad” and “happy” in the other corners.
But then… you could make an overlay with the two triangles, where happiness and love share a corner, hate and anger share a corner, sadness and apathy share a corner… the only one that doesn’t quite fit is sadness and apathy, but i suppose they can be similar.
haha. The geometry of emotions: Using mathematical metaphors to understand psychology.
Very nice, Clevername.
I think the opposite of love is indifference
Or, for the mathematically inclined: e^x
Clevername is killing me over here. How about 3 circles with the center points of all three at the angle points of the triangle
@OLIR: lol… i hadn’t considered that, but i’ll think on it a bit.
also:
is not the opposite of hate, also apathy?
A triangle would allow apathy to be represented as equidistant from both love and hate, but without eliminating the possibility of representing mixed and overlapping feelings.
This could totally become an app…
I sorta like the concept of heads and tails; the flip side of the same coin.
Heads=happiness, Tails=misery. Two sides, opposite each other on the same coin.
(Math was never my best subject).
but coins never stand on end… which is either apathy or a combined set of contradictory overlapping emotions.
Yeah, triangles and circles encompass more territory.
A coin is either/or, whereas a triangle or a circle offer more options within the spectrum.
You can get a coin to stand on end, but you need a flat surface and a lot of free time.
Maybe that’s what God has been busy doing with all of the leisure time he seems to have.
The opposite of love is “my wife”.
(period).
lol