Monica Roland

This paper addresses the relation between love and the gaze (or vision) as portrayed by both David Velleman (1999) and Iris Murdoch (1970). While Velleman’s account has inspired much of the recent philosophical debate on love, we now see an increasing interest also in Murdoch’s work. Despite Murdoch’s clear influence on Velleman, the two end up with quite different theories. I believe, however, that both accounts provide us with valuable insights into the nature of love and that they on certain key points also complement each other.

In this article I examine David Velleman’s account of love (Velleman, 1999). On his account, love for other persons is a moral emotion in the sense that it necessarily involves the moral attitude of respect; both love and respect are responses to the inherent value (dignity) of the other as an end in him- or herself. I consider two important objections to his account. The first objection is that his theory cannot account for the particularity and selectivity of love. The second objection is that his theory cannot account for different modes of love. Both objections stress that Velleman ignores the importance of the relational context for love. However, even if these objections are justified, it does not follow that we need to reject Velleman’s central thesis; that respect is a necessary condition for love. Rather, I will argue that an account of love as a response to a generic value we all share, is compatible with a theory of love as a justified (or appropriate) response to reasons for selectivity.

We commonly take ourselves to have good reasons for promoting the interests and well-being of our loved ones. There is disagreement, however, about the nature of those reasons. What exactly provides us with reasons for acts of love and how do these reasons relate to other reasons for beneficial acts such as moral reasons? I address these questions here by considering Harry Frankfurt’s and David Velleman’s respective accounts of love, with a particular focus on their responses to Bernard Williams’s hypothetical case of the drowning wife. While Frankfurt argues for a non-moral account of love, Velleman insists that love is a moral emotion. Furthermore, while Frankfurt argues that the husband’s reason for saving his wife over a stranger is given by his love for her, Velleman argues that the husband’s reason for preference has nothing essentially to do with love but is rather provided by their relationship. I argue that both accounts neglect the intimate relation between love and special relationships. Our reasons for benevolent acts on behalf of loved ones are provided by the same things we essentially value in love, the inherent moral value of our beloveds and the special relationships we have with them.