One of the main works of Matthew Liao was the study of the right of a child to be loved. Undoubtedly, the child has the right to be loved and, moreover, to love. Love should not be a duty, and it should be sincere and not only concern the child but also go from the child to the parents. Love can also be felt between friends or just close people. However, love is not limited to human relationships and can also be directed to the whole world. Love is an emotion that may or may not be. Love is also a strong feeling that cannot be commanded and often leads to the suppression of the free will of the loving person.
Commandability objection is an argument that is opposed to the opinion that love is a duty. Naturally, it is impossible to resist the appearance of love. Liao states: “Love is a matter of feeling, not of desire, and I can’t love because I want to, even less because I have to; therefore, the obligation to love is absurd” (Liao 1). There are supporters of the Kantian theory that everything should and can be commendable. It is difficult to agree with this opinion since love is still a feeling and an emotion that cannot be fully controlled, no matter how much a person wants to. True love cannot come from moral considerations or from duty (Love on demand: Can you will love? 10). Love is not a desire but something that arises unexpectedly and cannot be explained by philosophers, scientists, or other people. The best objection to the commandability objection is that love is an emotion that cannot be controlled.
This objection to the commandability objection cannot be called absolutely successful. Having experienced the full range of emotions that love or parting with a loved one brings them, some people will prefer that love can be managed. The fleetingness of love may cause significant pain (Frankfurt, Duty and Love 7). People understand that if love were manageable, they would avoid all the suffering that love brings them. Resolution in regulating emotions is not guaranteed, and there is no significant probability of having this success (The Idea of a Duty to Love 12). This statement confirms the point of view that the object to the commandability objection cannot be called successful.
Love is something conscious that needs to be worked on constantly. This is a kind of restriction of free will since loving people are ready to do something against their wishes, for the sake of the desires of a loved one, to commit serious deeds, to give everything that is. Loving people undoubtedly perceive each other as something valuable (Frankfurt, The Reasons for Love 38). Unfortunately, it happens that the power of love may be destructive, and it can bring suffering to the one who loves.
In conclusion, some categorically believe that love cannot be controlled, and some would like to learn how to manage it. Nevertheless, love is an emotion that cannot be prevented since it arises suddenly, regardless of whether a person wants it or not. It is so strong that it can change a person, to some extent, suppress their will for the sake of a loved one. Love can also bring tremendous pain and suffering, which makes people want to manage it.
Works Cited
Frankfurt, Harry. “Duty and Love.” Philosophical Explorations: An International Journal for the Philosophy of Mind and Action, vol. 1, no. 1, 1998, pp. 4-9.
Frankfurt, Harry. The Reasons for Love. Princeton University Press, 2004.
Liao, Matthew. “The Idea of a Duty to Love.” The Journal of Value Inquiry, vol. 40, 2006, pp. 1-22.
Love on demand: Can You Will To Love? Intro to the Philosophy of Mind and Action. The Idea of a Duty to Love.