ABSTRACT
This chapter examines three philosophical concepts of love as they pertain to interpersonal relations: Diotima’s eros or desiring-love in Plato’s Symposium, Ralph Waldo Emerson’s romantic love, and Charles S. Peirce’s agape or cherishing-love. The examination is pragmatist—that is, it seeks to clarify the meaning of these three concepts of love in terms of their conceivable experiential consequences in interpersonal relations. It focuses especially on loving interpersonal relationships that may be characterized as erotic, romantic, and/or agapistic. Lived experience both motivates the inquiry and provides insight for examining the meaning of these three concepts of love.
