Formal Mormon Theology

[Ego]

I think the best teaching someone might use to say there really can be love and pride beyond a feeling is what Lehi said in 2 Nephi 2:16 “Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.”

I call it the principle of equal and opposite enticement. If a person has two options before them that would yield the same amount of power and pleasure for them, but one also includes another person receiving the same while the other does not (but might yet have more pleasure on the surface in order to offset the enticement of the dopamine hit a person gets by being altruistic), then we can rest assured that if they then choose the altruistic path then they have a real will of love.

Wrong. One can feel love without feeling pride and vice versa.

I agree a person doesn’t necessarily feel both in any given situation. What I am saying is that the only way I could think of according to Mormon teachings for a person to truly prove that they have a will of love as opposed to a feeling of love is if they are in a situation where they are feeling both love and pride or at least the allure of both love and pride at the same time, both with equal persuading influence, but still choose the loving option.

[Dr. Shades]

Wrong. One can feel love without feeling pride and vice versa.

I agree a person doesn’t necessarily feel both in any given situation. What I am saying is that the only way I could think of according to Mormon teachings for a person to truly prove that they have a will of love as opposed to a feeling of love is if they are in a situation where they are feeling both love and pride or at least the allure of both love and pride at the same time, both with equal persuading influence, but still choose the loving option.

There's no such thing as a will to love. You either feel it or you don't.

[I Have Questions]

There's no such thing as a will to love. You either feel it or you don't.

Isn’t “love” something that can develop over time? So in that respect isn’t that a demonstration of someone willing themselves to learn to love something or someone?

[Ego]

I agree a person doesn’t necessarily feel both in any given situation. What I am saying is that the only way I could think of according to Mormon teachings for a person to truly prove that they have a will of love as opposed to a feeling of love is if they are in a situation where they are feeling both love and pride or at least the allure of both love and pride at the same time, both with equal persuading influence, but still choose the loving option.

There's no such thing as a will to love. You either feel it or you don't.

I am willing to accept that I might be wrong about this. After all it’s been a year since I worked on all this, I’m not particularly attached to it; however, I would appreciate if you provided more explanation and evidence for your positions. Repeatedly asserting that love and pride are only feelings only helps me understand the conclusion of your view, not the reasoning as to how you arrived there which I would like to know.

[Dr. Shades]

There's no such thing as a will to love. You either feel it or you don't.

Isn’t “love” something that can develop over time?

Yes.

So in that respect isn’t that a demonstration of someone willing themselves to learn to love something or someone?

No. It either develops or it doesn’t, regardless of your will.

There's no such thing as a will to love. You either feel it or you don't.

. . . I would appreciate if you provided more explanation and evidence for your positions.

The entirety of human experience.

Repeatedly asserting that love and pride are only feelings only helps me understand the conclusion of your view, not the reasoning as to how you arrived there which I would like to know.

No amount of toilet bowl philosophizing can change the facts. If you disagree, tell me the last time you fell in love with someone only because you filled out a pro/con list, or swelled with pride only because you did a cost/benefit analysis.

[Ego]

. . . I would appreciate if you provided more explanation and evidence for your positions.

The entirety of human experience.

Repeatedly asserting that love and pride are only feelings only helps me understand the conclusion of your view, not the reasoning as to how you arrived there which I would like to know.

No amount of toilet bowl philosophizing can change the facts. If you disagree, tell me the last time you fell in love with someone only because you filled out a pro/con list, or swelled with pride only because you did a cost/benefit analysis.

Well I won’t argue with that. I didn’t think that’s what I was implying though. Either way, unfortunately ‘toilet bowl’ philosophizing is the name of the game with theology.

[I Have Questions]

Isn’t “love” something that can develop over time?

Yes.

So in that respect isn’t that a demonstration of someone willing themselves to learn to love something or someone?

No. It either develops or it doesn’t, regardless of your will.

Does it? Don’t you have to have the will to love someone first, and only after you’ve set your will to it does it grow? I suppose the overarching question here is ‘Can you will (force?) yourself to feel something?’.

[Dr. Shades]

No amount of toilet bowl philosophizing can change the facts. If you disagree, tell me the last time you fell in love with someone only because you filled out a pro/con list, or swelled with pride only because you did a cost/benefit analysis.

Well I won’t argue with that. I didn’t think that’s what I was implying though. Either way, unfortunately ‘toilet bowl’ philosophizing is the name of the game with theology.

Indeed it is. I'm glad you see it, too.

No. It either develops or it doesn’t, regardless of your will.

Does it?

Yes.

Don’t you have to have the will to love someone first, and only after you’ve set your will to it does it grow?

No. Tell me the last time you picked a person at random and willed yourself to love him or her.

I suppose the overarching question here is ‘Can you will (force?) yourself to feel something?’

And the overarching answer here is "no."

[I Have Questions]

Tell me the last time you picked a person at random and willed yourself to love him or her.

So what are you saying are the reasons behind a person feeling “love” for someone, absent of having an initial determination to try to love them? At some point from a first date (or even during a first date) a person makes a determination that they want to try to love the other person. Don’t they?

[Ego]

Whether or not love is best described as a will or a feeling, the following is the rest of the postulates I wrote a couple years ago about love under the assumption that it is a will.

The following are additional observations about the nature of true essence:
Consciousness is part of the true essence of a person. L
Consciousness is part of the true essence because the consciousness of another cannot be perceived through the senses.

Haecceity is part of the true essence of a person. M
Haecceity (or individuality) is part of the true essence because the very act of saying that love is in relation to another assumes that each has individuality and truly are ‘other’ from each other.

Aesthetically pleasing phenomena in the flesh can bring joy. N
Full joy cannot be had without having aesthetically pleasing phenomena in the flesh. O
D&C 93:33-34 “For man is spirit⁠. The elements are eternal⁠, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receive a fulness of joy; And when separated⁠, man cannot receive a fulness of joy.”

Aesthetically pleasing phenomena cannot bring joy unless miserable phenomena of an opposite nature were first experienced. P
“For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my firstborn in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.” (2 Nephi 2:11)

I will only give one postulate about the Father and Jesus; concerning the rest of their attributes, I will use the postulates to prove them. The postulate concerning the Father and Jesus is this:
Father and Jesus have infinite wills of love. Q
As the apostle Jeffrey R. Holland said, “the first great truth of all eternity is that God loves us with all of His heart, might, mind, and strength. That love is the foundation stone of eternity, and it should be the foundation stone of our daily life” (Holland, 2016, Tomorrow the Lord Will do Wonders Among You).