Sex: A Philosophical PrimerThis book explores elemental principles in the study of sex while addressing readers who are not trained philosophers as well as those who are. Singer locates sex within a spectrum that also includes love and compassion. He claims that fundamental mistakes have persistently occurred because numerous theorists relegate sex, love, and compassion to separate and distinct compartments. His emphasis upon the internal linkage between sexuality and the varieties of love is further elaborated in later portions of the book: in relation to a distinction that Singer makes between 'the sensuous' and 'the passionate, ' followed by consecutive ideas about the nature and valuation of sex. Discussing sex as both an appetite and an interpersonal drive, Singer argues that much philosophical confusion has resulted from the doctrines of those who constrain sexuality within either of these to the detriment of the other. What is sexual for human beings is normally, and perhaps always in some degree, a composite of the appetitive and the interpersonal. In us sex is generically a function of each. This conception of appetitive and interpersonal strands as unified in our sexuality then becomes the basis for his remarks about the relative value of individual sex acts as well as their place within the aesthetic and moral dimension of human nature |
Contents
Sex Love Compassion | 1 |
Patterns of the Sensuous and the Passionate | 17 |
The Nature and Evaluation of Sex | 53 |
Criteria of Sexual Goodness | 65 |
Enjoyment and Satisfaction | 72 |
Completeness and Reciprocity | 78 |
Love | 84 |
Embodiment and Absorption | 89 |
Common terms and phrases
absorption aesthetic Alan Soble appetite argue aroused Art of Sex attitude believe century chapter Christian coitus compassion conception consciousness consummation craving Criteria of Sexual criterion D. H. Lawrence drive embodiment emotional enjoyable enjoyment erotic ethical evaluation of sex exist fact feelings Freud G. E. M. Anscombe genital George Santayana gratifying hedonic heterosexual heterosexual coitus human sexuality hunger idea ideal imagine inherently interpersonal involve Irving Singer Kant libidinal libido lovers Luther male marriage means moral mutual Nature of Love nature of sex occur one's orgasm pansexual passion person philosophers Philosophy and Sex Philosophy of Sex physiological Plato pleasure possible Pursuit of Love qualified critics reciprocity recognize relation reproductive romantic romanticism satisfaction satisfying Schopenhauer sensation sense sensuous sex acts sexual behavior sexual desire sexual experience sexual impulse sexual love sexual response social someone sometimes species Stendhal taste tensions theory of sex woman women
References to this book
Love, Sex & Passion for the Rest of Your Life: How to Create the Ultimate ... David Ryback No preview available - 2002 |