Thursday 2/22
Love, Lust, and Sex I
Assignments
Take-Home Midterm Examination Assigned
Readings
Texts
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Introduction
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 1
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 2
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 3
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 4
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 5
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Chapter 6
- Simon Blackburn, "Lust", Notes
Additional Readings
Quiz Questions
- How does Blackburn argue that "we must not allow the critics of lust to intrude the notion of excess"?
- How, according to Blackburn, was Stoicism a further "calamity for lust"?
- How does the issue of self-control figure in the Christian Panic?
Synopsis
We began today by reviewing the midterm exam. Remember that you have a couple of weeks to work on it. Remember also that you only have two pages per answer, for a total of five answers. This is not much space given the depth of the questions. Your problem in each case will be how to fit everything you want and need to say into the space permitted. To do this, you will need to choose your words carefully. Keep your sentences short. (Like that one: Only four words!) (Or that one! Only six words!) Okay, okay, I could go on forever with that gag. (8!) But I won't. (3!)
As I said in class, I would be delighted to see you in my office exploring ideas about the questions. I even have the coolest, track-lit, old-school blackboard on campus, which YOU, yes YOU!, can use to help formulate your thoughts.
Next today we turned to the concept of lust. I suppose exploring lust is the inevitable bridge between our discussions about love and our upcoming discussions about matters sexual. Our guide for this discussion is no less than Blackburn's contribution to the seven deadly sins series, "Lust". I find Blackburn's little book to be as fine an example of philosophy written for a wide audience as I can imagine. It is extraordinarily clear, cogent, stylistically impressive, and, frankly, fun. I hope you agree. Next to Plato, it is perhaps the best piece we have before us this semester.
As with love, romantic or otherwise, characteristic of lust is the experience of lust. Yet asserting that lust is a desire for sex simpliciter cannot, as Blackburn takes great care to point out, be right. After, as we described in class, there are many reasons we might desire sex, yet only some of these reasons might have any bearing whatsoever on lust. For example, we might desire sex because it:
- Gives us pleasure,
- Relieves boredom,
- Exercises us,
- Earns us money and/or favors,
- Brings us closer,
- Alleviates headaches,
- Helps us achieve orgasm,
- Alleviates menstrual cramps,
- Helps us procreate,
- Lets us get revenge,
- Gives us self-confidence, or
- Advances our careers.
Yet lust seems hardly a good description of an attempt to relieve boredom--a luke-warm rationale at best. Even getting us to orgasm seems wrong-headed, since we might in fact do all we can in having sex to avoid orgasm as long as possible.
Our discussion, which was vigorous and insightful, led us to much the same framework Blackburn adopts. That is to say,
Lust is the enthusiastic, whole-body, felt desire for the pleasures of sexual activity for its own sake.
Thus using sex to burn calories, make rent money, or even get rid of a headache have nothing to do with lust. To be sure, lust is compatible with all of these things, but that is not, it seems, how we should think of lust.
Naturally, the fierce nature of lust, the way it can grab hold of us, distract us, and lead us into all manner of delightful foolishness, has earned lust a terrible reputation. We will discuss this reputation next time and take up Blackburn's arguments to rehabilitate lust. In particular, we will examine how best to understand the point of these pleasures of sexual activity at which lust is directed as an end in itself.