【中英双语】从哲学观出发论什么是真正的爱情？

Romantic love, beautiful and intoxicating, heartbreaking and soul crushing, often all at the same time. Why do we choose to put ourselves through its emotional ringer? Does love make our lives meaningful or is it an escape from our loneliness and suffering? Is love a disguise for our sexual desire or a trick of biology to make us procreate? Is it all we need? Do we need it at all?

浪漫的爱情，美丽而醉人，心碎而灵魂破碎，往往同时发生。为什么我们选择让自己经受它的情感折磨呢?爱是让我们的生活变得有意义，还是让我们逃离孤独和痛苦?爱是我们性欲的伪装，还是生物学让我们繁衍后代的诡计?这就是我们所需要的吗?我们真的需要它吗?

If romantic love has a purpose, neither science nor psychology has discovered it yet. But over the course of history, some of our most respected philosophers have put forward some intriguing theories.

如果浪漫的爱情有目的，科学和心理学都还没有发现。但在历史的进程中，一些最受尊敬的哲学家提出了一些有趣的理论。

Love makes us whole again. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato explored the idea that we love in order to become complete. In his symposium, he wrote about a dinner party at which Aristophanes, a comic playwright, regales the guests with the following story, humans were once creatures with 4 arms, 4 legs and 2 faces.

爱使我们再次完整。古希腊哲学家柏拉图探讨了我们爱是为了变得完整的观点。在他的专题讨论会中，他写道，在一次晚宴上，喜剧剧作家阿里斯托芬(Aristophanes)向客人们讲述了这样一个故事:“人类曾经是有四条胳膊、四条腿和两张脸的生物。”

One day they angered the gods and Zeus sliced them all in 2. Since then, every person has been missing half of him or herself. Love is the longing to find a soulmate who will make us feel whole again. Or at least that's what Plato believed a drunken comedian would say at a party, love tricks us into having babies.

一天他们激怒了众神，宙斯把他们切成两半。从那时起，每个人都失去了一半的自己。爱是渴望找到一个灵魂伴侣，让我们再次感到完整。或者至少柏拉图相信一个醉酒的喜剧演员会在派对上说，爱诱使我们生孩子。

Much later, German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer maintained that love based in sexual desire was a voluptuous illusion. He suggested that we love because our desires lead us to believe that another person will make us happy. But we are sorely mistaken.

很久以后，德国哲学家亚瑟·叔本华(Arthur Schopenhauer)坚持认为，基于性欲的爱情是一种淫荡的幻觉。他认为我们爱是因为我们的欲望让我们相信另一个人会让我们快乐。但我们大错特错了。

Nature is tricking us into procreating, and the loving fusion we seek is consummated in our children. When our sexual desires are satisfied, we are thrown back into our tormented existences and we succeed only in maintaining the species and perpetuating the cycle of human drudgery. Sounds like somebody needs a hug. Love is escape from our loneliness.

大自然欺骗我们去生育，我们所寻求的爱的融合在我们的孩子身上得到了圆满。当我们的性欲得到满足时，我们又被抛回痛苦的生活中，我们只是成功地维持了物种，延续了人类苦差事的循环。听起来有人需要一个拥抱。爱是我们对孤独的逃避。

According to the Nobel prize winning British philosopher Bertrand Russell, we love in order to quench our physical and psychological desires. Humans are designed to procreate, but without the  of passionate love. Sex is unsatisfying.

根据诺贝尔奖获得者英国哲学家伯特兰·罗素的说法，我们爱是为了满足我们身体和心理上的欲望。人类生来就是为了生育，却没有激情的爱情。性是不令人满意的。

Our fear of the cold, cruel world tempts us to build hard shells to protect and isolate ourselves. Love's delight, intimacy and warmth helps us overcome our fear of the world, escape our lonely shells, and engage more abundantly in life. Love enriches our whole being, making it the best thing in life.

我们对寒冷、残酷世界的恐惧诱使我们建立起坚硬的外壳来保护和孤立自己。爱的愉悦、亲密和温暖帮助我们克服对世界的恐惧，逃离孤独的躯壳，更充实地投入生活。爱丰富了我们的整个生命，使它成为生命中最美好的东西。

Love is a misleading affliction. Siddhartha gautima, who became known as the Buddha, or the enlightened one, probably would have had some interesting arguments with Russell. Buddha proposed that we love because we are trying to satisfy our base desires.

爱情是一种误导人的痛苦。悉达多·乔蒂玛，后来被称为佛陀，或开明的人，可能会和罗素有一些有趣的争论。佛陀提出，我们爱是因为我们试图满足我们的基本欲望。

Yet our passionate cravings are defects, and attachments, even romantic love, are a great source of suffering. Luckily, Buddha discovered the eightfold path, a sort of program for extinguishing the fires of desire so that we can reach Nirvana, an enlightened state of peace, clarity, wisdom and compassion.

然而，我们热情的渴望是缺陷，而依恋，甚至浪漫的爱情，都是痛苦的巨大来源。幸运的是，佛陀发现了八正道，一种熄灭欲望之火的程序，这样我们就可以达到涅槃，一种和平、清晰、智慧和慈悲的开悟状态。

The novelist Caoxueqin illustrated this Buddhist sentiment that romantic love is folly. In one of China's greatest classical novels, dream of the red chamber. In a subplot, Jia lianfalls in love with ,Wang xifengwho tricks and humiliates him.

小说家曹雪芹阐释了这种佛教的情感:浪漫的爱情是愚蠢的。《红楼梦》是中国最伟大的古典小说之一。在一个次要情节中，贾瑞爱上了欺骗和羞辱他的王熙凤。

Conflicting emotions of love and hate tear him apart. So a Taoist gives him a magic mirror that can cure him, as long as he doesn't look at the front of it. But of course, he looks at the front of it. He sees Shi feng. His soul enters the mirror, and he is dragged away in iron chains to die.

爱恨交加的矛盾情绪把他撕裂了。于是道士给了他一面魔镜，只要他不看镜子的正面，魔镜就能治好他。当然，他看的是正面。他看到石峰。他的灵魂进入镜子，他被铁链拖走，死去。

Not all Buddhists think this way about romantic and erotic love. But the moral of this story is that such attachments spell tragedy and should, along with magic mirrors, be avoided. Love lets us reach beyond ourselves.

并不是所有的佛教徒都这样看待浪漫和性爱。但这个故事的寓意是，这种依恋会带来悲剧，应该与魔镜一样避免。爱让我们超越自我。

Let's, on a slightly more positive note, the French philosopher Simone be Beauvoir proposed that love is the desire to integrate with another and that it infuses our lives with meaning. However, she was less concerned with why we love and more interested in how we can love better.

让我们稍微积极一点，法国哲学家西蒙娜·波伏娃(Simone be Beauvoir)提出，爱是与他人融合的愿望，它为我们的生活注入了意义。然而，她不太关心我们为什么爱，而更感兴趣的是我们如何更好地爱。

She saw that the problem with traditional romantic love is it can be so captivating that we are tempted to make it our only reason for being. Yet dependence on another to justify our existence easily leads to boredom and power games.

她发现，传统浪漫爱情的问题在于，它太迷人了，以至于我们忍不住把它当成存在的唯一理由。然而，依赖他人来证明我们的存在很容易导致无聊和权力游戏。

To avoid this trap, Beauvoir advised loving authentically, which is more like a great friendship. Lovers support each other in discovering themselves, reaching beyond themselves and enriching their lives and the world together. Though we might never know why we fall in love, we can be certain that it'll be an emotional roller coaster ride.

为了避免这个陷阱，波伏娃建议真诚地爱，这更像是一段伟大的友谊。情侣们互相支持，发现自我，超越自我，共同丰富他们的生活和世界。虽然我们可能永远不知道我们为什么会坠入爱河，但我们可以肯定的是，这将是一次情感的过山车。

It's scary and exhilarating. It makes us suffer and makes us soar. Maybe we lose ourselves. Maybe we find ourselves. It might be heartbreaking. Or it might just be the best thing in life. Will you dare to find out?

这既可怕又令人振奋。它让我们受苦，也让我们翱翔。也许我们迷失了自我。也许我们能找到自我。这可能会让人心碎。也可能是生命中最美好的事情。你敢去发现吗?