No, my entire point was that those things were similar.
Falling In Love Over The Internet
- Thread starter VidiianSkinRash
- Start date
I agree.
In another thread recently, I tried to distinguish Love from Passion. Different things but often mistaken.
Passion is like a hunger, that you want to satisfy. It is that which tugs on your heart, making a person seem profoundly interesting and magnetic.
Love is something that exists between two people, that grows and makes both of their lives richer. Without some degree of entanglement of lives, this can't really happen.
I'd draw distinction again between Love (as in falling in love) and the other kind of love (humanitarian love) ~ which is a kind and selfless giving of oneself to another because of warm hearted feelings towards them.
I think what people find most painful is when what they feel for another is a combination of: passion, humanitarian love and an anticipation of love.
I personally have never "fallen in love" over the internet, but I wouldn't be so arrogant as to say it's impossible. For me however, in a romantic relationship-- the physical part is way too important for an online relationship to develop beyond infatuation or interest without actually meeting in person. In fact, my main experience with this would be a long-distance relationship, and I was pretty miserable with the lack of physical contact. Again, it just depends-- because I've met people who insist this is possible-- but the barrier of the internet takes away all my advantages 
Well if that is the limitation your going to put on the exchange than I would agree with you. Yes it is impossible to fall in love with someone online if all you are doing is exchanging e-mails about your favorite movies. If you are actually communicating like people in the modern age though all kinds of other possibilities are open. I would also say your argument probably works in reverse more often. People mistake a strong physical attraction to each other as love and the more they get to know each other the less in love they are.
RJD: Oh yes, very possible.
To the fictional character.... I don´t think that is similar, after all the fictional character is... fictional...not real... you can never meet the character in real or hold conversations with him.
An "online-person" is real, you can have real conversation, you can meet, if you want, the other has a life on his/her own, own dreams, owns plans, own hopes, own ways to see the world... a fictional character does not have all of this, cause it is just made-up by someone. How can falling in love with a real person online and falling in love with a fictional character be similiar?
TerokNor
That's a very insightful viewpoint. I do believe the personality type will determine whether the latter state is pleasurable or painful. I personally find the idea of unrequited love utterly wonderful. Not every desire must be satisfied. Certain aspects of love, such as unresolved sexual tension can be quite a blissful state.
The real person's dreams, plans, hopes and own ways to see the world are made up as well. See, the only two things that separate fictional characters from real people are the fact that fictional characters don't have a body or a subconscious. Without access to either of these, the differences are anecdotal.
I haven't fallen in love over the internet, but I have made a couple close friends, and I think my experience is applicable to romantic ones as well. The real test is what happens when you meet in person.
The first on-line friend I met in person, we both felt kind of awkward, we never got together again, and our on-line friendship drifted apart. Whether it still would have if we hadn't tried to turn it into something else, I have no idea.
The second friendship made a perfect transition from on-line to in person. In fact, this is the woman who's taking me to the hospital for my surgery and will probably stay w/ me a couple days when I get home.
I don't think I'm separating them at all. Can you explain a little more?
Well, if you can fall in love with someone without sharing the same physical space, you're separating the physical/sensual experience from the social/intellectual experience. I mean, it's self-evident. If one can exist without the other, they are separated. I'm not sure what is it that you don't understand here.
You're playing with words. If falling in love is possible in the absence of physical sensation, then physical sensation and social/intellectual interaction are separated.
Heh. Alright.
A fictional character can't interact with you or respond to you. How are the two even comparable?
Well for starters you've just compared them, so there's that.
But seriously, interactive fiction does exist, in video games for example. And even if it didn't, fictional characters could interact with you or respond to you as long as someone is writing their lines.I'm not looking, but, wow that would be tough for me personally. There's so much you miss out on by not meeting a person, in person. But, maybe I'm old fashioned? And, it's only a theoretical question for me.
I could more easily picture continuing a relationship where I had met the person and then continuing it online should she move away. Although that would be difficult to maintain.
Major red flag!! Web cams are so cheap and ubiquitious now that there's really no excuse. I'd be wary at least.
Mr Awe
I could more easily picture continuing a relationship where I had met the person and then continuing it online should she move away. Although that would be difficult to maintain.
Major red flag!! Web cams are so cheap and ubiquitious now that there's really no excuse. I'd be wary at least.
Mr Awe
Well for starters you've just compared them, so there's that.
Interactive fiction follows a script though. As realistic as the setting may be, you can't have an actual conversation with, say... Ashley Williams (Mass Effect) about things that aren't part of the script. Doesn't mean you can't be infatuated with fictional characters (just look at the history of fanfiction)... but it's not the same as forming a relationship with a real person. And if someone's writing their lines behind the scenes in response to you... well then you get into questions of identity. Do you know there's somebody writing the lines (presumably yes)? In that case, you're actually interacting with the author - but good authors are able to separate themselves and let the character's voice speak for itself, so you're still interacting with the author, but not the author-as-author if that makes sense.
In any case - still not the same as interacting with an actual, non-fictional person.
But the difference only exists from an objective point of view. If you're exchanging emails with a fictional person, there's no way for you to know.
Ah. I presumed from the outset when you said "fictional character" you meant a person who was known to be fictional - Edward Cullen or Hermione Granger or Han Solo, etc.
But with what you really mean - that can happen if you meet in real life too. I've heard multiple stories about two people falling in love, getting married, starting a family - only five, ten years later the wife finds out her husband isn't who he claimed to be all along, has a criminal past under a different name or another family in another state that knows him as a different person.
But with what you really mean - that can happen if you meet in real life too. I've heard multiple stories about two people falling in love, getting married, starting a family - only five, ten years later the wife finds out her husband isn't who he claimed to be all along, has a criminal past under a different name or another family in another state that knows him as a different person.
