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Why is it that the English language has dozens of words to describe varying degrees and specific occurrences for everything from shades of blue to feelings of anger, but has but one word to describe the concept of Love? when we love our children, when we love a friend, when we love our life partner or spouse... even when we love a particular activity or a food or a word, there is but one word to describe that sentiment: Love. when considered as a noun, we're offered adoration, worship  , affection, attachment, devotion, fondness, liking and loyalty as synonyms, but none of these really mean the same thing. taken as a verb, we have even fewer choices (atomica offers only "adore" and "worship"). how, then, do we differentiate the myriad forms that love takes, when trying to express ourselves? there's the "loving" vs. being "in love with" argument, but regardless--our language seems to come up woefully short in this important area. Atomica's translation tool provides the following:
Deutsch (German):
Liebe, Geliebte, Liebling, lieben, null
Français (French):
bien-aimé, amour, affection, aimer, raffoler de, être épris de, être amoureux, zéro, rien
Español (Spanish):
amar, querer, tener cariño, enamorarse, chifladura, cariño, enamoramiento, querido, amado, amante, amor, afecto
Italiano (Italian):
amare, adorare, amore, amante, affetto, amoroso, amorosamente
Português (Portuguese):
n. amor (m), afeição (m), amizade (m), zero (m) (Desp.) v. amar, querer bem, gostar de num. zero
Nederlands (Dutch):
liefde, geliefde, verliefdheid, genegenheid, schatje (informele aanspreekvorm), houden van, liefhebben, heerlijk vinden, verzot zijn op, vrijen met, liefdes-, nul (tennis)
Svenska (Swedish):
n. kärlek, förälskelse, tillgivenhet, lust , böjelse, förtjusning, passion, hälsning (ar), älskling, raring, lilla vän, rar (förtjusande) människa, sötnos, förtjusande (tjusig) sak, (Love) Amor, kärleksguden, (poet.) amorin, (i tennis o.d.) noll v. älska, tycka (mycket) om, vara förtjust i, hålla (mycket) av num. (i tennis o.d.) noll
Ελληνική (Greek):
n. αγάπη, στοργή, έρωτας, αγαπημένος, ερωμένος (άνθρωπος), (αθλοπ.) έλλειψη σκορ, μηδέν-μηδέν v. αγαπώ, ακριβαγαπώ, μου αρέσει πολύ, λατρεύω num. μηδέν
Русский (Russian):
любить, хотеть чего-л., любовь, предмет любви, любовная интрига My question, then, is this: It would appear that many of these other languages have several words of similar roots (and dissimilar, as well) for our one word "love". does this mean that these other languages have managed to fill in the gaps? i'm not sure if we have anyone familiar with Russian, or Greek a-Board, but i'd love  to hear some specific translations from those than can provide them.
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Joined: Dec 2000
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
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No, if you ran the same process in reverse you'd get all these synonyms: love, like, affection, adore, dear, darling, charity, friendship, fondness, desire, lust, nothingFrench has even less differentiation, with aimer being both 'love' and 'like'. C.S. Lewis wrote a study (a whole book, I think?) called The Three Loves on different concepts present in Greek words: eros the erotic love, philia 'affection, liking, friendship, bond', storge... I can't remember what storge is. But we are ill-equipped with words in the area and it does make for confusion. We could usefully distinguish affections for persons based on the hormones involved. The sex hormones testosterone and IIRC oestrogen dominate in the process of desire/lust. The mood hormones like serotonin dominate in "being in love", the happiness when with the loved one and anxiety when apart. And the bonding/maternal/orgasm hormones oxytocin and vasopressin dominate the calm, long-term security yu feel with someone. So I have proposed testolove, serolove, and oxylove. And of course they can overlap. 
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Joined: Mar 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Great topic, bridget!
Random thoughts while getting ready for work:
Note that the "nothing" translation is from "love" as used in tennis (fr. l'oef? egg=zero?)
The Portuguese nouns translate as love, affection, friendship. The verbs are to love and to care about(for). "gostar de num. zero" can only mean "to like the number zero" (???) (doncha love on-line translators).
And there's a Greek word for love that Nicholas didn't mention: agape. I think that's what we call "brotherly love."
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Joined: Jan 2001
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old hand
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old hand
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In Italian, there are two choices for love, which you use depending on who you talk to. "Amare" is romantic love, so "Ti amo" (I love you) should only be used on, say, my own husband. If you are talking about loving your parents or children, then it's "Ti voglio bene" which literally seems to mean "I want good" but I think it means "I want good things for you". Anyway, both those phrases translate into "I love you" in English but you have to know which is which.
The other Italian ones you listed are not as varied as you think:
amare: to love (verb)
adorare: I think this is really "to adore" which isn't quite the same
amore: love (noun)
amante: one who loves, lover
affetto: affection, sort of platonic, a friend may write "tanto affeto" (=much affection) in a letter
amoroso: full of love, amorous(?) (adjective)
amorosamente: full of love (adverb)
So you see they don't really cover much more territory than the English ones. For me the biggest distinction is the Ti Amo/Ti Voglio Bene split, which I find English doesn't sufficiently separate.
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Posts: 163
member
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Español (Spanish):
amar, querer, tener cariño, enamorarse, chifladura, cariño, enamoramiento, querido, amado, amante, amor, afecto
“estimar” and “apreciar” as “tener cariño” express a mild feeling and can be used when referring to acquaintances, relatives or friends.
Although we can replace “amar” by “querer” in most situations we cannot “amar” a good steak. For material things we use “querer” but only on ‘want’ expressions.
When we love activities or material things we use “encantar” or “gustar” and if the feeling is very intense we can say “adorar”.
I think most of those words have an English equivalent but it seems that the usage of them differs.
Encantado de colaborar.
Juan Maria.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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And there are yart, yart, yart all the thing from the heartheartfelt, heart to heart, sweet heart. and other body parts-- he/she is my right arm, my soul mate, attached to me at the hip , (that could be a very specific kind of love!) the apple of my eye...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"even when we love a particular activity or a food or a word, "
I was taught that the word love should be reserved for animate beings that could return love.
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old hand
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old hand
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Love. when considered as a noun, we're offered adoration, worship, affection, attachment, devotion, fondness, liking and loyalty as synonyms, but none of these really mean the same thing.
But you don't want them to mean the same thing, since you are looking for differentiation. I think the use of "love" for all these different attitudes/afflictions is a secondary phenomenon: either you don't want to differentiate them out of sheer laziness, or "love" is (improperly) used as a "generic superlative" for all these terms, to which I am inclined to ad: interest, predilection, preference, inclination, hankering, passion, attraction, crush, obsession, infatuation, enthusiasm..
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veteran
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The Three Loves
The third (first, actually) wasn't storge, it was agape, which is the first mentioned in the list of Greek words in the original posting. Agape is the personal love with no expectation of return or reward, like the love of God for his creatures, humans for God, humans for other humans (without any erotic element, which would be eros.
I take it that the Greek list is in modern Greek, which I know nothing about. A list in koine Greek would include philein but not storge.
Besides the words listed in French, there is the phrase avoir envie de ....
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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What! Love is all hormones-- what about pheremones? They have discovered some human phermemones-- and there is evidence for more.
A study done in US hospitals, where baby's are regularlly put in a nursery, (and don't "room in" with the mother) discovered mothers could identify there baby's clothes (and their babies) better by smell than by sight! The nurses could not. Most of the nurses couldn't even detect that the babies smelt differerent! (they all smelled like babies... which is an other point.. even with out baby powder, or baby oil, babies smell nice (well newborns do-- toddlers don't smell as nice) --Do newborn exude a pheremone? (any other mothers want to comment?--women seem to react stronger.. but men are not immune)
There is other evidence that subtle scents (real scents or pheremones?) help us recognize "close" biological relations..
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