Love – Why We Really Fall in Love

There have been many theories regarding love¹ and why one falls in love, but what I will tell you regarding love would really change your perspective about this four-lettered word. Humans have always survived; right from the age of Neanderthals, we evolved so that we could protect ourselves from the dangerous surroundings, but if you think about it closely, you will find out that man had nothing to do with evolution²; it was something entirely different which was responsible for that.

Enter the badass and the most powerful thing ever made by nature, the human Genes. The basic drive for survival can be broken down and understood easily from the gene’s perspective. The sole purpose of a human gene³ is to Survive and Survive and Survive. It doesn’t think about anything else except surviving.

Why Do We Really Fall in Love?

Now let me explain the role that genes play in us falling in love; bear with me a little longer. The genes knew that Neanderthals were nothing but a mess, as the only thing they knew was to fight and get into trouble; the only reason Neanderthals survived for so many years was that they could reproduce effectively and were somehow managing to keep the genes alive.

But the human genes are really smart, for they knew that these monkeys would surely be in big trouble sooner or later and could end them for good.

Finally, genes kick-started evolution. This time their primary focus was on brain development because they knew the consequences of bad development. Homo sapiens⁴ came into existence; the new humans were really smart as they made vaccines and houses, thus protecting themselves from various dangers of nature.

The only thing they needed to add to the humans was a drive to multiply, and now we have crossed the mark of six billion people. The biggest tool in the bag of tricks of the genes was making humans attracted to each other and thus serving their purpose to multiply.

The wibbly-wobbly feeling we get on seeing our crush is mainly due to the hormonal imbalance triggered due to the intrinsic nature of our genes. We get attracted to good-looking people because the genes know that they will produce better offspring.

I know this may sound harsh, but let me tell you something more about the nobility of genes. It’s very nice that they chose love for the reproduction mechanism; the world would have been a crazy place to live if we would still have been reproducing like the Neanderthals.

This time genes had chosen a grand structure to act in a civilized way and multiply. Because of Genes’ majesty, we can enjoy music and read poetry; genes are responsible for making various relations among us, for they knew very well that all these factors would ensure their survival.

You could also argue that genes had to do all this work when they could just have evolved us into a body that never dies. To this question, one could answer by seeing the total population of the earth; as far as genes are concerned, there is no need to kick start another evolution as humans have done a commendable job in terms of multiplying and ensuring their survival.

Also, the process of evolution takes thousands of years and who knows what these masters have in store for our future. But as far as humans are concerned, genes don’t matter because for them:

“Love is a disease, and the person you love is the only medicine.” – African Proverb

1. Evans, Mary. Love: An unromantic discussion. Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 2003. ↩︎
2. Davison, Andrew J. “Evolution of the herpesviruses.” Veterinary microbiology 86.1-2 (2002): 69-88. ↩︎
3. Miller, A. Dusty. “Human gene therapy comes of age.” nature 357.6378 (1992): 455-460. ↩︎
4. Stringer, Chris. “The origin and evolution of Homo sapiens.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 371.1698 (2016): 20150237. ↩︎

Last Updated on March 14, 2024 by NamitaSoren