PLATONIC LOVE? ARE YOU IN A PLATONIC LOVE RELATIONSHIP?

SLATE: HUMAN INTEREST: ORIGINS OF PLATONIC LOVE  by Juliet Lapidos

EXCERPTS:  
The Florentine scholar Marsilo Ficino coined the term armor platonicus (Latin for "Platonic Love") in the 15th century.  He had in mind Plato's Symposium, in which Socrates describes a possible ascent from base desire to high-minded contemplation - a "ladder"? with love for a beautiful person at the bottom, and love of Beauty itself at the top.  (Step by step: Love of a beautiful body, love for all beautiful bodies, love for the beauty of laws, love for the beauty of knowledge, and the love of Beauty itself).  Fincini Christianized the concept, interpreting the final Beauty as a reference to God.  He further asserted that true lovers are drawn to each other's divine souls" The passion of a lover is not quenched by the mere touch or sight of a body," he wrote, "for it does not desire this or that body, but desires the splendor of the divine light shining through bodies, and is amazed and awed by it."

SHOULD THEY BRING BACK THE GUILLOTINE? THE FRENCH REVOLUTION

SLATE : SHOULD THEY BRING BACK THE GUILLOTINE?  By John Kruzel
 

Courtesy Carolus/Wikimedia Commons

From the article

 

EXCERPT: Bringing back the guillotine may sound crazy, but it’s certainly better than the current alternative. It’s better for prisoners because quickly severing the head is believed to be one of the quickest, least painful ways to die. And it’s better for organ recipients because the bodies of guillotined prisoners could be more quickly harvested for viable parts, unlike organs that may become unusable after lethal injection due to hypoxemia.

 

ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA on THE FRENCH REVOLUTION