College Sex - Philosophy for Everyone: Philosophers With Benefits (27 page)

Moreover, it seems that a central motivation for denying the notion of plain sex is the supposition that plain sex is immoral since it implies that sexual desire is directed towards the body itself; and, viewing another person or being treated only as a physical body (i.e., as an object) is humiliating and even immoral. For example, in
Lectures on Ethics
the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) writes:

There is no way in which a human being can be made an Object of indul- gence for another except through sexual impulse.… Sexual love makes of the loved person an Object of appetite.… Sexual love … by itself and for itself … is nothing more than appetite. Taken by itself it is a derogation of human nature.… As an Object of appetite for another person becomes a thing.
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Supporters of the notion of plain sex hold, like Kant, that sexual desire and sexual activity are directed only to the partner’s body, but deny the negative connotations that are related to this approach. That is, according to the positive approach to plain sex, sex is indeed directed towards the body alone. It is pleasurable, exciting, and might lead to a rich and complex

experience, and of course is moral and respectful. Moreover, sex between lovers is also directed towards the body alone; beyond the legitimizing veils of love and marriage, it is the same sexual act – an activity in which one derives pleasure from a physical contact with another person, that is, sex by its nature is plain sex. Thus, an association of love shouldn’t change one’s evaluation of sex; one should have a positive or negative evaluation of sex irrespective to the question whether it is done between lovers.

Loving Sex between Non-Lovers

In order to reply, Juliet has to sharpen her position. She has to distin- guish her position from the vague position that sexual activity expresses (or ought to express) love. Juliet may suggest that even if one does not assume that a sexual act expresses love, there is still some association between love and sex. However, she has to explain of what this associa- tion consists.

Juliet may maintain that the strong emotional bond of love makes a difference, since “sex with love … is deeply personal. One forms a unity not only with body, but also with all the other aspects of what constitute a complete experience: the mental, emotional, and spiritual.”
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In response, Romeo may differentiate the characterization of sex from the characterization of the relationship between the partners: non-lovers may have “loving sex,” that is, sex with mutual care, sex in which each one of the participants relates and appreciates her partner’s special qual- ities, and sex which constitutes a warm and complex experience. At this point, Romeo may relate again to an experience he had at the end of the semester. After an exhausting period of classes, tests, and papers to sub- mit (a period in which one doesn’t have any time to attend to one’s per- sonal life, and even less time to be involved in a romantic relationship), he went out to a pub and there he noticed her. He couldn’t avoid staring at her; she seemed adorable to him. He sent her a glass of white wine, and then their eyes met. The evening they had spent together was “an evening of sensuous eroticism that continued for hours and included all the foreplay, kisses, and caresses that actual lovers enjoy, perhaps done simply out of mutual admiration for each other’s sensuous quali- ties and out of gratitude for having been chosen by the other for such an evening.Yet, because of inability (or will) to maintain a serious relation- ship, the pair went their separate ways in the morning; they never saw

each other again.”
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The vulgar image, according to which sex without love is impersonal, selfish, cold, and mechanical, is baseless.

I doubt whether the notions of loving sex and plain sex are compatible. After all, the notion of loving sex relates to an emotional component that is over and above the pleasure that is derived by the physical contact itself (which characterizes the notion of plain sex). Introducing Thomas Nagel’s philosophical analysis of sex may help reveal the stress in Romeo’s position (i.e., assuming both the notion of plain sex and the notion of loving sex). In the next section, I will introduce Nagel’s position and show how it sheds light on this issue.

Being Embodied

Nagel’s analysis combines the embodiment ingredient of sex (which Romeo assumes) and the interpersonal ingredient of sex (which Juliet assumes).
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That is, his analysis acknowledges the centrality of the body in sex without neglecting the interpersonal element. Nagel portrays a proc- ess of mutual perception and arousal of sexual desire: the self is sexually aroused by the other’s presence; the self’s arousal is perceived by (and arouses) the other; then, the perception of the other being aroused by the self’s arousal contributes to the self’s arousal, and vice versa; the arousal- loop may extend repetitively.

This multilevel, interpersonal arousal involves a process of mutual embodiment in which “one’s body actions are taken over by the body; ideally, deliberate control is needed only to guide the expression of those impulses.”
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That is, deliberate control is narrowed to a minimum; the body, which knows how to “fit into the complex of mutual perceptions,”
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takes control. Nagel describes a development of such a process:

Hunger leads to spontaneous interactions with food; sexual desire leads to spontaneous interactions with other persons, whose bodies are asserting their sovereignty in the same way, producing involuntary reactions and spontaneous impulses in them. These reactions are perceived, and that perception in turn perceived; at each step the domination of the person by his body is reinforced, and the sexual partner becomes more possessible by physical contact, penetration, and envelopment.
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Nagel’s analysis has pointed out essential characterizations of sexual activity: it involves an interpersonal interaction that happens in an

embodied mode. One of Russell Vannoy’s criticisms of Nagel’s analysis is directed to this point:

This inner complex of thought, emotion, lust and fantasy is miles removed from some kind of neo-primitivistic state of merely “becoming one’s body” or being in a state of sheer lust. Once again, therefore, Nagel’s two con- cepts of mutual perceptual feedback and sheer embodiment seem to work against each other, and it is not clear how the former state is going to pro- duce the latter.
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Vannoy has suggested that there is a conflict between being in an embodi- ment mode and interpersonal communication. I believe that this conflict is false; however, its falsity is not trivial. Explaining this falsity may assist us in clarifying the special characteristics of the interpersonal ingredient in sex.

A Primary Emotional Awareness

Psychologists maintain that interpersonal interaction between adult human beings requires a sophisticated cognitive ability that enables a conception of other minds. That is, an ability to attribute mental states (such as beliefs, desires, and hopes) to other persons, and to differentiate another person’s mental states from one’s own mental states.
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Moreover, an embodiment (a mode in which “one’s body actions are taken over by the body”)
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has something in common with an automatic mode of action (such as driving, typing, or reading); similarly, in an embodiment mode one “flows” with action. That is, the agent does not have to set up a goal and evaluate each action or step that she takes (the agent may set up her action at the upper level of activity and perform the subordinate activities in automatic mode).
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The seemingly incompatible characterization of a highly complicated “multilevel interpersonal awareness”
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within an embodiment mode strengthens the doubt concerning Nagel’s analysis; it seems to be a typical case in which a philosopher has theorized over and above a real phenomenon.

I believe that Nagel is right in that some interpersonal, complicated interactions are performed by an agent in habitual ways according to norms, without a need to comprehend the other participants’ mental states. For example, ordering meals in cafeterias is such a routine situation

that one need only identify the person standing beyond the counter as the cashier. That is, identifying the participant’s social role (i.e., “a cash- ier”) enables the interaction to take place. In this circumstance, thinking about the cashier’s mental states is redundant.
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A critic, however, may respond that this is a Pyrrhic victory, that it comes at a great cost. If the interpersonal component in sexual relation- ships is similar to the interpersonal relation between a client in a cafeteria and a cashier, then indeed Nagel is wrong; such patterns of “interper- sonal interaction” are extremely dull and routine – unlike the multilevel interpersonal awareness that Nagel has assumed (I can imagine Juliet nodding her head disappointingly to the comparison of making love to ordering a dish in a cafeteria). But I think that Nagel’s analysis is ade- quate to a different realm of interpersonal relationship: a realm that was described by psychologist Ulric Neisser by the notion of an “interper- sonal self.” As Neisser notes, “The interpersonal self is the self as engaged in immediate unreflective social interaction with another person.”
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The essence of this notion is self-awareness of the emotional changes which are created (in the self) by the perception of another agent and the inter- action with her (including her response to the self). To illustrate the pri- macy of the interpersonal self, Neisser references a notion introduced by Charles Darwin:

As Darwin put it, “when two young dogs in play are growling and biting each other’s faces and legs, it is obvious that they understand each other’s gestures and manners” … Darwin’s use of the term ‘understand’ in this context should not be misunderstood. He does not claim (or at least I do not claim) that puppies have an intellectual understanding of each other’s behavior.… What is going on between them is sometimes called ‘non- verbal communication,’ but even that term can be misleading; it tends to suggest that each participant is somehow telling the other about his/her own mental states. If that were true, the achievement of intersubjectivity would depend on the accuracy with which we attribute thoughts and feel- ings to other people. While we do sometimes attempt such attributions in adult life, they can hardly be the basis of the smooth and immediate inter- personal coordination I am considering here.
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The same applies to sexual activity: it is a smooth and immediate inter- personal interaction that is performed without attribution of thoughts and feelings. However, it does include a sort of (mutual) awareness of the partner’s feelings. This is a primary awareness of an interpersonal inter- action. It is mediated by emotional changes in the self. In other words,

the primary awareness of an interpersonal interaction is emotionally experienced; one may feel oneself good or bad, secure or anxious, relaxed or nervous, delighted or annoyed, or happy or sad within an interaction with others. These feelings, to a large extent, reflect the quality of the interpersonal interaction. Thus, in this respect, they constitute a primary emotional awareness of the interpersonal accommodation.

Neisser has also discussed studies of the communicative aspect of baby-caregiver interaction (e.g., what is called affect attunement). It has been shown that these communicative interactions have a potent emo- tional effect on the caregiver and the baby; disturbances in their content may lead to an extreme mutual emotional distress. Nagel’s analysis of sexual activity relates it to the realm of primary emotional awareness of interpersonal interaction. And accordingly, this characterization of sex- ual activity may explain (at least partly) the powerful emotional influence that sex has. In this regard sex is similar to dancing, being an audience in a live performance, or having a fight with someone. All these activities involve a very powerful emotional interpersonal interaction. However, it seems that besides infant-caregiver interaction, there is no other activity that involves such an extended and potent primary interpersonal interac- tion (adequately, in response to the notion of plain sex, one could have paraphrased: “it’s not the orgasm, stupid!”).
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Back to Romeo and Juliet: A Variety of Attitudes towards Sex without Love

So, where does the suggested analysis leave us in regard to Romeo and Juliet’s debate? It seems that both Romeo and Juliet are right (and wrong) to some extent. I believe that Juliet can establish an association between sex and a primary emotional awareness of interpersonal interaction. Juliet’s sexual desire has an interpersonal ingredient; she desires a sexual experi- ence that includes emotionally positive interaction with another person, and this desire is often identified as a (desire for) a feeling of bonding and intimacy within sex (in contrast to mere appetite for the other’s person body, similar to an appetite for food). However, some people (on some occasions) may feel exactly a desire for this – a yearning for the flesh alone. The difference between sexual desire that includes an interpersonal ingre- dient and a sexual desire for the body alone might be captured by James Barrel’s description of two attitudes towards the partner’s body. The first

description is when we feel tenderness we “look at the other’s body as a whole”; in contrast, the second, objectifying attitude views the other “as an object separate from and not embedded in the world.”
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The second kind of attitude, i.e., what Barrel calls the “objectness position,” is typical to the view of the body in pornography, to a relation of a client to a prostitute, and to sexual acts that are done out of “sheer lust” in order to discharge a sexual tension, e.g., a sailor on a short vaca- tion with the one thought,
woman
, rattling in his head, desiring to have sex in a club’s restroom or an orgy. Thus, Juliet may maintain that these kind of sexual desires and activities are limited because they do not include an interpersonal ingredient. Therefore, she feels that something is missing in sex without love.