On 'Love at First Sight'

This essay focuses on the early phases of romantic love and investigates the phenomenon that is often referred to as ‘Love at First Sight’, where typically very little information about the other is available, yet intensely felt causal processes are at work. It argues that the phenomenon called ‘Love at First Sight’ is not love in a proper sense, even if it may resemble love in certain aspects, and even if, under certain conditions, it may lead into love proper. The discussion touches on questions regarding depth, vulnerability and personal history, regarding the object of love at first sight and its attractive features, the role of perception or sight, and the phenomenon’s relation to infatuation, crystallisation and the erotic.