Talk:unconditional love

RFD discussion: September–November 2016

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unconditional love

An entry created by User:Tooironic in 2010. Several translations have been added since into the translations box, most of which are either redlinks or separated links to the parts. However, there is one translation entry that has actually been created, amor incondicional (Spanish), that I believe is also SOP for the same reason. So keep in mind that that entry is also being RFD'd here.

The reason I'm RFDing this entry is because the term's definition "Affection felt for someone that is not dependent on certain qualities or actions." may not look like it is SOP, but that definition is a rather outside the box way of saying unconditional + love. I was already suspicious when I looked at the entry, but the real thing that inspired me to RFD was the fact that I could also say unconditionally love (a verb meaning "to love someone in a way that is not dependent on certain qualities or actions"). Also we could form it backwards and say love unconditionally, or especially love someone unconditionally. That's not an RFD rationale in itself, but it goes to show that unconditional love isn't really a set phrase, which moreso suggests the SOPness of the term. PseudoSkull (talk) 01:52, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Hmm. Wikipedia has an entry on this term, which suggests it isn't totally SOP, so am leaning keep. You might say the same about unconditional surrender, which is likewise similar to but not quite the same as unconditional + surrender (for example, an unconditional surrender does in fact come with certain conditions). Also, your argument about the ability to say "love unconditionally", "unconditionally love", etc. isn't really probative because lots of idioms can be flipped around or rearranged in certain ways. For example, the expression "to drive one up the wall" can be passivized but it's still an idiom (the Free Dictionary gives the example "I was being driven up the wall by their silly chatter"), and you can insert certain words in the middle, cf. drive me completely up the wall. Benwing2 (talk) 02:49, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

• Tempted to say keep. A mother's unconditional love for her child is not literally unconditional - it depends on the condition that the beloved is her child. Smurrayinchester (talk) 13:43, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

I think in fact that unconditional in practical, not lexical terms doesn't always mean without condition. Renard Migrant (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Is it? Say, a father unconditionally loves his child, but later he finds out that he isn't actually the biological father - does that cause the love for his child to cease immediately? -- Pedrianaplant (talk) 20:08, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Of course, unconditional still means without condition, it doesn't change the meaning of the word, so much as people don't always mean what they say absolutely literally. Like someone who's 100% committed probably isn't, but that doesn't change the meaning of 100%. PS how do we not have 100%? It's clearly not SoP. Renard Migrant (talk) 22:16, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

And a perfect circle isn't actually perfect. This is more about how people use words loosely than about what the word means. Equinox ◑ 15:43, 21 September 2016 (UTC)

It's basically the same reason why we have an entry for unicorn even though there are no unicorns. Dictionaries do meanings, whether the thing they're talking about exists or not is irrelevant. Renard Migrant (talk) 19:54, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Delete as SOP per Equinox. - -sche (discuss) 19:25, 23 October 2016 (UTC)

Delete per Equinox. DCDuring TALK 20:15, 23 October 2016 (UTC)

Delete: SoP. — SMUconlaw (talk) 19:18, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

Deleted.​—msh210℠ (talk) 09:46, 28 November 2016 (UTC)