Love Me Like You Do In Plato’s “Speech of Aristphanes”, Aristophanes argues that the heart of human nature is a natural love that all humans posses which causes them to go out and find their other half after being cut into two and complete themselves. Humans only have one purpose to fulfill in their lives and that is to connect with the other part of them and they are not worried about anything else in their lives until they find each other. This argument makes since but on the other hand you could argue that nowadays people don't dedicate their entire lives just to finding their “other half” and losing complete focus on life and not realizing people can love them without being their soul mate. Aristphanes describes how the love idea started by stating what happened to the humans. There are three types of humans described by Aristphanes “The male kind was originally and offspring of the sun, the female of the earth, and the one that combined both genders was on offspring of the moon, because the moon shares in both. They were Spherical, and so was their motion, because they were like their parents in the sky” (Austin 75). After the third sex human, the “adrogynous” was cut in half by Zues and “now, since their natural form had been cut in two, each logged for its own together, wanting to grow together” (Austin 76). Humans wanted to be complete and the only way they could do so is if they find their other half and reconnect with each other. Since the humans wanted nothing but love when they connect “they would die from hunger and general idleness, because they would not do anything apart from each other…whenever one of the halves died and one was left,the one that was left still sought another and wove itself together with that”. When the humans have found their partner they eventually died because they refused to separate and once that happened the living still craved for love that was taken away from them. Human nature takes over after the human as experienced loved even after “Zeus took pity on them, and came up with another plan: He moved their genitals around to the front! Before then, you see, they used to have their genitals on the outside, like their faces…So Zeus brought about this relocation of genitals, and in doing so he invented interior reproduction, by the man in the woman” (Austin 76). Even with Zeus changing the humans to make them better and try to fulfill the mistake he had created the characteristic of human nature kicks in and they keep striving to find someone to fill the void of love in their lives. I agree that people search for love in their life part but not necessarily agree with the searching non stop part. Yes it is good to try and find someone that will fill the void of love in your heart and love you but at the same time its ridiculous to ignore everything thats going on in your life just so you can continue to search for your missing half and connect with them. There are people in your life that you can love and still be close friends with. Aristophanes takes the whole “soul mates” thing literally and argues that human souls that are supposed to be together will be together at some point, but I believe that at some point yes you do meet the person you will spend the rest of your life with, but at the same time once you meet that person you do not

have the same souls, that happens when you when you only have the desire to love that one person unconditionally till death.