A bit of TED-Ed with your Valentine's chocolate (Patreon)

Today, many are celebrating St. Valentine with chocolate, puns, and pink, and we couldn't miss the opportunity to gush about how grateful we are for the support of our Patreon community (💖🍫)! But we'd love to do it in TED-Ed fashion: with some science, philosophy, history and mythology. 

So here's our valentine to you:

What is love? - Brad Troeger

Is love a signal winding through your neural pathways? A cliche? A cult? Love is easy to compare but difficult to define, maybe because we’re fundamentally biased; we try to define love while falling in or out of it. And love feels differently to every person who feels it, but this subjective emotion has evolutionary explanations, too. Brad Troeger takes a shot at the definition of love. Watch the lesson here. 

Is there a disease that makes us love cats? - Jaap de Roode

Today, about a third of the world’s population is infected with a strange disease called toxoplasmosis — and most of them never even know it. And while the parasite can multiply in practically any host, it can only reproduce sexually in the intestines of cats. Could this disease be the reason so many people love cats and keep them as pets? Jaap de Roode shares what we know about toxoplasmosis. Watch the lesson here. 

The history of marriage - Alex Gendler

A white, puffy dress. Eternal love. A joint tax return. Marriage means something different to everyone and has changed over time and across cultures. Alex Gendler traces the history of getting hitched, providing insights on polygamy, same-sex unions and even marriage between the dead and the living. Watch the lesson here. 

The myth of Cupid and Psyche - Brendan Pelsue

Psyche was born so beautiful that she was worshipped as a new incarnation of Venus, the goddess of love. But human lovers were too intimidated to approach her, and Apollo recommended her father abandon her on a crag where she would marry “a cruel and savage, serpent-like winged evil.” But Psyche’s story ended up being much more interesting. Brendan Pelsue shares the myth of Cupid and Psyche. Watch the lesson here. 

Why do we love? A philosophical inquiry - Skye C. Cleary

Ah, romantic love; beautiful and intoxicating, heart-breaking and soul-crushing... often all at the same time! If romantic love has a purpose, neither science nor psychology has discovered it yet – but over the course of history, some of our most respected philosophers have put forward some intriguing theories. Skye C. Cleary outlines five of these philosophical perspectives on why we love. Watch the lesson here. 

🤓💗,

TED-Ed