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I, also, really enjoyed this topic of conversation. I like it because it's not really about who's "right" or what's unethical, which are, while worthy of discussion, very opinion based and often ends up raising more questions than answers (not that that's a bad thing, just really frustrating). Anyway, to touch on a few things, I think Liz's example of a "zombie brain" is a really intriguing one. Why would we be biologically built (from an evolutionary perspective) to both "cognitively merge", yet fall out of love with loss (or change?) of receptors? It seems there must be more to "love" (or at least maintaining a relationship) than this. I know the topic of loves other than romantic kept coming up but then shoved back in the closet, perhaps because as young adults we are more interested in the futures of our future marriages than a more stable love, like that of a friend or mother. However, I have found I've "fallen out of love" with a friend, so are there similar changes occurring there? Gillian's point about love as an addiction, and the idea of withdrawal, but in experiencing falling out of love, I wouldn't say I experienced the same withdrawal as, say, "heartbreak withdrawal". In that case, are the neurotransmitters still downregulating? at a faster rate?

Another interesting point that maybe someone else can also comment on was the question of possible age differences in being "better at relationships" (and whether this means staying in them, getting out of them, keeping them working, or even just realizing its potential is still arguable; i might argue that it's all of the above). It seems this is unanswerable with the current research, and there are many factors involved, but if everything is accounted for, I would presume this would still be unanswerable because of generational and cultural differnces. Our grandparents raised in a world of marriage at 20 years. Our parents were raised in a world of free love. We were raised in a world with a 2-1 (or 2.7-1) divorce rate. It seems that the cultural differences found among generations would make it impossible to reliably study such an effect. Similarly, it would difficult to study "relationship capacity" across cultures for the very same reasons. And, like Elliot said, "trying to break love down into many describable parts seems to somewhat ruin the wonderful, indescribable aspect of love." So why bother?