Love as mental disease  

Leave it to the Economist to try to medically cure love:

That raises the question of whether it is possible to "treat" this romantic state clinically, as can be done with OCD. The parents of any love-besotted teenager might want to know the answer to that. Dr Fisher suggests it might, indeed, be possible to inhibit feelings of romantic love, but only at its early stages. OCD is characterised by low levels of a chemical called serotonin. Drugs such as Prozac work by keeping serotonin hanging around in the brain for longer than normal, so they might stave off romantic feelings. (This also means that people taking anti-depressants may be jeopardising their ability to fall in love.) But once romantic love begins in earnest, it is one of the strongest drives on Earth. Dr Fisher says it seems to be more powerful than hunger. A little serotonin would be unlikely to stifle it.

I love the idea of trying to "treat" love. I have an ongoing discussion with a good friend about the effects of Prozac et al on artistic production from those with marginal psychologies (eg witness the high proportion of manic-depressives among major 20th century poets). But this takes it a step further: not only can we suck the poetry out of you, we can suck the love out of you too. And it turns out we've been doing this for a while now! I knew Prozac had "sexual side effects", but I didn't realize it was because it prevents you from falling in love...