I always thought “te amo” translates to “I’m in love with you”. The “in love” makes it very unambiguous exactly what kind of love you mean (whereas I can say “I love you” in an unromantic way, to my kids or whatever).
If you want to say “te quiero” without bringing up the word “love” (and risk being interpreted as being “in love”) you might try use phrases like “I really care for you” or talk about feeling close or that they are important to you. I agree the phrasing is awkward. I really like the Spanish phrase “te quiero” because it’s so much simpler! What is the phrase for 2.5?
The author seems to not realise in English you can say “I (really) like you - will you be my girlfriend/boyfriend?” which would imply you want an exclusive relationship. It can happen this way but I agree the prevailing culture might generally be murkier.
The thing with the 3. in both Spanish and Japanese is that they are unambiguously for romantic relationships*, if you wanted to say "I like/love pancakes" you'd say "me gustan/encantan las tortitas", with "encantan" being the superlative of like, you wouldn't use love*.
There is no 2.5 in Spanish/Japanese AFAIK? Like the 2 can be extended to include 2.5. I wanted to point that out, that IMHO in English "I love you" as a romantic phrase in a couple feels to be in a bit of an awkward position between 2 and 3; when you are starting/just a couple it's too early to say it, when you have found your soulmate and are totally in love it's not strong enough of a feeling.
* weeell, technically, "amo/amar" can be used as a figure of speech in some situations where it's not purely romantic; but it's kind of uncommon and a wordplay, like trying to describe that you are in love with pancakes everyone would understand it's not "real love", you just want to express how much you like them.
If you want to say “te quiero” without bringing up the word “love” (and risk being interpreted as being “in love”) you might try use phrases like “I really care for you” or talk about feeling close or that they are important to you. I agree the phrasing is awkward. I really like the Spanish phrase “te quiero” because it’s so much simpler! What is the phrase for 2.5?
The author seems to not realise in English you can say “I (really) like you - will you be my girlfriend/boyfriend?” which would imply you want an exclusive relationship. It can happen this way but I agree the prevailing culture might generally be murkier.