Empathy - a Philosophical Discussion.

[the_great_she_elephant]

Something to exercise your Monday brains

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What is empathy?

How does it differ from sympathy?

Do animals feel emapthy or is it a purely human trait.?

Is it something intrinsic to human nature, or a learned emotion?

Is it something we all have or a luxury  only affordable by those for whom life is not a continual struggle for survival?

Can you empathise with someone and still treat them like bleep?

I have  my own thoughts on these questions, but I thought I'd throw it open to everyone else first and see what your ideas are. Feel free to add other questions on the subject if you think I've missed any.

[the_great_she_elephant]

(not in reply to anyone specifically)

Does empathising with someone necessarily mean you care about them? A sadist, for example, must be able to inagine what it feels like to be a victim, otherwise he/she wouldn't get a kick out of hurting people. 

And, in  answer to  Bob. No I don't think t is a scientific question - more one of semantics, perhaps?

[*lady*godiva*]

hi Lloyd

see, my understanding is that what you were feeling when your friend's mum died was sympathy. So not pathetic at all, because it would have been impossible for you to be empathetic on any level at that stage.

When you explain how you felt when your own mum died (sorry) I believe that what you are descibing is empathy. Now that you had personal experience from which to draw, you were able to empathise.

Your point about rape - because I can only sympathise, having never even met someone (that I know of) who has been through that experience, I didn't even consider that different situations within the same term could affect one victim differently to the other. Now, I know that rape is bad, but only because I have learned that from social attitude and tv etc, not because I have experienced it first hand. As much as I learn about it, I could never possibly understand how someone who has suffered that really feels, so whilst I do feel really bad for them, and I can "hear" them when they say how they feel and intrinsically know that they must feel devestated and violated etc, I can't empathise with them, due to my understanding of the definition of the word, it is impossible. What I feel and express is sympathy

and maybe that also applies to the different types of rape? Maybe the emotions and processes that one who was date raped verses another kind are entirely different, so even between victims, unless it was the same kind, only sympathy for their situation is possible?

[softail-joanie]

Empathy: Understanding other people's situation because you can relate to it. "walk a mile in my shoes" "I used to cry because I had no shoes, then I saw a boy who had no feet"

Sympathy: Acknowledgement of a situation like a death and providing emotional support.

Thanks for explaining that. Can one have empathy for someone, having been in a similar situation but not quite as sevre or brutal, and also have envy for them as well, at the same time. Wishing that it was them, that they could trade places, not to do them any favors,  just so that it would only be a one time thing and not an ongoing struggle? One can only be killed once, one can be beaten and abused many times.

[*lady*godiva*]

I am not understanding your question. (And I am assuming it was aimed at me?) I think it is your last line which has thrown me a curve ball.

Are you meaning wanting to trade places with someone who had only been beaten one time even though that was more severe than the experiences of someone else who had been beaten many times, but not as bad?

but I think it would be possible to have empathy and feel envy

Of course you could feel bad that someone was experiencing hardship. The prerequisite for empathy is that you have experienced it yourself. And I think it would only be natural to compare your situation with someone else's.

If I lost $500, but my neighbour only lost $200, I could still feel bad for them, but I think I would been a bit envious that I had not lost only $200 and wished I had my neighbours experience rather than my own.

[i-need-a-martini]

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@the_great_she_elephant wrote:

(not in reply to anyone specifically)

Does empathising with someone necessarily mean you care about them? A sadist, for example, must be able to inagine what it feels like to be a victim, otherwise he/she wouldn't get a kick out of hurting people. 

And, in  answer to  Bob. No I don't think t is a scientific question - more one of semantics, perhaps?

---

But would a sadist really understand their victims feeling or are their own feelings of power (or whetever) overriding all else?

The kick in hurting people is about how it makes HIM/HER feel rather than the victim.

[the_great_she_elephant]

Yes, but isn't imagining what the victim must be feeling what gives the sadist his sense of power? 

[softail-joanie]

Yes, as yours was the first reply that seemed to explain the diffrence in a way I could understand. Philosophically speaking, I Think empathy and envy can mix. Before this topic I might not have known the differance between empathy and sympathy. Then I got to thinking that it wasn't so much sympathy I was feeling for Kelly Thomas, I think about that video I seen alot, and find myself comparing it to events in my own life. In that way I suppose what  have for him is empathy. But then I think, every time i'm abruptly reminded that police in some form, city, county sheriff, highway patrol, ect. are aware of my presents here and are looking to abuse me in some way at the worst possible time. I think they know that I'm looking for an apartment and have plans to have me banned from any place I happen to get into so I'll be criminal trespassing in my own home.

I don't doubt that the fatal beating Kelly Thomas underwent was his first encounter with police, but here's where the envy part comes in,  it was his last. they can't get to him now, wherever he might be depending on one's own belief. Fact is the police have fun with me, and if I went the way of Kelly Thomas, their fun would be over. So they never take it too far, just enough to show alittle and then they say I did it to myself for added insentive to keep me in a cold holding cell without chothing or other covering in a way to dehumanize me.

I have empathy for Kelly Thomas, and envy i suppose, and with the exception of his father who himseld is a retired cop, some poetic justice there, I have sympathy for his family.