Empathy -- Interesting Links

Empathy:  “Identification with and understanding of another's situation, feelings, and motives”

Empathy is an interesting subject.  It has profound biological underpinnings, as explained here and here.  Serial killers have genetic and brain-map characteristics consistent with low empathy.  So do people with autism, as well as some high-level business executives.  Interestingly, a lower-than-average level of empathy tends to make some business leaders appear (ironically) more like charismatic leaders who can make difficult decisions, and it also allows them to manipulate and deceive others more easily.  (No testing has been done on politicians…yet.)  Typical traits of "leaders" with low empathy are narcissim, Machiavellian-ism, and sycophant-ism.

For more on the various biological underpinnings of empathy, you can research such topics as mirror neurons, von Economo neuron (VEN) (also called "spindle neurons"), amygdala, insula and the orbito-frontal cortex.  While many documented aspects of empathy are related our brain's architecture, its very plasticity implies that assuming we have no profound brain abnormalities, we are nevertheless still responsible, ultimately, for our own empathy or lack thereof.

Tragically, a person’s level of empathy can be greatly reduced if, while very young, he/she is subjected to emotional and/or physical and/or sexual abuse or even just a profound lack of nurturing, such as is often experienced in Russian orphanages.  As a result, the young child, while biologically “normal”, can develop psychotic personality traits; i.e., a lack of conscience, violence towards others, and an inability to bond with others.  This is often labeled “reactive attachment disorder.”  Fortunately, it is often treatable, at least to a large extent.

While empathy itself seems to be built into us from a biological standpoint, the boundaries of our empathy are strongly influenced by social, religious and cultural considerations.  We tend to think of those outside our “boundaries” as our presumed enemies, as barbarians, as less than human, or even as mere unemotional “statistics” for which we have no interest. An interesting TED talk seeks to turn this on its head, for those with geopolitical boundaries on their empathy.  Another TED talk attempts to expand the racial boundaries to our empathy.

Even linguistic considerations can affect our empathetic boundaries, examples being relatively vague, technical-sounding doublespeak like "collateral damage", "enhanced interrogation" or "creative destruction".

The general size of peoples’ empathetical boundaries has tended to increase over historical time, from a person’s own immediate family toward the whole human family.  What actually has caused this?  It’s easy to identify the most profound influence; i.e., Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan, the Christian legacy of which in turn inspired social reforms, anti-slavery movements, pacifism, non-violence and the concept of the brotherhood of man.  Some Eastern religions, philosophies and traditions also clearly had some influence as well.  However, even today we unfortunately put boundaries on our empathy towards others.

Another factor that can affect our empathy is simply our lack of attention.  If we don't stop and look at something, our empathetic tendencies don't even have a chance to engage.  And when we are used to walking around in an overcrowded city, our mind wants to defend itself against over stimulation by our senses.  We tend to do this by blocking out other people, looking right through them, or avoiding even looking in their direction.  After all "we have places to go, things to do, people to see."  However, the very act of continually putting ourselves in such a position that we are never prepared or have time/energy to "get involved" reflects in itself a kind of inexcusable selfishness.

And then there are those political boundaries that divide and polarize us, even within our own country.  The Spanish civil war (1936-39) was extremely brutal and it’s origin can be traced to hatred between the poor landless socialists, Marxists and the Monarchists (whose vast personal wealth was threatened), as well as the various Fascists, Anarchists and Separatists—who all were political factions with their own agenda, and who did everything they could to undermine each other as well as the middle-of-the-road, fledgling democratic government.  What ultimately resulted after this brutal war was a 39 yr authoritarian dictatorship under Francisco Franco, who was convinced that Spain could not be governed by a democracy.  All because they couldn't (or wouldn't) reach across to each other and find common ground.

Perhaps this is an apt history lesson for the struggling democracies of countries like Egypt and Libya—not to mention the U.S. (and the European Union, as epitomized by this video, and Greece in particular as epitomized by this video).  Today in the U.S., we have similar factions—including numerous single-issue Republicans, i.e., anti-government rednecks, gun activists, Fascists, Bible-thumpers, racists, anti-gay rights activists, anti-abortionists, $2/gal oil activists, anti-environmentalists, Libertarians (Ron Paulers), Middle-of-the-roaders (a lot of Democrats and a few Republicans), a smaller number of single-issue activists on the left, and passionate activists on both sides of the issues of Medical reform as well as illegal immigration.  Unless we are able to reach across the aisle, understand the concerns and fears of our political opponents, and strive for middle ground and compromise, we’re likewise going to look more and more like Spain in 1936.  In other words, cool down the rhetoric.  Empathize.  You might like this serious message from a (normally) very funny guy.