How can we reason empathetically?

Yes. It's not only incomprehensible word-soup, it's limited to only one gender.

Re: How can we reason empathetically?


Of course it can. All it takes is keeping current with your political representatives and the issues they stand on. It's called doing one's homework, and it is impossible only if one thinks one can solve the world's problems while sitting in the comfort of one's armchair.



Not only is this simply a rationalization for being lazy, but it also contradicts your numerous assertions that your claims are based on external observation.

I know the image of the solitary, misunderstood genius locked away in his study is a romantic and irresistible one, but if your goal is to fabricate claims about the world without having to verify their validity, just own up to it and say so. You don't have much to lose that you haven't already sacrificed, and you have something to gain by at least being honest about it. But don't try to pretend that philosophy demands your laziness.



It sounds like you are proposing an alternative in which we insulate ourselves from current events and instead inject ourselves, for our own personal advantage, into the issue. Substituting one flawed approach for another is not progress.

An opinion on empathy - it is useless without the desire to connect. It's not empathy then, it's analysis.

An opinion on empathy - It is both the ability to put oneself in anothers shoe, and the desire to connect. 'Empathy' is useless without the desire to connect. It's not empathy then, it's analysis.

edit : excuse the double post

coberst,

I note you have not had a single positive response to this on four of the forums on which you have posted it. Maybe it is because your use of "must" is itself didactic. :wink:

You are right on the button.

I defiantly think it is the case that the more suffering each of us endures the more empathetic we become. That is a heavy price we pay for growing our ability to comprehend this very human ability of empathy. Some say that the artist's ability is dependent upon the amount of suffering endured and I can very well see how that may be true.

Perhaps the use of 'must' is a problem. However, I use it in the sense that it is the only technique that I know of to accomplish the task. It is not meant as a normative demand but as the only way that I know to be successful.

coberst,



There are other routes to "empathy" but your own investment in "I" will preclude your understanding of them.