Re: Empathy

On Thu, Dec 20, 2012 at 5:19 AM, hibbsa <[email protected]> wrote:
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>
> --- In [email protected], Brett Hall <brhalluk@...> wrote:
>>
>> On 17/12/2012, at 19:22, "hibbsa" <asbbih@...> wrote:
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>> >
>> >
>> > --- In [email protected], Elliot Temple <curi@> wrote:
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > On Dec 16, 2012, at 11:15 AM, hibbsa <asbbih@> wrote:
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>> > > >
>> > > > Something that might be helpful to a discussion about empathy would be
>> > > > if particapants disclose whether they personally consistently experience
>> > > > what they assume must be meant by 'empathy'. Not everyone does.
>> > >
>> > > Stop trying to invade people's privacy.
>> > >
>> > > -- Elliot Temple
>> > > http://fallibleideas.com/
>> > >
>> >
>> > Voluntary disclosure doesn't involve any kind of invasion that I can see. So the question would be the relevance/importance to the discussion of what is suggested.
>> > About that I would say that, if you don't experience the sensation of empathy, and never have...then you about as useful to people that do or have as a blind man is to a discussion about the visual sensation of colour.
>> >
>> Is this what emotions are like? Is empathy, poorly defined as it is, a quale like the perception of some colour?
>>
>> Brett.
>>
>> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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> From what I can make of it, empathy is linked in with social instinct (Or call it social static memes if you prefer...in the end once 'static memes' have been worked through to their consequences I suspect there aren't going to be that many differences)

What does "worked through to their consequences" mean?


> Not everyone has it. Psychopaths don't get empathy. Autism/Asperger's have less empathy which may be part of the reason for the tendency to be socially isolated, unable to grasp social cues and so on.

Those concepts are not any good. We have better ideas to explain what
you're trying to explain. Those concepts explain that genes have a
causal role, but they don't.

When psychologists refer to someone as having a "psychopathy", what's
really going on is that that person has evil ideas, ideas that he uses
to kill and hurt innocent people. And I guess the psychologists assume
that having those evil ideas *must* be due to a physical illness, but
that's false. Horrible experiences during childhood (plus his
understanding about them, i.e. his choices) is sufficient to causing
one to have evil ideas.

When psychologists refer to someone as having "Autism/Asperger's",
what's really going on is that that person has ideas that are not
socially accepted, ideas that he uses while playing and talking to
people and whatever else. And the psychologist is assuming that having
these socially unacceptable ideas *must* be due to a physical illness,
but that's false.


> What is the difference and similarity between psychopathy and autism spectrum disorders would be of potential interest.

Well, a similarity I see, using my ideas above, is that having evil
ideas about killing and hurting innocent people (aka "psychopathy") is
a special case of having ideas that are socially unacceptable (aka
"Autism/Asperger's"). But, a few hundred years ago, it was socially
accepted to kill people who had socially unacceptable ideas (referring
to the killing of "witches"). Would you call those witch-killers
psychopaths? If so, how do you explain why there were so many more
psychopaths back then than compared to today?

-- Rami Rustom
http://ramirustom.blogspot.com