On Empathy, my own thesis.

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The following will be one of an informal thesis on this forum with open comment to discussion, objection is welcome.

Unlike the more scientific approach Ganondox has taken with his diagram, which I commend him for, I will post my own beliefs, some contain objections to his portrayal, some are necessarily an agreement, but the purpose is to define what I believe is the case. This was made not to reply to him, but i was inspired after looking at his post.

This topic is empathy and why I believe lack of empathy is a symptom of autism worth admitting but should not be viewed as an essential, as in relating to essence (not importance), trait since empathy is a dynamic multilayered phenomena. If we understood this, we would allow admitting it without a moral component good or bad involved.

I will explain my own points. I just read some Aquinas, I will plagiarize the hell out of borrow his writing style for today.

Article: Whether there is empathy in the complete sense in the mean autistic person who is unaffected by character defects as there is in the mean typical person who is unaffected by character defects?
(Note: Mean not as in "mean to someone", I refer to a hypothetical individual with the mean quantity and severity of autistic symptoms. Just in case you don't know what that word means)

Objection 1: As an autistic, I feel distress at the sight of others pain and personal distress would fall under Empathy as it is said empathy is the feeling inside oneself, and the pain of another also is a feeling inside themselves.

Objection 2: When a person I had know was sick, I felt the need to tend to that person for there own well being, a sociopath never has the desire to tend to another for their own well being, a sociopath lacks empathy, therefore I must have it otherwise I would not.

Objection 3: Since empathy can be divided into emotional and cognitive, I could have one but not the other. Autism is an inverse of the sociopath's situation.

Objection 4: Autism does have a lack of empathy but it is not a necessity or habit but a true individual trait. As Hans Asperger named autism "Autistic psychopathy".

On the contrary, I first argue to divide empathy into cognitive and emotional is too simple a classification, either it must be divided further or simply be defined as one. For empathy is an action, and to perform an action require all the means and tools. If it falls short then it is not empathy for it is not complete enough to be called empathy. But for this definition, all moral implications or judgement ought be removed. Hence I will stick with empathy and sympathy alone for vocabulary. To define them further is a possibility but must be done and each term used according to the situation requiring it.

If I were forced to use clearer terms, my first division into classification would be that emotional empathy is the feeling of one other's feeling as if it were yours, cognitive is the knowledge for applying one's action based on another, and sympathy as being concerned about another person's well being.
I believe cognitive is impaired and a necessary result of the condition of autism disorder.
I believe emotional is impaired to some degree as necessary result but also as a habit as defined by the American Journal of Psychology 1903: "A habit, from the standpoint of psychology, is a more or less fixed way of thinking, willing, or feeling acquired through previous repetition of a mental experience."
I believe sympathy has chance to be likely to be impaired but of the greatest degree determined by habit rather than necessity from autism's symptoms.

So like human language, an invention of making sound, assigning meaning, combining sounds into a structure, empathy is a process from available tools. A more perfect empathy, I define, is being put in another person's shoes and responding appropriately as if you were they, not as if they were you. The term "putting yourself" is insufficient for a rational discussing, as the other person's experience of pleasure and pain ought to take precedence when you respond to them instead of your own, but the phrasing for knowledge of how to best respond can be from your own experience. Their shoes find their way onto your feet, and you come closer to understanding what they are feeling, what they have felt, what they are intending, what they have intended, what they will, all this including what they do not, to cover more means more perfection. As an example, bpd falls short of perfect empathy. Studies have shown their cognitive empathy for another's emotions may be intact, but not for thoughts. Therefore there is a lack of empathy. The word "lack" doesn't mean complete absence, as that would imply absolute solipsism, nor does it imply there exists complete presence, as that would be absolute perfection, such as absolute telepathy with no individuality.

Also noted is why I would not consider the social dysfunction or empathetic dysfunction of autism as "defining" traits within the context of psychiatry, indeed they are core traits but "definining" deals with the non-objective, best left to psychology. What I define autism in it's non-scientific but rational essence is a disorder of these:
-Need for sameness/repetitivity
-Executive dysfunction/cognitive dysfunctions
-Weak central coherence
-Autism itself (as defined by what Blueler first said)
-Clouding of perception of reality, not a full absence as in psychosis, but a narrowing or fogging.

I theorize the empathetic disturbance and social problems in autism are not a matter of a personality trait or character of the individual, it is a disturbance of perception and ability for actions, sometimes an individual action.
To have sufficient empathy to say one has it, one must be able to achieve it more perfectly. No one may achieve anything perfectly, but with the ability of the undisturbed typical person being used as a criteria, autism entails less perfection. Empathy can be a catalyst for moral virtue, but the lack of doing is morally neutral in itself, the reason of what entails the lack could be result from that which is has moral neutrality or is a vice.

Reply to objection 1: I concede before I object that it is certainly the case that empathy is not concrete in it's reaction the way a person feels hotness from a fire, or coldness from ice within their vicinity, yet it has been shown the distress through testing that it has it's root closer in feeling one's own feeling in the autistic individual, as can be argued to be like the result of feeling hotness from fire, as the feeling comes without regard or shared perception to the fire which feels no hotness itself. The distress felt exists autisticly (as coined by Blueler). The feelings of personal distress from being in the vicinity of another's distress without the feeling for the need to relieve them of their predicament, not unheard of in autism, is a falling short of sufficient perfection for empathy whatever the reason may be, whether the feeling is not there or a person is incapable because of being overwhelmed.

Reply to objection 2: To show concern for others can be motivated or urged by a more perfect empathy, but doesn't need it as a vital component to ever happen. One could be motivated to help for one's own gain on one hand, and one could be motivated for genuine concern without full knowledge or impulse from having been made aware. In this case, a person who is blind could still dim the lights in the room for another's benefit without knowing their perception. A charitable action could be out of self interest, hidden motivation, good morality, or sympathy.

Reply to objection 3: Sociopathy has a lack of empathy as a necessity of a character defect, an inability creditable to the individual. Autism has a lack of empathy as a necessity creditable to the individual's ability and potential for actions. Thus a sociopath does not desire to achieve fuller empathy, and autistic person can while not being able to do so if they admit it. The comparison is not a mirroring, what the two states have in a common is the lack of achieving empathy. Otherwise it is apples to oranges. Sociopathy is rooted in the individual's natural will, autism in the individual's natural ability. Yet a person may of their own free choosing or permissiveness with autism let or fall into the state of their will conforming to their (in)ability(ies) in their life, something I believe is not a virtue, but a vice. That is another matter for discussion.

Reply to objection 4: Hans Asperger was born in Austria and spoke German and used German a medium, and when he spoke and used German as medium such as through writing, it was during the early 20th century. The English term autistic psychopathy was not originating, nor was every coined in English on it's own, but only existed a translation of the German "autistisch psychopathierien" whose components existed in the when and where, where the individual parts held value for the definition. Autistisch carried the transparent meaning from Blueler. Psychopathierien carried the transparent weight of it's components. Psycho-mind, and pathierien-a more stable and pervading disorder, (unlike -itisch/itic which implied more severe break down and possibly collapse as in psycho-tic) as can be still found in the word psychopathology. "Psychopathierien" had replaced other terms meaning "defective/perverted" at the time in Europe.

It appears you are using a lot of words to say very little. It would be more clear if you stopped trying to imitate Thomas Aquinas and just got to the point. Anyway, the objections to the idea that autism is defined by a lack of empathy aren't based on a moral argument, they are based on the idea that it's just wrong. Of course empathy is affected, because the totality of cognitive and social functions are affected in a myriad of different ways, but portraying the effect as a deficit is misleading, and it obviously isn't a defining trait of autism because it's affected in many disorders.

Well yeah, technically saying it is a "deficit" is innacurate since empathy is not a substance like cholesterol. "Disabled" or "impaired" is more accurate. And yes, autism shouldn't be defined by it because it is not unique to autism but common to many neurological conditions, but somehow it's become a huge topic of discussion. If 5 people sit in a room an all are wearing purple shirts with a pink elephant on them, yet every keeps pointing at the fourth guy saying "look at him! Look at his shirt! He is wearing a strange shirt!" while being indifferent to the other 4 people. It would be odd.
I wonder why?

Of course though those proud people who seem to fixate on "empathy" to no end, you know who I am referring to, may reply "no, there is also narcissism and sociopathy!" But these two are sitting in a different room, but only the fourth guy gets compared to them, not the others.

I would wonder what drew so much attention to the fourth guy's shirt?

i don't care less.
whatever your angst ridden causation for your hastily arranged understanding of it is, it does not factor into my mind.

i do not feel what other people do, and i don't give a s**t.
they will no doubt attract someone who feels like they do, so it's all cool.

Why do people keep making threads about this? Why are you all constantly arguing against arguments that haven't been made?

If I'm aware that someone is feeling badly, then I care about them, and want them to feel better. But my problem is I'm not instinctively aware how others feel, so I have to be told verbally, or else I won't know.

I'm also not certain if my sense of 'caring' qualifies as empathy, or if it's just a philosophical attitude, that I want other people to be happy. Other people's problems don't drain my energy, or wear me down, so I'm not actually feeling what they're feeling.

I've come to believe that I'm not good at trying to help other people with their problems, and I serve them better by remaining silent, and not making them feel worse with my lack of understanding.

Thank you for sharing - this is a interesting point that I will be pondering.

I feel like I can be overly empathetic to things I actually see but if I hear about someone who has died it doesn't bother me - because we all die eventually. I understand why someone is sad, because they will miss that person but unless I see them crying/upset I feel nothing.

However - if someone is feeling an intense emotion I INSTANTLY feel the same emotion in myself, like a mirror. Someone cries happy tears and I cry too. Someone is sad and I cry too. I can't stop it unless I leave/close my eyes and shut it out. - I did NOT have this as a child. When I was little I was much more "blank" unless I was really happy/excited about something.