Empathy and Virtue

CHAPTER 13 Empathy and Virtue The way Battaly construes her argument against empathy is rather complex, but I will try to summarise it in a way that is clear and hopefully faithful to the author’s intentions: if empathy is a virtue, then it must be intentional or at least have some voluntary component. In fact, as Aristotle had rightfully noticed in the Nicomachean Ethics, we praise or blame people depending on their virtuous or vicious behaviour, and we do that because we hold them responsible for their actions. Of course, one can only be responsible for something that one has control over. Ergo, virtues are traits of character that we must have control over. For this reason, all the concepts of empathy which describe it as a fundamentally automatic and involuntary phenomenon must be ruled out, for they cannot, by definition, regard empathy as a virtue. Necessarily, the only notion of empathy remaining, the one which conceives it as a phenomenon in some way controllable, is that of empathy as perspective-taking. However, the situation is not that simple. It might, in fact, be that perspective-taking is not a virtue, but a skill. Battaly resorts once again to Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics to illustrate the analogies and the differences between the two concepts. A skill can be defined as ‘an acquired ability to reliably attain a particular end’.1 In fact, we are not born with skills, we have to train and develop them, and once we have developed them well enough, skills grant us special abilities to attain various ends: to 1 Battaly (2011, p. 290). © The Author(s) 2024 M. Camassa, On the Power and Limits of Empathy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37522-4_13 259 260 M. CAMASSA successfully play football or chess, to speak a language, to do derivations in logic, for example. This also implies that a person who accidentally—even though repeatedly—attains a certain end cannot be considered as actually skilled,2 for the very good reason that skills are based on the agent’s knowledge, training, and experience, not on chance. Finally, skills cannot be but voluntary abilities, for the agent must exert control both over their acquisition and over their exercise and improvement. Concerning these characteristics, skills and virtues are similar: since virtues must be acquired and developed with practice and are also voluntary. However, virtues and skills have several differences as well. Two are the most crucial. First, skills are, essentially, abilities, that is, they signal what one is able to do; virtues, in contrast, are dispositions, which means that they designate what one would do given certain circumstances. This entails that whereas the virtuous person always displays their virtues when the situation requires it, the skilled person might decide either to show what they are capable of or simply forego the opportunity, depending on what they want. Thus, for instance, the courageous person will always react with courage by confronting danger every time it is appropriate, given the circumstances. Whereas a person skilled in, for example, playing football will use this ability when they need, want, or are forced to but may simply forego all other opportunities to play. The second difference between virtues and skills regards the reason, the motivation behind one’s own actions. The virtuous person is moved exclusively by the idea of the good. In other words, virtuous actions are performed by the virtuous individual only because they are morally good, not for ulterior reasons. For instance, a person who gives money to the poor only to be praised and admired by others is not truly generous. On the contrary, those who are skilled not only can perform their abilities out of egoistic motives, but can even pursue morally bad ends, as conmen, thieves, or professional assassins inter alia attest. Hence, these being the different features of virtues and skills, how should empathy be considered? Battaly has no doubts: empathy is a skill. In fact: Suppose that, other things being equal, an agent foregoes opportunities to engage in imaginative perspective-taking. Does this demonstrate that she is not a good imaginative perspective-taker—that she lacks empathy so construed? It does not.3 2 3 Cfr. Aristotle (1992, 1105a22–1105a26). Battaly (2011, p. 296). 13 EMPATHY AND VIRTUE 261 The example she uses is that of an expert therapist, very skilled in perspective-­taking, who one particular day, out of boredom and complacency, knowingly forgoes opportunities to engage in perspective-taking with their final client of the day. Does this show that they are not a good perspective-taker? No, as in fact, they are an excellent one. What we say is rather that they did not choose to use their ability, that they were not in the right frame of mind, or something similar. But we cannot deny their skills. The other main reason, for which we cannot consider empathy to be a virtue, is that it does not necessarily aim at the moral good, as virtues should do. Indeed, as mentioned earlier, one can be good at perspective-­ taking and use this ability to deceive others. Given all that, Battaly’s answer cannot be but categorical: empathy is not a virtue, but a skill. I shall not criticise so much the content of Battaly’s view on virtues, because—good Aristotelian as she is—I think she is fundamentally right. In particular, I agree that virtues are, under many important aspects, under our voluntary control and that they are dispositions to act in a certain way given the appropriate circumstances. Finally, of course, I agree that the truly virtuous person aims for what is good. What I shall criticise, instead, is her opinion that empathy cannot share these characteristics of virtues. I think, in fact, that if we analyse these features more closely, it will soon become clear that they are also common to empathy and that Battaly’s choice to restrict empathy to the sole phenomenon of perspective-taking is unduly limiting. Let us begin with the first characteristic: the question of voluntary control. As highlighted previously, Battaly thinks that the only definition of empathy which depicts it as a mechanism potentially under our intentional control is that of empathy as perspective-taking and we have seen the problems that this entails for Battaly. However, there are various ways to overcome this criticism. First of all, we should make clear that the characterisation of empathy I have given over the course of the book can preserve the feature of voluntary control while affirming that empathy is more than just perspective-taking. We have said, in fact, that empathy is a complex phenomenon, involving a variety of different psychological mechanisms. For the sake of clarity and simplicity, empathy has been divided into low-level empathy and high-level empathy. Perspective-taking is surely the main methodology employed in HLE, but it does not feature in LLE, which benefits from more automatic and conceptually poor mechanisms, such as instant-reading (and interpretation) of the target’s facial expressions, and gestures. Hence, empathy is more than mere 262 M. CAMASSA perspective-­ taking. However—Battaly might reply—then you should abandon describing empathy as under voluntary control; in fact, it seems that LLE occurs involuntarily and automatically. The key to confuting this critique is to highlight my notion, according to which empathy can and must become—following the example of virtues—a habit. I may not have direct control over LLE (although, as made clear earlier, I have a degree of control over my empathic reactions), but I do in regard to HLE and also the triggers of empathy. In other words, I may not be able, for example, to choose to feel a hint of sadness as a result of contemplating the unhappy face of a young woman. Nonetheless, I can choose to observe her face, her behaviour, to take her perspective, and to become attuned to her. In addition, if I do these things habitually, I will sooner or later develop a habit of empathising. Does this disqualify empathy from being a virtue? It does not. Indeed, Aristotle (who is Battaly’s representative for the correct definition of virtues) thought that this was exactly the distinctive feature of the virtuous person: the virtuous individual does not have to reflect on what should be done in a given situation; instead, by way of habit, they are used to instantiating certain virtues when the situation requires it and does so almost automatically. Hence, insofar as we consider empathy to be an ability that can be developed and become a habit, it does not conflict with Aristotle’s view on virtues.4 Empathy is ultimately, and in many regards, under our control and can become a disposition to enact in certain ways given the appropriate circumstances. What is the situation regarding the third condition, however? Does empathy always aim for what is good? Here my answer will follow two lines of thought. Let us begin by saying that even asking such a question would be a serious misinterpretation of the doctrine of virtue by Aristotle. It is not, in fact, the virtues which ipso facto aim for what is good (how could a virtue ‘aim’ at something?) but it is the virtuous person who pursues certain aims, and the aims of the virtuous person are always good. In actuality, the virtuous person is guided by wisdom/prudence (phronesis), which is crucial in order to recognise what is morally good and to use one’s own virtues in order to realise that good in the praxis. This means that the virtuous person is truly virtuous only when they are guided by 4 Nota bene: empathy is also able to satisfy the condition of the golden mean between two extremes, one of excess and the other of deficiency. We may, in fact, assert that empathy is the mean between a kind of over-sensitivity or even identification with the other (excess) and pure insensitivity or apathy (deficiency). 13 EMPATHY AND VIRTUE 263 phronesis.5 Consider, in fact, of what would happen if an ill-intentioned person were also courageous. Their courage would give them the strength to fulfil their bad aims, thereby making them even worse from a moral point of view. Phronesis is what steer virtues to the good. Hence, since all virtues need a guide, why should empathy constitute an exception? I agree with Battaly that empathy can be used to pursue morally bad ends, but since this is true for other ethical virtues as well, I claim that empathy should ‘simply’ be led by phronesis. Nevertheless, there is more that is worthy of consideration. Before moving on with the analysis of empathy as a virtue, however, it will be useful to introduce what I think is the concept of empathy in its fullest sense. Many of the arguments I have made in the course of the book were meant to set the stage for the introduction of this concept to be analysed more in depth here, in the section dedicated to moral motivation and conduct. I have stated, for instance, that empathy implies the lingering in the inner world of others. Now it is time to ask ourselves: why is it so important to do that? It is important, because empathy mainly regards what we might call (using a term by Blum, 1980) the ‘weal and woe’ of others, their suffering, and their well-being, which we can recognise, understand, and feel. Therefore, everyone (or almost everyone) of us is concerned about their own well-being. Emotions, like joy, sadness, pride, and envy, can all be connected to a special concern we have to fare good. We are happy when our general well-being is high, sad when it is low or when we suffer, proud when we have achieved something that we deem valuable (and so, directly or indirectly, good for our well-being), and envious when we believe someone fare better than us. Lingering in the inner world of others permits the identification of and, ultimately, the feeling of the same concern the other has for their own well-being ‘from the inside’, as it were. Thus, thanks to empathy, we become concerned for the target of our empathy. Empathising in this sense, with a sad person, for example, does not simply mean that we should feel their sadness, but that we should feel this sadness as mattering. We become, in the words of Batson,6 empathically concerned about the other’s well-being. Quoting the words of Aaron Simmons (who mentions the link previously referred to regarding empathy and caring): Cfr. Aristotle (1992, 1144b). See esp. Batson (2011) and Batson et al. (1987), although you will find this concept in many of his works. 5 6 264 M. CAMASSA […] empathy in its fullest form is typically if not always essential to caring for another’s well-being. When we feel concern for another’s suffering, we necessarily empathize with her insofar as we share in her feelings of concern for her pain or distress.7 If empathy can become a habit in the model of ethical virtues, and if in its fullest form means to linger in the other long enough to see the concerns of this other individual as things that matter,8 then also the criticism about foregoing opportunities will not carry weight. In fact, if I fail to feel empathy for others when the circumstances are appropriate, I could not be called empathic in the proper sense. My relationship with the virtue of empathy would be akratic at best, but I would not have reached the ‘moral excellence’, so to speak. Hence, although concern can certainly exist without empathy (I might very well be concerned not about an individual, but about something, for instance, or I might feel concerned about a person without wanting to empathise with her), true empathy cannot exist without concern. At this point, some scholars might want to object by asking: is this conception of empathy not too similar to what was elsewhere called ‘sympathy’ or ‘compassion’? In effect, if we intend sympathy as ‘a feeling or emotion that responds to some apparent threat or obstacle to an individual’s good and involves concern for him, and thus for his well-being, for his sake’,9 in some sense this is true. Although, as mentioned earlier in the book, sympathy can also occur without necessarily feeling empathy. It can by way of depicting exactly what I have labelled ‘concern without sharing of feelings’ or even a positive emotion of wishing well and/or practical support directed to the well-being of others. This last definition makes it different from compassion, which, as the name suggests, always implies a sharing of (negative) feelings (pace Bloom’s writings). I would therefore maintain the concept of sympathy as being closely related but nonetheless distinct from empathy. Instead, I see no other origin for compassion other than empathy itself. This should be viewed as good news, as it simplifies the wide and complex range of fellow-feelings. It does not mean, however, that Simmons (2014, p. 98). Nota bene: not everything the other is concerned about can be seen as mattering ‘in a good sense’ by the empathiser. Empathy is not limitless and we, as empathisers, may very well have principles so strong to prevent us from empathising with, for example, dictatorial or racist ideas, pedophiliac desires, and so forth. 9 Darwall (1998, p. 273). 7 8 13 EMPATHY AND VIRTUE 265 empathy always leads to compassion: in fact, only empathy with a person who is suffering can possibly bring about compassion. Indeed, we all know that we can feel empathy even with a person who is faring well: in this case, compassion will not possibly arise. Nevertheless, in situations in which we strongly empathise with a person’s plight, our empathy will take the form of compassion. I am well aware that there are scholars who would not accept my arguments: not only anti-empathists, but even authors who are mere sceptics about empathy, such as Michael Stocker, Martha Nussbaum of Upheavals, or Stephen Darwall (at least in his less recent works), would probably object by saying, with Darwall’s words: ‘Empathy can be consistent with the indifference of pure observation or even the cruelty of sadism. It all depends on why one is interested in the other’s perspective.’10 However, as already made clear previously, that which occurs in the case of sadism is not true (affective) empathy, and now we have even more evidence to notice that this notion is not valid. If the sadist really empathised with the feelings of fear, horror, and pain of his victim, he would not be able to go on hurting this.11 What occurs in the case of sadism, torture, but also indifference is, at most, cognitive empathy, that is, the pure understanding that the other is suffering, but this suffering that is recognised is not shared in, nor felt from the inside; hence, true affective empathy is, in this case, Darwall (1998, p. 261). The assertion that empathy is consistent with sadism, indifference, or torture is simply nonsensical. Indeed, there is clear and conclusive proof of this, even in real-life scenarios. Consider, for instance, the first person who comes to mind when imagining a very empathic individual. For me, it is my partner. She is the kind of person who is very attentive to the feelings of others and understands their mood and state of mind before they even mention it. She is never indifferent to others’ feelings because she immediately takes these to heart and gives them importance. She cannot avoid feeling sad when someone in the room is unhappy or in a negative state. She always gives to beggars (as well as to charities) because she imagines what it must be like being poor. Also, every time we watch a film together in which, for example, one of the characters, for whatever reason, gets hurt, she covers her eyes and moans almost as if she was the one getting hurt. For the same reason, she hates violence in all its forms and every time an insect appears in one of the rooms of our house, she forces me to remove it without killing it. For this and many other motives, I am totally persuaded that she can be defined as a very empathic person. Now, would it be possible for my partner and people like her to become skilled torturers or sadists, when the mere sight of a person using violence against another physically repels them? I believe that the answer is obviously negative and the fact that several philosophers have thought this to be a likely conclusion simply shows how philosophical considerations can sometimes drive us away from sane, common sense. 10 11 266 M. CAMASSA totally excluded. I think that the reason why so many authors have been persuaded by the fact that empathy could coexist with sadism and indifference was the fact that they did not see empathy as a complex phenomenon, constituted by both a cognitive and an affective part. Probably, they have understood empathy as a monolithic phenomenon, and since we have prima facie evidence of the fact that there is an aspect of what looks like empathy deployed in the work of, for example, the professional torturer, they have concluded that empathy has nothing to do with moral concern. Now we are able to see things differently. However, there is one point on which I fully agree with Darwall: the fact that: ‘It all depends on why one is interested in the other’s perspective.’12 Ultimately, it is our will, our intention (together with our level of development with the mechanism of empathy) which decides how much we empathise with our target. The person who prepares to torture another human being will start with the unyielding stance of not having empathy for the other. He or she will free their mind of any true sharing of feelings and, thereby, of a real concern for the other. The virtuous person, instead, will always aim for the golden means: not too much empathy—which would lead to identification and/or personal distress—and not too little— which would induce a kind of emotional indifference. In medio stat virtus. 13.1   Empathy and Phronesis This also means that empathy will necessarily need the contribution of practical wisdom and reason in order to lead to morally good acts (and judgements). Nevertheless, this should not be seen as a shortcoming: in fact, reason and phronesis must guide all virtues. This constitutes an answer also for all the scholars who criticise empathy by favouring other emotions: no emotion is ever infallible, and all emotions need the precious contribution of rational arguments and prudence, exactly as empathy does. Reading the works of anti-empathists, it is evident how simplistic their idea of empathy often is. They tend to see it as a type of emotion which can indifferently arise at any moment and with any person: we can indifferently empathise with, for example, an Adolf Hitler and his ideas as we can do it with, say, a Martin Luther King and his principles, and for this reason they think empathy is profoundly unreliable in ethical matters. Now, apart from the fact that in these cases ‘sympathy’ would be a more appropriate term 12 Darwall (1998), p. 261. 13 EMPATHY AND VIRTUE 267 than ‘empathy’, since here we want to express the fact that people might be positively inclined and have a general attitude of support towards the ideas of these two figures, we can now (re)affirm that empathy never occurs in empty space. Behind the fact that someone prefers to ‘empathise’ (again, it is the incorrect verb, but let us keep it, for the sake of the argument) with Hitler rather than with MLK, we must understand that there has been a certain background of education and of experience that has ultimately led this person to make what we would judge as the wrong moral choice. The empathy of this individual is misdirected because, arguably, their education was misdirected. This individual, in other words, did not experience any positive moral development, and the ‘moral’ principles at the base of their convictions and sentiments are crippled as a result. However, as already reiterated, the situation is different in the case of someone who has achieved moral virtue. We have stated previously that Battaly is wrong in believing that the only form of empathy under our voluntary control is perspectivetaking; in fact, there are numerous tasks that we can voluntarily perform which are conducive to empathy, such as paying closer attention to the affective cues in others’ behaviour, regardless of whether they are human or animals.13 Thus, once again, phronesis reveals itself as central. Indeed, it is a way in which we can control our empathy with others: insofar as we are capable of reflecting, of reasoning about how and with whom we ought to empathise and put, as it were, our empathy to the test. The merit of the work by anti-empathists, far from being that of freeing ourselves from empathy, is that of making extremely visible the limits of our human condition and how much room we have for improvement in how, when, with whom, and for what reasons to empathise. There are so many ways that we may empathise wrongly: we may empathise too little and become indifferent, too much and become physically distressed even by the most trivial things, or we may empathise excessively with those we consider similar to us and not enough with people we consider different, thereby becoming parochial. The list is long. Nonetheless, failures, biases, shortcomings, and weaknesses are not the prerogative of only one of our faculties, but of our very humanity. They can affect our reasoning or any 13 It is evident that some people fail to empathise with animals because they do not see them as emotional beings in some sense similar to us. However, by paying closer attention to their behaviour and by knowing the cues they use to express discomfort and distress, for instance, we can enhance our abilities to empathise with them. However, I shall not argue this at length in this book, as I do not consider myself expert enough in the field of animal ethics. Other authors will be more suited to support the case. 268 M. CAMASSA emotions we have as much as they affect empathy, hence, the only thing we can do is learn to avoid these shortcomings as much as possible, not to abandon one of our abilities simply because it does not lend itself to what is an impossible perfection. There is also one sense in which the moral potentiality of empathy is clearly higher than that of compassion or (at least in the traditional use of the term) of sympathy. I am referring to the fact that empathy allows us to understand, share, and reflect on positive emotions as much as well as negative ones. We are not only able to empathise with feelings of suffering, but also with feelings of joy, pride, admiration, among others. It is a pity that neither philosophic nor scientific literature has ever dedicated the space to empathy in this positive context that it deserves. I think that a series of psychological experiments coupled with appropriate philosophical investigations would surely be in order. In what follows, I will try to make a brief argument that will hopefully pave the way for further studies in this direction. 13.2   Empathy with Positive Emotions We have emphasised several times the ways in which empathy can foster moral behaviour by making us notice people in need, by motivating us to help them, by developing a caring perspective, and so on. This is a natural consequence of the fact that a moral act stands out more vividly when it is performed to help a person who fares badly; it takes, in essence, the form of the good fighting the bad, of a positive force combatting a negative one. However, concern for others and moral behaviour does not only require us to help people in trouble and, consequently, to empathise exclusively with them, but also that we share and reflect on positive emotions. The ability to feel, for example, joy with others, to anticipate in our mind what positively motivates them, is a fundamental part of the moral life. In fact, if I understand what makes others happy, I will know what I have to do in order to make them stay that way and to help them when they do not fare well.14 Also, if I share other people’s positive emotions, 14 Of course, an easy and obvious objection would be to mention that not everything that makes other people happy is necessarily also good. One can have immoral desires, for instance. However, in the framework of a virtue ethics, or at least, granted the fact that the empathiser is not an immoral person and would consequently never support immoral demands (at least not deliberately), this objection loses its meaning. 13 EMPATHY AND VIRTUE 269 feeling good as a result, I will be more motivated to help them—a form of positive conditioning. The effects of positive conditioning are well documented in the scientific literature on the subject, and nonetheless, it is hard to find a work that tries to couple the beneficial effects of positive conditioning and empathy. On the contrary, there are authors who take the power of positive affect to be a proof of the inadequacy of empathy in comparison. Prinz, for instance, has no problems in affirming that ‘a small dose of happiness seems to promote considerable altruism’,15 but he never wonders whether empathy could be connected to happy feelings. In fact, it seems that he considers empathy as connected with the negative ones only: ‘The meager effects of empathy are greatly overshadowed by other emotions. Consider, for example, positive affect.’16 Further, after having cited a study in which people feeling happiness show a far greater willingness to help others in comparison with people in the control condition he states: This conclusion is embarrassing for those who think empathy is crucial for altruism because vicarious distress presumably has a negative correlation with positive happiness. It could be that vicarious distress reduces helpfulness by diminishing positive affect.17 These words demonstrate beyond all doubts that Prinz excludes a priori a possible link between empathy and positive affect: for him, empathy only arises in relation with negative feelings and, so it seems, it is deeply connected with vicarious distress. However, the philosopher does not provide a definitive proof for this so integralist an affirmation. It goes without saying that a person only capable of sharing the pain and suffering of others and not their joys would not only be miserable, but likely, over time, barely able to function as a human being due to the high quantity of vicarious distress they would be feelin