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  1. ‘Empathy and the boundaries of interpersonal understanding’ – introduction.Katharina Anna Sodoma, Elizabeth Ventham & Christiana Werner - 2024 - Philosophical Explorations 27 (2):123-127.
    One of the reasons why empathy is a topic of enduring interest is the role it can play in understanding others. Empathy can help us to predict each other’s future actions and explain past ones; to...
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  • Doing Good with Virtual Reality: The Ethics of Using Virtual Simulations for Improving Human Morality.Jon Rueda - 2023 - In Andrew Kissel & Erick José Ramirez (eds.), Exploring Extended Realities: Metaphysical, Psychological, and Ethical Challenges. Routledge.
    Much of the excitement and concern with virtual reality (VR) has to do with the impact of virtual experiences on our moral conduct in the “real world”. VR technologies offer vivid simulations that may impact prosocial dispositions and abilities or emotions related to morality. Whereas some experiences could facilitate particular moral behaviors, VR could also inculcate bad moral habits or lead to the surreptitious development of nefarious moral traits. In this chapter, I offer an overview of the ethical debate about (...)
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  • Empathy, Motivating Reasons, and Morally Worthy Action.Elizabeth Ventham - forthcoming - Journal of Value Inquiry:1-13.
    Contemporary literature criticises a necessary link between empathy and actions that demonstrate genuine moral worth. If there is such a necessary link, many argue, it must come in the developmental stages of our moral capacities, rather than being found in the mental states that make up our motivating reasons. This paper goes against that trend, arguing that critics have not considered how wide-ranging the mental states are that make up a person’s reasons. In particular, it argues that empathy can play (...)
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  • Shared Belief and the Limits of Empathy.Monika Betzler & Simon Keller - 2021 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 102 (2):267-291.
    To showaffective empathyis to share in another person's experiences, including her emotions. Most philosophers who write about emotions accept the broadly cognitivist view that emotions are rationally connected with beliefs. We argue that affective empathy is also rationally connected with belief; you can only share in another's emotions insofar as you can share certain of her beliefs. In light of that claim, we argue that affective empathy brings both epistemic dangers and epistemic benefits, that the ideal of universal empathy cannot (...)
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  • Virtual Reality and Empathy Enhancement: Ethical Aspects.Jon Rueda & Francisco Lara - 2020 - Frontiers in Robotics and AI 7.
    The history of humankind is full of examples that indicate a constant desire to make human beings more moral. Nowadays, technological breakthroughs might have a significant impact on our moral character and abilities. This is the case of Virtual Reality (VR) technologies. The aim of this paper is to consider the ethical aspects of the use of VR in enhancing empathy. First, we will offer an introduction to VR, explaining its fundamental features, devices and concepts. Then, we will approach the (...)
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  • Empathy with vicious perspectives? A puzzle about the moral limits of empathetic imagination.Olivia Bailey - 2021 - Synthese 199 (3-4):9621-9647.
    Are there limits to what it is morally okay to imagine? More particularly, is imaginatively inhabiting morally suspect perspectives something that is off-limits for truly virtuous people? In this paper, I investigate the surprisingly fraught relation between virtue and a familiar form of imaginative perspective taking I call empathy. I draw out a puzzle about the relation between empathy and virtuousness. First, I present an argument to the effect that empathy with vicious attitudes is not, in fact, something that the (...)
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  • Empathy and the Value of Humane Understanding.Olivia Bailey - 2022 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 104 (1):50-65.
    Empathy is a form of emotionally charged imaginative perspective‐taking. It is also the unique source of a particular form of understanding, which I will call humane understanding. Humane understanding consists in the direct apprehension of the intelligibility of others’ emotions. This apprehension is an epistemic good whose ethical significance is multifarious. In this paper, I focus on elaborating the sense in which humane understanding of others is non‐instrumentally valuable to its recipients. People have a complex but profound need to be (...)
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  • The Relational Value of Empathy.Monika Betzler - 2019 - International Journal of Philosophical Studies 27 (2):136-161.
    ABSTRACTPhilosophers and scholars from other disciplines have long discussed the role of empathy in our moral lives. The distinct relational value of empathy, however, has been largely overlooked. This article aims to specify empathy’s distinct relational value: Empathy is both intrinsically and extrinsically valuable in virtue of the pleasant experiences we share with others, the harmony and meaning that empathy provides, the recognition, self-esteem, and self-trust it enhances, as well as trust in others, attachment, and affection it fosters. Once we (...)
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  • Empatía y moralidad: las dimensiones psicológicas y filosóficas de una relación compleja.Belén Altuna - 2018 - Revista de Filosofía 43 (2):245-262.
    Para algunos la empatía es “el centro del universo moral”, mientras que para otros juega un papel secundario o, en todo caso, éticamente poco fiable. Acudiendo tanto a sus precursores filosóficos –como Hume y Smith–, como a sus investigadores contemporáneos en el campo de la psicología – como Hoffman y Batson–, este artículo elabora una defensa ponderada del papel de la empatía en la motivación, el desarrollo y el juicio morales, reconociendo sus limitaciones.
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  • Is empathy an emotion?Isaura Peddis - 2018 - Dissertation, University of Birmingham
    The main aim of my thesis is to ascertain whether empathy has the required qualities of an emotion. Disagreement is rife regarding the process leading to the arousal of an emotion, which creates uncertainty as to what exactly an emotion is, and how it appears. This is the first issue I tackle in my work, as I concentrate on examining some of the significant cognitive and feeling theories of emotions. My study of these theories outlines their downsides, and I instead (...)
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  • Kinesthetic Empathy, Dance, and Technology.Andrew J. Corsa - 2016 - Polymath: An Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences Journal 6 (2):1-34.
    I argue that when we use email, text messaging, or social media websites such as Facebook to interact, rather than communicating face-to-face, we do not experience the best kind of empathy, which is most conducive to experiencing benevolence for others. My arguments rely on drawing interdisciplinary connections between sources: early modern accounts of sympathy, dance theory, philosophy of technology, and neuroscience/psychology. I reflect on theories from these disciplines which, taken together, suggest that to empathize optimally, we must see or hear (...)
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  • Empathy and Moral Judgment.Antti Kauppinen - 2017 - In Heidi Lene Maibom (ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Empathy. Routledge.
    Empathic feelings seem to causally influence our moral judgments at least sometimes. But is empathy necessary for our ability to make moral judgments? And is it a good thing if our judgments are based on empathy? This chapter examines the contemporary debate on these issues.
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  • Empathy and moral education, Theatre of the Oppressed, and The Laramie Project.Andrew J. Corsa - 2021 - Journal of Moral Education 50 (2):219-232.
    Notable theorists have argued that theatre and drama play positive roles in the moral education of children and adults, including cultivating their capacity for empathy. Yet other theorists have expressed concerns that plays and educational practices involving improvisation might not lead to positive changes in real life, and might even have negative influences on actors and audiences. This paper focuses in particular on the dramatic methods employed by Theatre of the Oppressed, devised by Augusto Boal, and on the methods involved (...)
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  • Why a Virtual Assistant for Moral Enhancement When We Could have a Socrates?Francisco Lara - 2021 - Science and Engineering Ethics 27 (4):1-27.
    Can Artificial Intelligence be more effective than human instruction for the moral enhancement of people? The author argues that it only would be if the use of this technology were aimed at increasing the individual's capacity to reflectively decide for themselves, rather than at directly influencing behaviour. To support this, it is shown how a disregard for personal autonomy, in particular, invalidates the main proposals for applying new technologies, both biomedical and AI-based, to moral enhancement. As an alternative to these (...)
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  • Is my feeling your pain bad for others? Empathy as virtue versus empathy as fixed trait.Gregory R. Peterson - 2017 - Zygon 52 (1):232-257.
    The purpose of this article is to critique the primary arguments given by Paul Bloom and Jesse Prinz against empathy, and to argue instead that empathy is best understood as a virtue that plays an important but complicated role in the moral life. That it is a virtue does not mean that it always functions well, and empathy sometimes contributes to behavior that is partial and unfair. In some of their writings, both Bloom and Prinz endorse the view that empathy (...)
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  • Empathy and Common Ground.Hannah Read - 2021 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 24 (2):459-473.
    Critics of empathy—the capacity to share the mental lives of others—have charged that empathy is intrinsically biased. It occurs between no more than two people, and its key function is arguably to coordinate and align feelings, thoughts, and responses between those who are often already in close personal relationships. Because of this, critics claim that empathy is morally unnecessary at best and morally harmful at worst. This paper argues, however, that it is precisely because of its ability to connect people (...)
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  • Empathy for Non-Kin, the Faraway, the Unfamiliar, and the Abstract––An Interdisciplinary Study on Mencian Moral Cultivation and a Response to Prinz.Jing Hu - 2018 - Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 17 (3):349-362.
    This article challenges the pessimistic view that empathy and other fellow feelings are biased and erratic motivation for morality. By discussing Mencius’ account on how to develop empathy from its biased and erratic beginnings, I argue that empathy can be extended to less common objects, such as non-kin, the faraway, the unfamiliar, and the abstract. The extension facilitated by empathy in turn enhances one’s moral cognition toward the sufferings of less common objects; the extension also helps to include less common (...)
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  • Another Brick in the Wall? Moral Education, Social Learning, and Moral Progress.Paul Rehren & Hanno Sauer - 2024 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 27 (1):25-40.
    Many believe that moral education can cause moral progress. At first glance, this makes sense. A major goal of moral education is the improvement of the moral beliefs, values and behaviors of young people. Most would also consider all of these improvements to be important instances of moral progress. Moreover, moral education is a form of social learning, and there are good reasons to think that social learning processes shape episodes of progressive moral change. Despite this, we argue that instead (...)
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  • Empathising in online spaces.Elizabeth Ventham - 2024 - Philosophical Explorations 27 (2):225-236.
    This paper aims to better understand and account for potential difficulties in empathising with each other in online spaces. I argue that two important differences between online and in-person communication are both to do with what information comes across in equivalent interactions. Firstly, there are ways in which less information comes across in online interactions (both consciously and unconsciously). Secondly, agents have greater control over what information comes across in online interactions. I argue that these differences can cause problems in (...)
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  • Phronesis and Empathy: Allies or Opponents?Eugenia Stefanello - 2024 - Topoi 43 (3):951-962.
    Empathizing with others is thought to be a useful, if not necessary, skill for a wise person to possess. Beyond this general conceptual assonance, however, there have been few systematic attempts to conceptualize this relationship. This paper aims to address this issue by investigating what role empathy is said to play inphronesisand whether there is a legitimate place for it in Aristotelian (or neo-Aristotelian) accounts of practical wisdom. First, after a brief overview of Aristotle’s account ofphronesis, I will try to (...)
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  • Towards a Clear and Fair Conceptualization of Empathy.Caroline Bollen - 2023 - Social Epistemology 37 (5):637-655.
    Empathy is operationalised and measured in various different ways in research. I have identified several trends in empathy research that have resulted in what I refer to as neurotypical gatekeeping of the concept of empathy. Narrow assumptions on the relationship between experiences and expressions have made the concept exclusive to those who are perceived as neurotypical. In several ways, this has biased our knowledge of empathy, especially regarding autism. This does not only invalidate autistic empathy, but also sustains a harmful (...)
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  • Epistemic and Psychological Benefits of Depression.Magdalena Anna Antrobus - 2018 - Dissertation, University of Birmingham
    In this thesis I propose a new way of understanding depressive illness as not exclusively harmful, but as related to particular, empirically evidenced, epistemic and pragmatic benefits for the subject, alongside the associated costs. For each of the benefits considered, I provide and concisely analyse the empirical evidence both in its favour and against it, suggest ways in which these benefits could apply in the circumstances presented, discuss some outstanding problems for that application as stated, and describe potential implications. The (...)
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