The AntiChris

:banghead:

Sabine Grant

I think where we differ may be the degree in which you have been in your own " gutter" or I have been in mine.

While in my gutter, I experienced the negativity and unproductivity of christians who made a point to confront me with my weaknesses in ways that were about burning bridges rather than build them. Their lack of empathy with my situation and my personal struggles contributed to my withdrawing from their counsel.

The long term goal is to be the focus.... which necessitates the application of endurance, patience, and a determination to not judge the intent. I disagree with you that we all have Christ's ability to discern the intent behind the thoughts and feelings. Our ability to misevaluate prevails because we cannot attain the divine qualities of KNOWING the mind of another person or what we define as christians as " their state of heart". David aknowledges in Psalms the total knowledge of God of his " heart" and pleads for Him to show Him His everlasting ways.

There is a difference between encouraging a person to pursue destructive habits or what we consider immoral actions and empathizing with their feelings.
I think the worst form of contempt appears when we claim to " straighten someone else out" but fail to relate to their conditions. In other words... when we refuse to walk in their shoes.

" satan get behind " was not addressed to the person Peter whom Christ cherished but to the cause of his behavior as percieved by Christ. Empathy from Christ to Peter is demonstrated in the Olive garden as Peter falls asleep rather than keeping company to Christ. ( as well as the other disciples). " For though the spirit is willing enough, the body is weak". Imagine the lifestyle those disciples had... homelessness, fatigue, stress, the knowledge of what is to become of their rabbi. So instead of watching and praying, they went to sleep. However, Christ does not attack their spirit...he confronts the weakness of the body. Further empathy is demonstrated as Christ already knew that Peter would deny Him. But He also knew that Peter needed to be humbled before his character were to be complete to be the builder of the early church. He knew the potential of Peter.

Can we claim to know the potential of whom we consider to be an immoral person? But if we walk in their shoes or bare feet for an instant as we empathize with them, our need to judge will be demeaned as we contemplate " how would I want to be dealt with if it were me?"

There is a way to reach the mind or " heart " of a person we wish to help out of their personal gutter. But always with humility. Always with a self introspection process. It is not about walking on egg shells around " such people". It is about aknowledging our own humanity to them rather than rubbing their face in the mud of their gutter. It is about finding ways to relate to their weaknesses so we can understand why they give in to them. Find the cause and the solution is right there.

yguy

If by this you mean that they told you unpleasant truths about yourself without regard for whether you were able to bear them, I agree. None of us can handle the truth all at once, because it would kill us. OTOH, a slap in the face delivered with love can be a lifesaver.

I must disagree. I recently had a conversation with a lady in which it became clear to me that she resented her mother. It took a little persistence on my part to get her to see it, but eventually she admitted it. The point is that I could see about her what she could not see about herself.

I think the reason we can't have such insights about people we care about has mainly to do with the fact that we jump to conclusions about them, or are too emotionally involved.

Of course, but He knew very well that Peter would feel pain to the extent that he protected the evil in him. The energy behind Christ's rebuke to Peter was the same as that behind His tounge-lashing of the Pharisees; but they saw Him as hateful and evil, while Peter's humility allowed him to see himself as evil, to the extent that he was.

I don't need to play any mental tricks on myself to avoid judging. I either do it (when I'm dumb enough to) or I don't.

I know a man whose son ended up in jail on a drug charge at age 30. When the son asked his dad to bail him out, the dad reminded him that he had put himself there, and that he could bloody well get himself out. Today the son is a success story, but if the dad had bailed him out, he likely would never have had to reach inside himself to find the courage to face reality.

Farren

I did my dog a damn bit of good by empathizing with him. And he's somebody, so your argument is flawed.

It is because of that empathy that I console him when he is unhappy, respond by playing with him when he is in need of excitement, and fill his bowl when he indicates that I have not fed him enough and his bowl is empty.

As a result, my dog is very happy. Obviously its done him a damn bit of good.

So you'd spit on Christ for intuitively understanding your feelings? That's an exceedingly odd statement yguy.

empathy
noun
1 the power of understanding and imaginatively entering into another person's feelings
See also: identification [3b]

Empathy, as defined by my dictionary, is IMHO the most valuable tool we have in our dealings with other humans. It is eminently worthy of cultivation. Without it, we cannot respond adequately to another's needs, as we cannot know them adequately. Without empathy, it is infinitely more likely that compassion will be misguided and inappropriate in its execution.

yguy

While I'm sure it is balm to your ego to think you can confer personhood on a dog, it is really nothing more than a fatuous delusion.

No, I'd spit on Him if He had the sort of empathy for me that you have for your dog. Or more to the point, if you empathized with me that way, you'd be more likely to get a punch in the mouth than an expression of heartfelt gratitude.

Farren

yguy, before engaging you on this thread I had the impression you where quite a nice guy with some misguided beliefs. That impression had changed. I'm beginning to think you're a nasty piece of work with some serious bigotries.

If you think that its fluffy and new-agey to believe we have empathy with animals, you are evidently poorly schooled in the sciences.

Since the vast majority of our genetic code is shared with dogs it is reasonable to assume that many of our behaviours are shared with them. This includes a massive number of subtle and not-so-subtle signals of mood and feeling.

A massive number of studies strongly demonstrate that there are emotional signals common to many different mammals. The structures deeply implicated in emotional response and attention (the amygdala, limbic system etc) are common to man and all of other mammals, so its absurd to believe we don't share a massive emotional common ground.

Its equally absurd to think we don't have some similar faculties for interpreting these without language, as this would require either non-language speaking mammals to have no way of communicating emotion or humans to not have the shared organs.

This is some of the stuff I was able to dig up. I've got lots of books that cover the topic but I'm too lazy to type out excerpts:

Ethological Theory and the Expression of Emotion in the Voice

The semiology of Communication patterns between dog and man

Empathy: Its ultimate and proximate bases

Rethinking Feelings: Integrating the Biology of Emotion with Redecision Therapy

So if I read your emotional signals properly and responded to them appropriately you'd punch me in the mouth? You must be a cold, cold person yguy.

My impression is that you have a poor understanding of the meaning of empathy, and a religious obsession with the concept of compassion, to the exclusion of all the things it relies on.

Its easy to demonstrate that a seriously brain damaged individual has a limited capacity for compassion. The presence or absence of a host of faculties is required to enable compassion. It is not a thing autonomous of the human condition.

Empathy is one such faculty. It is a critical faculty. One of the links I've provided shows that empathy is critical for a baby to learn most basic human behaviour. In a number of the psychiatric books I have a lack of empathy is targeted as the reason most autistic people don't get past the mental age of 8.

I respectfully submit that without empathy, compassion is a meaningless concept. You can't fulfill another's needs when you don't fully understand them, and empathy is the ability that allows us to understand them in all their subtlety, in a way that Pavlovian observation will never achieve.

Sabine Grant

FARREN : I agree with your evaluation that empathy is a necessity to generate compassion.
As you mentionned autistic children, I recall a little guy from Albania who was adopted by a friend of mine in Italy. Jonathan had spent the majority of his infanthood in isolation... in a cage in an orphanage. No hands handled him to nurture his sense of recieving tenderness... no faces smiled at him to teach him how to smile....Jonathan is a very perturbed child who was diagnosed with a chronical form of emotional detachment. He has no sense of understanding right from wrong as if he had no conscience. When confronted if he hurts an animal for example, he feels no remorse.
I do believe that because he was deprived of empathy from other human beings, he cannot relate to others thru feelings. He is loved very much but unfortunatly he cannot feel what it is like to be loved.

Viti

yguy, what does the word empathy mean to you? How do you define it? To empathize with someone does not mean they are to be coddled and babied every step of the way. It means trying to understand or imagine how X would feel or affect you and making decisions based on that.

I have never been shot, but I can imagine it it not pleasant to be shot, therefore, I wouldn't shoot anyone. If my dog is in pain, I know what it is like to be in pain, therefore I try to ease his pain.

One of the signs of sociopathology is lack of empathy. Murderers do not empathize with heir victims, allowing them the callousness to kill them.

Are you confusing empathy with sympathy or pity?

Farren

In the absence of yguys reply, I'd have to say I think he has a clear idea of what it is (read the "I feel your pain" comment), but doesn't fully appreciate its role or significance.

btw yguy, sorry I called you a nasty piece of work earlier, it was a kneejerk response to your emotionally violent statements.

Farren

Precisely.

I think its a tragedy when people miss out on such a critical stage of their development (or are abused in the place of nurture), but I do believe developmental problems stemming from nurture can be fixed over time, it just takes a lot longer because the mind is fixed into patterns already.