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The thing is, once you put yourself in someone else's shoes it is that much harder to act in a way that is against that person's best interest. You would actual
by amag 8y ago
The thing is, once you put yourself in someone else's shoes it is that much harder to act in a way that is against that person's best interest. You would actually need to deliberately work against your emotions to harm someone once you have empathized with them. It's kind of forcing yourself to jump off a cliff. Sure, it's possible, but it doesn't come natural. So the two (empathize and doing good) aren't completely two different things.
- projektir 8y agoYes. To both possess empathy and then proceed to do harmful things requires you to actively convert to a negative moral philosophy (i.e., legitimately realize you are doing bad things and are OK with it). Most people are not like this, and actively believe they are good people, so higher empathy does, in practice, makes them nicer people.
- philosopher1234 8y agoI think it might be too strong to say the things you are doing are bad just because they hurt other people. Thats what tradeoffs are, like firing people, for instance. I would write more but basically I think its too strong to say that most people are not like this or perhaps its too strong to say that its morally wrong to doing something harmful to someone.
- ThrustVectoring 8y ago>To both possess empathy and then proceed to do harmful things requires you to actively convert to a negative moral philosophy Or taking a consequentialist moral philosophy quite seriously. You can both empathize with terrible people and believe that harming them the correct thing to do for the greater good.