Skeptic Spirit

Is there something we could call empath ethics? After all, we are able to dig out enough information about other people, and the law doesn’t really apply to us on the matter of gathering information. So can we do as we please, or are there rules to follow? Those are leading questions – I have already found my answers. But for the sake of the discussion…

“With great powers comes great responsibility”

Although that is both true and inconvenient, it is also worthless as a guideline for empathy. Not only is it impossible to live by, it also contributes to the disillusion that we are ethical beings with a capability of acting selflessly. I don’t give much for humanity. It is impossible to live by, because we get information about other people wether we want to or not. And we act selfishly wether we want to or not. Only by being consciously aware of the selfishness, we can rethink our choices in life, and we cannot be aware, if we deny the fact that we are self-centered creatures. So in order to do good, we must accept that we normally do good for ourselves first, which could be translated into the religious term “sin”. We sin, then we deny it, which is also sinful. Then we lie about having denied it, and at the end we might have been better of by admitting that we do sinful stuff. (do I hear crackling fire in the background? What are they yelling…? Learn the switch? The bitch? …ah!)

So feeling a sense of responsibility doesn’t really make things better, only less transparent for oneself. The empath ability could potentially be a rather strong weapon against other peoples well being. And yet we mostly seem to be acting kind of responsibly? The empathy has a self regulator build in. It is as taken out of a comic book, this is Superman’s kryptonite. Because we could do great damage, but since I feel what you feel, I also feel the damage I have created. So I damage myself if I damage you. 

On the other hand, if I make you happy, I feel your happiness. So, if I am a really selfish bitch, I am gonna make you very, very happy. There is no need for moral lessons or ethical values. There is only “do good – feel good” as opposed to “do bad – feel bad”. 

And to top it off I will now share this thoughtful quote, not entirely unrelated:

The remarkable thing is that we really love our neighbor as ourselves: we do unto others as we do unto ourselves. We hate others when we hate ourselves. We are tolerant toward others when we tolerate ourselves. We forgive others when we forgive ourselves. We are prone to sacrifice others when we are ready to sacrifice ourselves.

- Eric Hoffer