This post explores the parallel – the analogy – between empathy and taste. Such a parallel is justified by invoking the tradition in which empathy is made the basis of aesthetics. Instead of regarding this basis as a historical confusion, the grain of truth to which this tradition points is explicated in terms of an analogy between taste (in the Kantian sense) and empathy. A full, robust definition of empathy makes use of the four moments of the judgment of aesthetic taste – disinterestedness, universality, purposiveness without finality, and necessity. Empathy then also brings in the concept of the other. This conversation is possible because empathy recruits the same underlying aspects of the human mental apparatus as does taste – the sensus communis in both forms– though it is applied differently. Please see – KantianReviewTasteEmpathy2010Feb01
February 8, 2010
January 23, 2010
Empathy and Intersubjectivity – the Legacy
As noted on the first page of the attached article, “intersubjectivity” is understood in the article to mean our interrelated being together with one another in the interhuman world of regard for and sensitivity to the feelings of other individuals (persons). My contacts in the psychoanalytic community have told me that, since the mid-1980s when my article was first published, “intersujbectivity” has taken on a life of its own in the context of self psychology and relational theory, the latter reportedly alternatingly competing with and cooperating with self psychology is a (mostly) friedly rivalry. Without wishing to claim priority, I merely note that I was not familiar with this psychoanalytic literature on intersubjectivity at the time – though, of course, ‘object relations’ was a familiar literature – either because it [intersubjective approach] only existed in nascent form in scattered article or because I simply overlooked its significance. I would be please to be corrected on the dates and emergence of the literature (so please feel free to leave a comment below). However, with the publication of Robert Stolorow and G.E. Atwood’s (1994) Contexts of Being: The Intersubjective Foundations of Psychological Life, among other works, the intersubjective approach comes into its own. At this point, my intention is to note the distinction in the development of the term “intersubjectivity” without pretending to give an account of the points of convergence or divergence. That remains a future task to be engaged. By the way, as far as I know, the attached PDF is not otherwise available in electronic form, and you will have to use the rotate feature on your PDF reader to rotate the pages 90 degrees or, failing that, print a hard copy to read. After having received numerous requests for it, I felt it better to make it available in some form, even if only as an imperfectly captured electronic image. See EmpathyIntersubjectivitybyAgosta
January 7, 2010
Engaging Heidegger’s Special Hermeneutic of Empathy for Self Psychology – the presentation
This is a presentation engaging Heidegger’s Special Hermeneutic of Empathy from the perspective of Heinz Kohut’s Self Pscyhology. A shortened version of this is scheduled to be delivered at the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis on Wednesday Feb 24th at 1:30 PM (13th floor 122 S. Michigan Ave). Open to the public – though it is always advisable to call ahead to verify the logistics and if you want to get the service lerning unit – right now, the snow is coming down in big globs here in Chicago. This is a draft. If you have any questions/inquiries that you would like me to address in the talk, please post a comment and I will address the matter in the talk (or if the answer is too long or complex, I will communicate the details separately via an email (so provide one)). Makes sense?
• This work takes its start from
– One idea in Kohut: the loss of the selfobject’s empathy leaves one apathetic, lethargic, depressed, a sense of not being human (e.g., p. 200 (How Does Analysis Cure)) and from …
- One line in Heidegger’s Being and Time where he calls for “a special hermeneutic of empathy [Einfühlung]” but does not give one – this talk is NOT psycho-biography, but (if it were) one might say that empathy was what was missing from the biography (and the psyche)…Please see attached for the PDF of the ppt… LFCAgostaEmpathy20090212
January 6, 2010
Cover Art for Empathy in the Context of Philosophy, the book
Here is the cover art for Empathy in the Context of Philosopy. The picture is the top third of a weaving by Alex Zonis, my wife. The complete weaving, consisting of 250,000 teeny-tiny glass beads can be seen at www.mostlyglass.com under her name (Zonis). Check it out. My ‘friends’ are telling me ‘Well, at least there is some talent in the family!’ In order to get at the text on the back cover, you may need to see the separate post entitled Advanced Praise for Empathy in the Context of Philosophy. I am humbled by the comments of my colleagues and friends.
November 29, 2009
Empathy and the Emotions: Unexpressed Emotions are Incomplete…
Join me today for a conversation that engages the issue of how unexpressed emotions are incomplete. The emotions constitute information processing that operates in parallel with cognition (intelligence). Translation between these two differing systems occurs frequently, but emotions are not reducible to propositional (cognitive) attitudes. On background, the overall approach to the emotions of the position in this post is that emotions are not a natural kind: There is nothing necessarily in common between basic emotions, social pretenses, and irruptive motivational reactions (“moral sentiments”). Of course, the reader will recognize tha Paul Griffiths has explored this approach, which is hereby acknowledged. With this background in place, the argument of this post is that unexpressed emotions are incomplete across all the different kinds. Empathy, as form of receptivity to the expression of emotion, implies an invitation to unexpressed emotions to attain completeness. This position is recommended to escape from the paradox that an unexpressed emotion does not exist. The occurrent but unexpressed emotion with its inchoate, emerging affective (felt) component – not a mere disposition – exists in interesting and important ways that are engaged. This position also escapes from the paradox that emotions, expressed or unexpressed, must have an affective (felt) component. Many emotions have a readily identifiable affective (felt) component, but by no means all. Three paradigm cases (and subcases) are explored in detail in the attached unpublished paper [actually an unpublished book chapter not included in Empathy in the Context of Philosophy (Palgrave, 2010) ] and used to drive the argument. The lack of expression is just as significant, though less obvious, than that of expression and arouses an empathic receptivity. The point is that the observation of small details, including empathic receptivity to micro expressions, informs the interpretive activity of empathic understanding providing as it were the means of a raid on the inarticulate. Additional consequences and the resulting dynamics of this discovery—unexpressed emotions are incomplete – for empathy are explored in this attachment: CH04EmpathyandEmotionsUnbound20090112 Please give the benefit of your feedback.
November 25, 2009
The Philosophical Significance of Neurology for Empathy – The Light Goes on!!!
Join me in a conversation about empathy and neurology. The short version is that the individual experiences empathy and the light goes on! Today’s inquiry explores the philosophical significance for empathy of the research on the mirror neurons, the related shared manifold hypothesis, micro expressions and the investigations that have grown up around them. Three of the consequences will be explicitly addressed. Evidence that such a capacity as empathy exists at all will be provided, but in the ironic spirit of proofs of common sense. In turn, the inquiry into existence will lead to the rehabilitation of introspection as a method of investigation proper to empathy, albeit with certain conditions and qualifications. Finally, the scope and limits of the shared manifold hypothesis, which conceptually implements the functional and causative role of mirror neurons, will be engaged. The result will be that the shared manifold is less transparent the more that it is shared. A bigger magnet will not make a difference. [Please see chphilsignifempathyneurology20081118 ]
November 16, 2009
The Development of Sympathy in Hume’s Thinking: From a ‘Delicacy of Sympathy’ [i.e., Empathy] to a Taste
Draft article: DraftHumeSympathy20091116Agosta
There is a long history in British empiricist philosophy that engages “sympathy.” There are at least four meanings of “sympathy” in the writings of David Hume, dating to his a Treatise on Human Nature (1739). In today’s post I want to qualify the statement that “sympathy” in Hume means what today we call “empathy.” In selected quotations where Hume conjoins the sympathetic communications of sentiments with the idea of an other individual, “sympathy” means “empathy.” In particular, “delicate sympathy” would capture those features of fine-grained distinction that are characteristic of empathy, but the possibility remains undeveloped by Hume. In the development of Hume’s philosophical activity, “delicacy of sympathy” is swallowed up conceptually by “delicacy of taste.” In subsequent passages (and here is the qualification), “sympathy” means “the power of suggestion” or “emotional contagion” (see above “contagious”; T 3.3.3.5; SBN 604-5). These different, over-lapping, not entirely consistent uses of “sympathy” exist side-by-side in the Treatise (1739) as demonstrated by the textual evidence cited in the attachment. Furthermore, “sympathy” is not a static concept in Hume; but undergoes a dynamic development. By the time of the Enquiry (1751), the push down of “sympathy” behind compassion and taste is complete. “Sympathy” migrates in the direction of compassion as it takes on the content of qualities useful to mankind as benevolence, leaving taste to dominate the field of fine-grained distinctions in the communicability of feelings between persons (“friends”) as well as in the appreciation of beauty. This former point is essential. Taste gives us an enjoyment of the qualities of the characters of persons in conversation, humor, and friendship that is a super-set of what empathy does with its fine-grained distinctions in accessing the experiences of other persons. The prospect of “delicacy of sympathy” in the social realm of human interrelations is left without further development by Hume. Instead, Hume presents taste as the capacity to discriminate “particular feelings,” which are produced by beauty and deformity. [1] This special capacity to feel is dependent on the ability of our sensory organs to perceive the fine details of a composition. A detailed engagement with these distinctions is attached above. Please give me the benefit of your comments, feedback, criticisms, impertinent remarks – you get the idea. All signed, authenticated contributions given full credit in the footnotes if this rough draft is ever formally published.
As noted, Hume has at least four distinct meanings of “sympathy” that he uses opportunistically. First, “sympathy” functions in the communicability of affect; next it encompasses what is often described as “emotional contagion,” the communicability of affect without the inclusion of the idea of the other individual as its source; thirdly, it encompasses the power of suggestion; and, finally, it comes to include an element of benevolence, approaching the meaning of “compassion” that we hear in it today. How this series of transformations unfolds is the topic of this story as the meaning of “sympathy” evolves from a communicability of affect to the (re)active sentiment of compassion with which we regard it today. The crucial difference between sympathy in the strict sense and emotional contagion is delimited in terms of a double representation. The opportunity for Hume was to develop the parallel between a “delicacy of taste” and a “delicacy of sympathy,” the latter capturing what we moderns mean by “empathy.” This opportunity is lost, however, and the “delicate” aspects of sympathy end up being gathered together with “delicacy of taste” and buried over in the discussion of aesthetics rather than as a free standing topic in (moral) psychology.
[1] David Hume, “Of the Standard of Taste” (1757), in Of the Standard of Taste and Other Essays (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965): 11.
November 15, 2009
Heidegger’s Special Hermeneutic of Empathy, the Essay
The article at the end of this post is a rough draft – very rough – of material eventually worked into my book of the same title, Empathy in the Context of Philosophy (Palgrave 2010). It is useful in that it contains chatty, informal discussions that had to be cut [edited] out as not being adequately serious and significant as befits a philosophical monograph (and also due to limitations of word count). In Heidegger’s Being and Time the alternative of inauthentically being with other people is contrasted with authentically being alone in the face of death, one’s own individualizing and inevitable demise. The third choice of authentically being with other human beings is neglected, pushed down into a few parenthetical remarks that dismiss empathy [Einfühlung]. The possibility of authentic human being with others is delimited but, for the most part, not developed. This chapter gathers together those remarks and amplifies them with an analysis of human being with other human beings by applying the basic Heideggerian distinctions of affectedness, understanding, interpretation, assertion, and speech to an interpretation and implementation of empathy. Insight from the later Heidegger is integrated. An analysis of empathy is produced in the spirit of Heidegger’s distinctions. This results in clearing the way for an implementation of empathy as the foundation of human interrelatedness and the implementation of the missing chapter from Being and Time on Heidegger’s “Special Hermeneutic of Empathy.” For further details, distinctions, and discussion see attached – EmpathyHermeneuticsHeidegger
November 13, 2009
The Validation of Empathy in Psychoanalysis
The argument of this blog post is that empathy can adequately be validated by formulating one’s empathic receptivity in an interpretation, which, in turn, is subject to confirming or refuting experiences, responses, reactions, replies. The unpacking of the term “empathy” into receptive and interpretive phases of a hermeneutic circle contains the key to answering the question of how to validate empathy. Note that this approach to validation involves a flanking movement through which the possibilities of understanding and misunderstanding emerge simultaneously.
The issue of the validation of empathy goes to the heart of what it means for an intellectual discipline to be a science. At the same time that Heinz Kohut was preparing his definitive paper (Kohut 1959) defining the scope and limits of psychoanalysis as a science based on empathy and introspection, Heinz Hartmann and Ernest Nagel (Hartmann 1959; Nagel 1959) were squaring off for a separate debate about the scientific status of psychoanalysis.[1] While some of the ideals of science as rigorous mathematical discipline to which all others should aspire have faded since then, the aura of respectability – and its contrary – lack of scientific respectability – continue to haunt psychoanalysis. In many ways, this debate was the original “trauma,” to which Kohut was a witness but in relation to which he was just a “voice crying in the wilderness.” His contribution was overlooked at least until his 1977 Restoration of the Self, on which a detailed drill down of the scientific position of psychoanalysis was performed in the context of empathy and introspection.[2] Consideration of the perspective of empathic data gathering would have made a difference in specific ways that can only and best be appreciated by laying out the terms of the debate as well as the response that occurred as Paul Ricoeur entered the fray in 1970.[3] Please see the attachment for further discussion, argument, quotations, and details – CHEmpathyValidation
[1] H. Kohut. (1959). “Introspection, empathy, and psychoanalysis.” Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association 7, No. 3: 459-83. Heinz Hartmann. (1959). “Psychoanalysis as a scientific theory.” Psychoanalysis, Scientific Method and Philosophy: A Symposium, ed. S. Hook. New York: New York University Press, 1963: 3-37; E. Nagel. (1959). Methodological issues in psychoanalytic theory. Psychoanalysis, Scientific Method and Philosophy: A Symposium, ed. S. Hook. New York: New York University Press, 1963: 38-56.
[2] See Chapter ___ on Empathy and Introspection. See also Heinz Kohut. (1971). The Analysis of the Self. New York: International Universities Press. When I say “the contribution was overlooked,” I mean “overlooked” as a contribution to the scientific foundation of psychoanalysis; obviously the appreciation of two new kinds of transference and related issues about the self were immediately appreciated if no less controversial for all that. Also Heinz Kohut. (1977). The Restoration of the Self. International Universities Press, 1977.
[3] P. Ricoeur. (1965). Freud and Philosophy, tr. D. Savage. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970.
Advance Praise for Empathy in the Context of Philosophy
Tags: blurbs, Empathy, nice comments
I am humbled by the comments of my colleagues, friends, and associates.
“An insightful and provocative exploration of a topic that has only recently begun to receive the attention it deserves and the conceptual clarity needed for a proper understanding. Agosta’s study is rich in historical context and thorough in covering the intersections of philosophy and psychology on the question of empathy. It is also accessible and stimulating for a host of applications to current concerns. Agosta rightly, in my view, finds in Heidegger a primary vehicle for advancing the discussion, yet he has his own voice and sense of how to think it through. An impressive achievement.”
Lawrence J. Hatab
Louis I. Jaffe Professor of Philosophy
Old Dominion University
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That much used and routinely abused word, empathy, has enjoyed an uncomfortable popularity in fields as disparate as politics and psychoanalysis. At last a philosopher has arrived to bring clarity to the confusion. Lou Agosta has brought together the salient points about empathy as seen in neurology, psychoanalysis and literature into a happy home under Heidegger. Heidegger calls for ‘a special hermeneutic of empathy’ but does not give one. Agosta delivers it. The book is a must-read for anyone who chooses to use the word again.
Arnold Goldberg, M.D.
Author, Misunderstanding Freud
Professor of Psychiatry
Rush University Medical College
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Lou Agosta’s Empathy in the Context of Philosophy is a vivid, sweeping, thought-provoking and attitude changing treatment of one of the central, if often neglected, ideas of our culture, namely Empathy. It collects and scrutinizes ideas from a remarkable array of sources — from neuroscience to hermeneutics, from analytic philosophy to Freudian psychoanalysis, from Grimm Brothers stories to speech acts — all the while demonstrating Empathy’s seminal role in our understanding of mind, ethics, and ourselves. If morality stands apart from empathy, Dr. Agosta also shows how it is a pre-condition of it. He does this, and quite a bit more, through a lively tour of much of Twentieth Century thought, all the way correcting some of that thought’s myopia and self-righteousness, and allows us to regain a fine understanding, perhaps lost in the travails of modern life, of what it is that both makes us human and provides the possibility of joy with others.
Joel Levin
Author of Tort Wars and of Marrano Justice
Joel Levin, Esq.
Levin & Associates Co., L.P.A.
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Empathy in the Context of Philosophy is a masterpiece of philosophical-historical scholarship, presenting a rich and comprehensive account of the explicit and implicit conceptions of empathy that have appeared in the course of Western thinking from Hume through contemporary phenomenologists, both philosophical and psychoanalytic. Agosta’s Heideggerian interpretation of empathy is truly a tour de force. In Being and Time Heidegger criticized traditional Cartesian conceptions of empathy and called for a “special hermeneutic of empathy,” presumably grounded in his analysis of existence, but he failed to offer such a hermeneutic himself. It is this missing hermeneutic of empathy that Agosta supplies, masterfully applying Heidegger’s modes of Dasein’s disclosedness to elucidate the design structure of empathic engagement, which Agosta rightfully claims constitutes the foundation of authentic relationality. This book will be an invaluable resource not only for scholars in philosophy and the human sciences, but for practitioners of psychoanalytic and humanistic psychotherapy as well.
–Robert D. Stolorow, Ph.D. [Psychology], Ph.D. [Philosophy]
Author, Trauma and Human Existence (Routledge, 2007)
http://robertdstolorow.googlepages.com
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