Top Ten Publications

By Lou Agosta on September 25, 2014

The following professional publications have garnered the most downloads over the years. They are included for those visitors to this site who have an academic, scholarly interest. These are peer-reviewed publications and tend to be scholarly. No apologies for that – just noting that if you as a reader want specific personal guidance on specific personal issues, then the recommendation is to give me a call or send an email.

A Rumor of Empathy in the Philosophy of Martin Heidegger. This essay develops a four part definition of empathy out of the Dasein-analysis of Martin Heidegger – empathic receptivity, empathic understanding, empathic interpretation, and empathic responsiveness (in language) are developed out of Heidegger’s design distinctions for human beings (affectivity (Befindlichkeit), understanding (Verstehen), interpretation (Auslegung) as a derivative form of understanding, and speech (Rede)): click here: HeideggerRumorOfEmapthy
Chapter Six of my empathy book where Kohut’s notion of empathy as vicarious introspection is engaged from the perspective of psychoanalysis as a hermeneutic discipline: click here: ChapterSixEmpathy
Chapter Three of my empathy book on “Empathy Between Death and the Other”: click here: HeideggerChapterThreeEmpathy
This essay is a chapter in the two volumes Empathy I and II edited by Joe Lichtenberg and others. It looks at how empathy is the foundation of human intersubjectivity, where “intersubjectivity” is used in the sense of the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl. A kind of Kantian transcendental argument is developed out of a single paragraph in Heinz Kohut’s Self Psychology: click here: EmpathyIntersubjectivitybyAgosta
Before there was “empathy” there was “sympathy.” This essay engages four different definitions of “sympathy” in David Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature (1739), and, yes, the overlap and differences with “empathy” are significant. Click here: HumeOnSympathyEmpathy
A book review by yours truly of Arnold Goldberg’s book, The Analysis of Failure on what can be learned from failed psychoanalytic cases (which is much). Click here: GoldbergAnalyticFailureReview2014
This is one of my favorite legacy publications, which looks at images of fragmentation and integration of the self in one of the classic folktales edited by the Brothers Grimm. It makes the point that without empathy a significancy aspect of our humanity is missing. The hero of the story does not know who to experience shuddering (visceral fear, goose flesh). That experience is a “proxy” or substitute for his entire capacity to experience emotions. Without that capacity, he lacks humanity. The hero’s fairy tale journey and adventure in the world allows him to recover his empathy and become a whole and complete human being. The Recovery of Feelings in the Folktale. Click here: JRHRecoveryFeelingFolktaleAgosta
Heidegger on Aristotle’s Account of the Emotions. This essay engages the account of the emotions provided by Aristotle. Amazingly enough, the most complete account of the emotions provided by Aristotle is not in his psychology but in his Rhetoric. The speaker has to understand the emotions in order to arouse and de-arouse (quiet) them. Heidegger points this out in Being and Time (1927) where Heidegger says (in so many words) that this is the “best ever” account of the emotions. However, Heidegger is doing fundamental ontology and leaves this aspect of the emotions undeveloped. This essay develops it further. This Hot Link is an essay on this subject published in Philosophy Today(Dec 2010) – click here – AgostaHeideggerIssue4 2010-Agosta
An early version of the above-cited multidimensional definition of empathy. The colleagues at the Karl Jaspers society were gracious enough to sponsor a presentation on empathy at their conference. As you know, Jaspers was one of the inventors of existentialism and Existenz Philosophy, focusing on meaning creation in a challenging post-modern world: Click here: Vol.6-2AgostaHeideggerianApproachtoEmpathy
This legacy essay explains why Kant scholars will be interested in fairy tales. Click here: KantStudienKantsTreasureHardToAttainAgosta
An essay that looks at archeological metaphors in Freud and philosophy, inspired by Paul Ricoeur’s book on Freud and its use of the archeological metaphor. Caution – the attached file is large (21MB) – so if it does not load for you, please leave me a comment and i will break it up into parts, okay? For further details, click here: – IJPPPsychoanalysisandPhilosophyAgosta and part two – IJPPPsychoanalysisandPhilosophyAgostaPart2

My commitment is to a gracious and generous listening – empathy. I have performed significant academic, scholarly work on empathy in order to make my commitment to a gracious and generous listening (empathy) a scientific, professional as well as a personal reality. My intention is to make empathy less of a rumor and into an expanding reality in the community and in relationships.