Throughout Part I, Adam Smith discusses the different scenarios in which humans feel sympathy. He says that the "imaginative capacity of sympathy" allows us to feel grief or happiness when another person feels that way. Even when he goes in depth when describing the extent in which sympathy affects human nature through the lenses of different passions, Smith never once mentions the existence of empathy. I am not sure if he considers sympathy and empathy one in the same, or if he simply does not consider the existence of empathy. But I would like to challenge this model of sympathy by saying that humans are able to empathize with other people due to their own experiences, which is what allows us to imagine more realistic pictures.
If we use his theory of imaginative capacity of sympathy, a person is able to sympathize with another because they were able to imagine the situation of the other. The distinction between empathy and sympathy is extremely important to make Smith's case stronger, in my opinion, but I would like to ask the rest of the class what they think. I believe this because there are situations that I cannot even start fathoming or imagining, such as child prostitution or child soldiers, but I still sympathize with them without empathy. However, I think that empathy is necessary in order to have a realistic imaginary picture of the situation because otherwise you are just imagining things that might be simply wrong. In 2010 there a massive 8.8 earthquake in Chile that woke me up from my sleep and is still one of the most impactful experiences of my life. This earthquake happened after the one in Haiti the same year. I know that I was not able to understand the gravity of the situation or how vulnerable the people there must have felt. However after the Chilean earthquake, whenever I see earthquakes in the news and see the pictures, I am more reactive towards that news because I am able to feel what they feel. Ultimately, I think it is important to show that there are situations in which sympathy does not play a role and that the statement "Nothing is so soon forgot as pain" (21) might not be completely true.
Cristina,
ReplyDeleteFirst, I want to emphasize/sympathize your feeling during earthquake. Even though, being far from the center of earthquake, I did not experience such a strong earthquake as you experienced. But I do understand how trivial people feel about themselves facing tremendous calamity as well as the fear after the tragedy.
Second, I definitely have the same feeling when I read Smith's paper. I was about to name my blog post "Sympathy as Empathy." "'Sympathy', though its meaning may originally have been the same, can now fairly properly be used to denote our fellow-feeling with any passion whatever" (p2, my version is weird. My page number probably is not the same as yours). Smith has generalize the meaning of sympathy, including enjoyable feelings, to suggest an idea that is closer to what empathy means currently.
Hey Cristina!
ReplyDeleteJust for clarification, the word "empathy" didn't even exist at the time when Smith was writing. Edward Titchener coined the word in the end of the 19th century! He translated it from the German word "Einfühlung." I agree with you that Smith could have made handy use of "empathy" had it existed. That being said, he does a remarkable job of describing empathy before the concept of empathy event existed. I agree with you!
Jacksón