Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion is a deliberately maverick work – astringent, provocative, often witty and unabashedly against a prevailing culture that places so high a premium on the virtue of empathy that at least 1,500 books available through Amazon apparently have a version of the word in their title.
The President has highlighted this particular virtue of empathy in the emphasis he has placed on understanding the law as it "affects the lives of ordinary people," and Kagan herself, in her tribute to Thurgood Marshall, singled out Marshall's belief that it was the responsibility of the courts to show "special solicitude for the despised and disadvantaged".
Sharing laughter with others encourages camaraderie and the virtues of empathy and mutual respect.
Levine has good, if familiar, lessons for parents about the virtues of teaching empathy; encouraging the development of an authentic self; and making time for dreaming, creating and unstructured outdoor play.
Tempting though it is to assume that Nielsen and Sanders must, on some level, oppose this cruel policy, there's no reason to believe they have more empathy by virtue of being women.
"The Virtues of Heartlessness: Mary McCarthy, Hannah Arendt, and the Anaesthetics of Empathy," American Literary History, Winter 2006.
He felt that it is a virtue to meet patients with an adequate level of empathy and compassion, but at the same time that it is easy to become distanced from one's patients.
A modicum of empathy seems to me an essential virtue for citizens of a free and democratic society.
Ofsted's report, Religious Education: realising the potential, says the subject "plays a key role in promoting social cohesion and the virtues of respect and empathy, which are important in our diverse society" but it finds "many pupils leave school with scant subject knowledge and understanding".
It is the practice of responsibility in its three modes, mediated through dialogue, which involves the virtues: critical agency focusing on the practice of phronesis; accountability focusing on the practice of empathy, courage and justice; positive responsibility focusing on phronesis and creative virtues, including courage and imagination.
Her research interests include the biological and social bases of empathy and compassion, and she strives to cultivate these virtues in her students through a social justice-inspired approach to science education.
