Maybe it's time to rectify that mistake? You have to create the conditions for stability, if we never try we will never have it. — ChatteringMonkey

OK, then we won't.
I do, however, resist the urge to correct you King James English.

Russia has 6000 nuclear bombs, but sure let's just brush away the stability of the region like it's a nothing burger. — ChatteringMonkey

The region has no stability. A Putin-Trump divvy will not provide one. What the hell are you on about?

No, and you would do well not to quip when you've clearly not understood what has been said. We've been here before too, Vera. — AmadeusD

I might do well not to quip... But I do better, quipping.
I always understand what you mean; I just don't agree with it.

She claimed to have them [statistics]. — AmadeusD

I didn't claim anything; I asked a question: do you have a factual basis for saying that my perspective is wrong? I have piles of facts and statistics, dates and events. I often choose to share them. Didn't seem worth my while this time. You have an opinion. I have a different opinion. I answered Amity's question honestly. Your response was not relevant.

I was talking to Vera. Not you — AmadeusD

I was talking to Amity. Not you. (Didn't even know you were lurking.)

Our time is not special. — AmadeusD

I expect that's pretty much what Romulus Augustulus said, the year before he was deposed.

Most people in those threads you mention are absolutely out of their minds on panic and sniffing their own arses. If you cannot see that, so be it. But given I spend time outside of lil political bubbles, and subscribe to no common ideologies, It is clear as day. — AmadeusD

I got mine, Jack. (for now) Whatever others suffer is no skin off my ass.

So why bother to jump in here?

Seems to me, it is only perspective that can lead to these sorts of rants (not derogatory - anything adequately complete will be a rant in this context). If this were based on 'facts' then your personal feelings wouldn't be relevant. — AmadeusD

I see. An overview of history is insufficient basis for an opinion. OK

While marches may seem futile, they and campaigns are not about losing. They are about fighting for justice and a way to come together - to show we are not alone. — Amity

I have all those teeshirts. The last campaign I supported was a Green; some previous ones were NDP. This riding is solid fake Tory - the Alliance stabbed them in the back and stole their name some decades ago. All my candidates are plucky little losers. I simply meant that the winning streak my generation enjoyed is over; this is the down-slope before the next up, which may be next year or next century or never - I don't know. There is hope, but its heart beats faintly now.

This strikes me as the exact out-of-perspective thinking that everyone of every age who wants to feel good about themselves would put forward. — AmadeusD

Oddly enough, the perspective doesn't make me feel the slightest bit good. Can you cite where I've gone wrong on facts or statistics?

And if he decides it's a good idea to stay in the war, do we just support him no matter what, effectively delegating our foreign policy to him? — ChatteringMonkey

Who are your "we" ? I imagine the several sovereign - for the moment - nations of Europe will formulate their own foreign policy according to what they perceive as their own long-term interest and commitment to one another. If any one of those heads of state and his or her compatriots choose to fight for their homeland to the bitterest of ends, it will be up to the others whether they support that action.
I'm really fed up with references to "the war" as if the Ukrainians had any choice in the matter. This is not a two-sided conflict: they were attacked and have been defending themselves. The "stability of the region" was not endangered by Zelensky or his people and they are not responsible for restoring it by letting themselves be subsumed in Putin's empire.
Shall we ask the Palestinians to seek refugee status in Greenland in order to maintain Nyetenyahu's 'stability'? Who's next to be required to give up their freedom and their home for stability in some region?

What do you mean by that? And what does it mean for the way you feel and live your life now? — Amity

Things end. Stars implode; species go extinct, civilizations collapse; biological entities die. Like every story, the history of the human race has a natural ending. I know that my personal death is not far off and believe that one or more of those other endings is also inevitable - I'm hoping it's collapse of this civilization, rather than extinction, because that allows me to imagine a new, more positive human story.

The way I live is pretty much the same as it was in optimistic youth: a compromise with modernity and capitalism; trying to keep my footprint small without giving up ordinary comforts; trying to effect change, without giving up my tenuous security. These days, I don't go on futile marches or campaign for losers; I just write books nobody reads.
Thing is, I lived through a full cycle of history: from the wreckage left behind that great global insanity we fondly recall as WWII, through the decades of technological and social progress experienced by fortunate first-worlders, the elation of winning battles in civil rights, reproductive rights, gay rights, workers' rights... only to see it all clawed back, torn down and trampled again. Just as it had been a hundred times before in other civilizations. Meanwhile, we were gobbling up the bounty of this planet, not to improve the lot of all mankind but to enrich a few, and turning it into, not useful manure but toxic waste and debt-bondage.

I saw the dark tunnel opening one spring day in 1976, four years after the first summit in Stockholm on preventing climate change - a very hopeful thing that had been! I was having lunch with colleagues and one of them ordered imported bottled water . Four more years later, not only had none of the promises been kept, but resource extraction, automobile use, industrialization, deforestation and pollution had accelerated sharply. Then the three nations of most concern to me elected the Reagan-Thatcher-Mulroney axis to govern our affairs. It's been downhill since, with very few moguls to slow the descent.

It looks to me like each period of madness in history ends in greater destruction. Is this one big enough to be the last? We can hope not, but I left my faith in humanity in the 20th century.

I have no final solutions, I'm just describing what I think I see. And yeah, history is long, and never finished. — unenlightened

This is a truism, not a truth. We're still seeing suns that no longer exist and not seeing planets that once flourished.
I take your meaning and laud your principles; it's the long term I don't believe in.

The state of oppression is exactly a state of inequality, and the solution is exactly to move to a state of more equality. So how does that happen? — unenlightened

That movement happened while democracy functioned reasonably well. After a shake-up of the class structure and economy via war and technological change, redistributed some wealth and expanded education and woke the ex-soldiers and female factory workers to their own potential. Even so, it was a slow, hard climb.

I think it is done by establishing an equality of the oppressed. — unenlightened

Only, that is a long way from done, anywhere, and even while progress seemed to be speeding up, the anti-democratic factions were busy undermining it and corrupting the means of governance.

So we have been playing monopoly for a century or so, and now we can see who has won. So that game is over, and we can ignore the winners counting their money and gloating, and get on with our spirited levelling without them. — unenlightened

Make that 6 millennia and it's not exactly over. Those who have won will not let anybody else ignore them or form coalitions against their control. The worst part is, they've always been able to persuade plebes to do their oppressing of other plebes.
I appreciate the efforts of individuals, groups and organizations that work toward mitigating the fallout, adapting their lifestyle and forming supportive communities or preparing the survivors for a changed world. I can't fight down the conviction that it's too little, far too late. But I'll certainly check out your link, which looks very positive.

This is because the oppressed are motivated to understand and transcend the social order. — unenlightened

Hardly ever, if history is anything to go by. The masses generally support the status quo: the oppressed are loud in their defence of the social order and take it for the moral order, the natural order, the unchangeable, necessary order. That's exactly where all discussions of capitalism, vegetarianism and American-style democracy very quickly go. The most oppressed only ever revolt under the leadership of an unoppressed elite - that is, middle-class intellectuals who had the luxury of an education, the leisure for reflection and the freedom to speak. But without the education, reflection and deliberation, the revolting oppressed, fuelled by anger and heedless of consequence, turn into oppressors - or monsters.

How we liberate one another, oppressed and oppressor, and find our humanity, is through the spirit level. Essentially, organizing society horizontally rather then vertically. In practical terms, this is what a properly functioning democracy would accomplish in two or three generations. Which is why oppressors and aspiring oppressors invariably corrupt democratic systems.

The term 'new world order' is, of course, not necessarily the same as 'order'.
I meant it as the major change in American politics with its global implications. A new balance of power in international relations; we see history in the making. Where Trump's vision of 'peace' is all about 'making a deal' and if he says it often enough, and loud enough, he will be seen as 'Peace-maker Extraordinaire'. — Amity

Yes, I realize it meant change in the balance of power. Just can't resist some fun with words. What I meant was that, atm, it's all up in the air; we can't tell whether will land on its ass or its head - for damn sure, not on its feet! - or whether there ever will be a balance again, or just more flux and heave until we blow it all up.
He may get a chunk of Ukraine - after all, he's had it in for the Zelensky government since 2019, when they wouldn't give him any dirt on Biden - but he's not getting that medal. Meanwhile, he and his merry band of monsters are tearing apart their own country. There may not be an America left that holds any kind of power in the world. Probably China's turn anyway. At least they don't want to accelerate climate change.

People have different ideas of what constitutes science and of how it is practiced.
I think all intelligent living things practice science: observe, experiment, theorize, test, conclude. Somebody contained and controlled fire, invented a wheel, dammed a river and irrigated a field, built a boat, made a bow and arrow, planted a garden, all without knowing what science is. People found analgesics and disinfectants, preservatives and dyes, without a concept of science. That's just stuff you do to deal with the physical world.

But they didn't need that to know how they felt or how to interact with one another.

That doesn't make you agree with Harris, though, unless, like him, you believe the example of health and scientific medicine suggests that our knowledge of right from wrong ought primarily to rest on the scientific investigation of what it is that makes people enjoy higher degrees of "well-being". — Pierre-Normand

You're right. I don't think science has any part in it. We understood sickness and health, happiness and sorrow, love and hate, right and wrong long before we had a concept of science. oddly enough, we also practiced the scientific method long before we had made science a concept.

My question is do you agree with Harris’ point regarding topics that have no strictly objective or easily proven right or wrong? — Captain Homicide

Sure. Language may be be variable, malleable, open to interpretation and tricky, but there are some words we all understand through common human experience. We know when we feel well and when we feel ill, no matter how somebody defines those conditions. We know when we love someone, even if there are many kinds of love and definition is elusive. We know what hunger, fear and grief are, regardless of the words used to describe them.
We also know right from wrong, ever since that fatal apple that put us within striking distance of divinity and got us expelled from Eden. We spin it, skew it, twist it and pervert it; we can argue, legislate and lie about it, but we know.

Wait and watch.

I'll stop chattering if you stop beating the wardrums. — ChatteringMonkey

Like Chamberlain did? It doesn't matter; neither of us has any influence.

I lost my copy decades ago. But, yeah - very little has changed.

But rather misogyny and the manosphere is something that's man's fault majority wise. Sure there may be some women counterparts to it but they're not the prime movers. — DifferentiatingEgg

They're secondary game-pieces, deluded by false promises of security, while men, deluded by false promises of autonomy are the primary game pieces. Neither are movers; both are moved. Looking to set one another straight is as futile as blaming one another - these controversies are noting more than devices to keep us - not just men and women, but Christians and Muslims, migrants and natives, blacks and whites, city and country, red and blue, perpetually divided so that we can never take effective action against our common oppressors.

That you lot want to pretend Nietzsche doesn't belong here is the side track... not me, I know he brings a lot of food for thought to this table... — DifferentiatingEgg

He, like Mills, is a little out of date, Nietzsche, more out of tune - on every subject, with any mainstream thought - each formed by a different time and culture.

Thing is, you can't educate men who have gotten their own way, or think they have. Women are hardly the only ones shaping and adapting themselves to fit an image made by someone more powerful: men have been allowing themselves to be defined by nationality, caste, occupation, education and sports franchise since the dawn of civilization. They, too, serve their kings and generals, foremen and CEO's; wear the required uniform, speak the expected passwords... and lose themselves. Unless the men are liberated*, they will continue to oppress women, children and livestock at every opportunity.

* Some men, in all historical periods have managed to liberate themselves and then gone on to speak up in behalf of the women, the slaves, the factory workers, the children and even the animals. They are usually punished for it by the men they try to educate.

Agree that it's a good idea to sell out Ukraine?
If by 'good', you mean idiotic, self-destructive and downright disastrous - sure.
So now can you stop chattering about that option?

How it could go wrong is if Europe goes in unprepared without the US in a foolish attempt to become the champion of the free world — ChatteringMonkey

The current US administration is nothing remotely like the "champion of the free world" and has no intention of saving any country from any aggressor; is, however, intent on getting its greedy little fat hands on Ukraine's resources, even if it has to go halvsies with Putin. Who cheats whom in this arrangement is moot, as far as Ukraine and Europe are concerned (though it's obvious which one is smarter) : they're to be sacrificed and served up to dictators willing to share with the TP monster.

But the literal killer is that production is becoming possible on a one off basis, with 3d printing for example. The end point for all this is indeed medieval — a few robber barons with robot armies instead of serfs. 'The People' will cease to exist. That is the vision towards which the oligarchy is moving the world. It doesn't even require a conspiracy, because it is plain economic sense. The world will be so much easier to control without all these wretched greedy peasants. — unenlightened

Have you read Moorcock's novel Dancers at the End of Time?
But meanwhile, the peasants are still needed to do all that buying and consuming, tax-, rent- and interest-paying. How they gonna do that when half are in law-enforcement and the other half in jail?

I am sure that philanthropy is still a thing but it is well-hidden. — Amity

Not hidden, so much as ignored. While most philantrophy throws crumbs to the poor or supports their church and highbrow arts, some is actually directed toward improved living conditions for the third world ... uh ... developing countries. They're not all evil, but the money they give is first gained by the wrong means and the spending of it feeds capitalism. That is: they suck up a huge amount of the world's natural and human resources and replenish a very small part, while perpetuating the system that caused all the misery they're trying to alleviate.

Trump is a 'clear and present danger'. — Amity

It's March. We'll soon find out whether my addled prophet had the right vision for the wrong year.

They have almost succeeded, and I hear no credit being given to the founder because, who (else) cares about Africa! — unenlightened

Bill Gates, I understand, though apparently not always in the right way. Carter was a uniquely human individual, massively underappreciated by his country. Capitalism corrupts more than transactional behaviour; it degrades language and rots minds.

Should Europe have to carry a drawn out war against Russia, and devote a lot of its allready strained budget to the military, where do you think this is going? — ChatteringMonkey

If they don't stand up to Russia now, and exhaust its military and economic capability, all of Europe will be salami-sliced. More quickly, if Russia is allowed to gobble up the Ukraine's resources.

And I don't think the current US administration is all that worried about forming coalitions. — ChatteringMonkey

The present administration is not worried about anything. It's insane and undirected, except toward the profit and aggrandizement of a few oligarchs. They may or may not make land-grabs around the globe - starting with Greenland, which is European property, while Putin bites off Kosovo. Chubby-T will make a deal with Putin, on which one or both will renege, unless one or both is/are assassinated before they can.

It's a trap strategically, and would make sure Europe will become technologically dependant on the US for decades to come because that's where it would be forced to buy its weapons. — ChatteringMonkey

I guess it will - assuming the US weapons industry survives Trump's disastrous economic policy. But it will be done on a very dark market, not as international trade. Then again, there is always China.

For sure, there is a new world order. That much is obvious. — Amity

I don't see order here. I see upheaval, crisis, imminent threat to all life on the planet. But if we do survive this one, I maybe the asteroid will sort us out.

The US has waged wars of aggression, and that's 2/3 of the NATO. — ChatteringMonkey

The US and NATO are separate entities. Why do you think the US wars of aggression required a coalition of consenting nations? Only four of the thirty-two NATO members were involved in Iraq and six in Afghanistan - nowhere near two thirds.

Not wanting an alliance specifically designed to keep your country in check, on your border, seems pretty reasonable to me. — ChatteringMonkey

So, you can understand why Ukraine wanted to join NATO. They've been under threat from Russia their whole lives.

You're so much more succinct than I am.

Mill, like much of the Enlightenment, was no doubt influenced by the loosening of the Christian religious stranglehold over European thought and the examples brought back from the New World of native philosophies and societies that functioned* immeasurably better than the European ones at that time. In pre-civilized communities, every member has to contribute as much as they are able for the well-being of the whole. They simply could not afford to waste half the tribe's intelligence and skill. Nor would a father
tolerate the abuse of his close cherished girl-child. The experience and memory of elders, both male and female were essential and respected and wise elders do not countenance waste or internal strife.
*They're making quite respectable progress toward regaining those ancient values. But, though the official discrimination eased up - at least in Canada, for the moment - many lands and other rights are still in dispute; the natives are a long way from self-determination. John Ralston Saul's book has some wise commentary on the subject, though it's a little out of date.

Everything changed with the ownership - not the cultivation - of land and the ascendance of warrior and priestly castes. Thereafter, social value was linked to dominance rather than contribution; both property and status were competed-for and jealously guarded; it was then that genetic provenance became important to men for their heritage and succession. It was then, too, that more and more new soldiers were required from the baby-dispensers to bulk up the unproductive and very expensive standing armies. So the hierarchical societies, which relied on conquest to increase their wealth, built reproductive bondage into their religious doctrines.

We should defend our values, but stop trying to impose them on others... if we keep making geo-politics about morality we won't get anywhere. — ChatteringMonkey

The present US government wouldn't recognize morality if it was rotting chained upside-down in its dungeon. None of this BS is about morality.

Poor little Russia was not shaking in its boots at the prospect of NATO, whicyh has never waged a war of aggression, getting one more member - that had been next door all along. But the countries were under Russian occupation not so long ago, especially Ukraine where Stalin perpetrated his greatest atrocity, have plenty to fear from Russia. Putin didn't attack Ukraine out of fear: he wants the grain and the minerals, as well as the territory.
All the oligarchs are out to eat as much of the world's wealth as possible before closing time.

How many of us are frustrated in our lack of power, our vulnerability to imposed, dramatic change? — Amity

An increasing number, apparently. And the arch-apologist broadcaster spins it as a 'far left' conspiracy, 'far left', in his case, meaning any organization that promotes liberty, democracy and equality - you know, those radical American ideals they tried to enshrine in a constitution and its 27 amendments.

How many will turn to the 'certainties' and 'strength' of a male, dictator? — Amity

The one good thing about the Trump regime is its rush into madness. They could have snuck up on people, as clever dictators do, incrementally but Chubby-T is neither clever nor patient. Single best thing he's done to bring down his own administration: appointing Musk Slasher-in-chief. They can do an enormous amount of damage and hurt an awful lot of people before any change can take place.... but....
It should provide a warning to other populations leaning hard right.

OTOH,
the main drivers of the rightward shift are not going away just because we oppose the methods of their representatives. Automation proceeds headlong to deprive people of jobs they need in order to live in a home and be properly nourished. Price-gauging in food distribution, housing and transportation continues to make life harder for working people and untenable for the unemployed. Arable and habitable land is shrinking; inter- and intra-national conflicts turn large populations into migrants and refugees. As hardship increases, so does discontent and when discontent grows, so does the need for scapegoats.
Women in the workforce have been an irritant to some portion of male population since the end on WWI; the more women are educated and well-paid for executive and technical positions that men used to consider their exclusive domain, the greater the resentment from men who don't like to compete: the ones who don't perform well in school, are less meticulous, lack discipline would like much better to rule by force of brawn. The mainstream religions did nothing to set them straight, not just because they themselves are patriarchal in organization, but because women do the unpaid church-related charity work and each denomination is jealous of its parishioner numbers: depend on the reproduction of the faithful.

It's much easier for the exploiting classes to point at bogus causes for the people's anxiety, to goad the resentful into hatred and backlash against progress than to create conditions wherein people can co-exist with a minimum of discomfort.
For example, automation could always have been appropriately supervised and taxed, working hours reduced accordingly; quality day-care and primary education provided at work-places; good public housing, sanitation, education, health-care and elder-care provided by the government; a living wage for migrant workers and non-discriminatory housing and banking regulation and genuine equal treatment of citizens under the law and in the work-force.

All of these measures could have been implemented from the onset of the Industrial Revolution, when is social upheavals were first observed. A few progressive industrialists made sincere efforts on behalf of their workers and neighbours, but by 1914, social conscience had pretty much been drained out of capitalism. The robber barons would rather buy corrupt politicians than sound policies.

I don't think I have anything left to say on this subject, except to repeat: No, an empathy chip won't work.

But morality is fluid, changing between cultures and through time. How can you have a standard with such a fluid foundation? — Christoffer

All societies do have standards and norms, moral precepts and laws, at any given time, for whatever length of time. This was never a mystery. It's not a 'fluid foundation'; it's social evolution, which is more rapid than biological evolution, but takes a similar pattern of punctuated equilibrium: centuries-long stasis, interspersed with years- or decades-long bursts of change after major upheavals.

Culture, world-views and society change massively over time. It isn't static. — Christoffer

That's why you have to take your standard from where you happen to be in geography and history, rather than demand a constant universal one.

How can you find a stable moral ground while society is changing without careful evaluation and dissection of the moral values that are changing? — Christoffer

By being the philosopher, revolutionary, inventor or prophet who causes the change. Everybody else just goes along, willingly or not, with the status quo of their time and place.

A problem with democracies has been that crime and punishment becomes voting issues, and so we have outsourced an academically sound topic to that of the mob screaming for solutions and politicians promising solutions that are satisfying for the crowd/mob, not those that are effective in preventing crime. — Christoffer

Outsourced? From what previous condition? Prelates and kings. They were not able to prevent crime, either, they just dealt with it more harshly. Who, exactly, are those who have effectively prevented crime?

Isn't it then true that since morality constantly change and this morality is informing the societal norms and standards, that in order for it to change in a rational and thoughtful way, people need to carefully evaluate societal morals in order for them to change over time in a thoughtful and responsible way? — Christoffer

Which people need to carefully evaluate societal morals in order for them to change over time in a thoughtful and responsible way? If not the democratic mob, then - the self-appointed emperor, the military dictator, the high priest or the omnipotent professor? All but the last have been in charge, without affecting any real change in the human condition. How do you propose to elevate the academic to philosopher-king?

It [outside] is abstract because you refer to it as some standard within a system that is constantly changing. — Christoffer

No, I didn't. I said people can't see inside of other people's minds to know what the other is thinking or feeling. We may guess at their motivations and intentions, may sympathize with their situation, but we judge them, according to the norms of our society, by their words and actions.

A person within this system might adhere to the norms and standards around them, but a citizen in Nazi Germany did so too. — Christoffer

Exactly. From the perspective of our own culture, we can disapprove of the norms of other cultures, just as they can disapprove of ours. Your own social environment is what's available to teach you a primary mode of thought, which you may modify later in life, but most people don't. That's what makes it so hard for immigrants to adjust to a different culture, and for that culture to adjust to them.

Only through empathic understanding can we truly evaluate and arrive at good moral standards that consist through time rather than change by doctrines. — Christoffer

I support your effort to do so.

Why not go back and re-phrase the issue as ‘ I cannot identity with people whose motives and thinking are alien to me’. That will open up alternatives to the conclusion that they are objectively ‘pathologically destructive.’ — Joshs

Because an alien mode of thought is one thing to consider - been there, done that - a lot. A trail of broken bodies in shallow graves is quite another, and I will not attempt any kind of connection with the mind that took pleasure in their pain.
But that is a personal bridge which I refuse to build. I asked a quite different question here:
"And if normal people cannot identify with pathologically destructive people? I doubt pathologically or calculatedly destructive people identify with their victims either."
That was not about me, it was about the behaviour of the majority of law-abiding, generally honest, generally compassionate people viz-a-viz home-invaders, rapists and terrorists. I myself, might begin to fathom the actions of those people, but their victims probably can't, any more than a hazardous waste dumper can empathize with the people who well get cancer from the water. I don't get to define all psychological terrains; I can only describe the ones I've seen.

Empathy is used to understand information. Evaluation can only be done out of information. You can't evaluate without anything to evaluate and draw conclusions from and you can't evaluate if you don't understand the information. — Christoffer

I see that evaluation - whatever you mean that in regard to human behaviour - is very important to you. I don't quite understand why.

How do you arrive at moral behavior? For yourself and society? You keep returning to some "standard" or "norm", but how are these defined? — Christoffer

In order to 'evaluate' anything, you first need a standard against which to measure it and some unit of measurement. How such standards and norms are defined is according to the precepts and world-view of the culture: what a society expects, accepts and tolerates from its members. Moral and legal systems differ, as do human attitudes from one historical period to another. That is why I find your demand to evaluate behaviours and their motives so perplexing.

And how do we figure out how to deal with destructive ones without fully understanding their emotions? — Christoffer

We don't. Every society sets up a system of laws to regulate its members' behaviour, and every society fails to prevent crime, interpersonal conflict, injustice and abuse.

You're referring to this abstract "outside" which informs our morality, but what is this "outside" but the thing we formed by our empathic understanding of the human condition? — Christoffer

Inside and outside are hardly abstract concepts. (and I didn't say appearances inform our moralities; that's far more complicated than everyday assessment of another person's actions). We see what other people look like, what they do, hear what they say and judge them accordingly. We can imagine how they feel if it's similar to how we might feel in their place.
In general, human do not treat one another as if all that understanding and bridge-making were very effective.

Anyway, whatever empathy is, you won't find it in a computer chip.

And if normal people cannot identify with pathologically destructive people? I doubt pathologically or calculatedly destructive people identify with their victims either. Some bridges cannot be built.

It depends on what the surgeon’s goals are, doesn’t it? — Joshs

Cut it open, take out the bad bits, stitch it up, bandage it and collect a fee. Many doctors are naturally empathic - which is a factor in their choice of career - and in modern times, most are trained to consider the patients' mental state. But if I had to choose between one who knows the technical aspects of the of the indicated treatment and doesn't care about me personally and one who is deeply caring but not so competent, I know which I'd prefer.

The psychotherapist may not ‘identity’ with the glee of a serial killer in the sense of being tempted to become a serial killer themselves, but if the therapist cannot see not only how the glee is morally justified from the serial killer’s perspective, but build a bridge between that perspective and that of the therapist, then they will not be of much help to the client. — Joshs

The one who actually treat that killer - assuming he's eligible for therapy rather than the needle - may have to identify (very likely at some risk to his own mental health). The ones who study the etiology of the illness - if indeed, it's considered an illness rather than evildoing or heroism in the particular society, who study, describe and classify the behaviour need no more emotional bridges with their subject than those who study, describe and classify the pathogens that cause epidemics.

That comparison is not valid as not having an insight into the experience of emotion means you cannot evaluate the emotions that led to a certain behavior. — Christoffer

Evaluation is intellectual - where it's applicable at all. What's the standard against which you evaluate another person's behaviour? Your own, or the norm accepted by society. Emotions may cause him to act a certain way, but he's not evaluated by society on his feelings, only on his actions. Behaviour, is judged on legal considerations of prevention, correction or punishment. No empathy required.

You're basically asking humans that do scientific research on humans to evaluate emotional driving forces behind behavior, without an understanding of what those emotions really are. — Christoffer

Not to evaluate. Only to understand and figure out how to deal with the destructive ones.

How do you discern an immoral act without examining the emotions that informed that act? — Christoffer

That judgment is made from the outside: What did the person do? Does our collective moral framework condone that act? (Morality is not a given; it varies by culture, circumstance and time.) Should we allow him to keep doing it? If not, how do we stop him? (More often by incarceration than fellow feeling.)

We can study an animal and conclude their pain-centra to fire when we do something to it, but to study complex moral actions by examining the reasoning and emotional complexity that caused it is not quantifiable in the same way. — Christoffer

Who says it needs to be quantifiable? Humans do torture one another as well as other animals and not necessarily for their own pleasure: sometimes it's just business.
I do not believe that every executioner feels the fear of his charges, that every pain researcher shares the distress of his lab specimens, that the members of a lynch-mob identify with their victims. Conversely, I don't believe that it is necessary for a surgeon to experience the suffering of his patients or a psychotherapist to identify with the glee of a serial killer.

We clearly have very different definitions of empathy.

The ability to feel as another does not mean to agree with their actions out of those emotions. — Christoffer

No, it doesn't. You might have an idea how they could achieve their need by more effective or socially approved methods. Agreement is intellectual; it can be granted or withheld; fellow feeling is unconditional and automatic. Understanding in a clinical sense leaves you aloof; feeling does not.

How do you academically evaluate a murderers psychological state of mind without the empathic ability to recognize that psychological state of mind? — Christoffer

By having studied similar cases and followed similar behaviours back through their history. Like understanding the malfunction of a car engine without feeling like a car engine.

Can you not emphasize with sexual attraction, pleasure etc.? — Christoffer

The normal kind, yes. I can empathize with a woman who has been jilted, a man whose partner has been unfaithful, a young person with a hopeless crush or two star-crossed lovers who are kept apart by forces beyond their control. I cannot empathize with, feel for or comprehend the drive to hurt and kill the object of desire.

Empathically understand a sexual predator is absolutely possible, but sympathizing with them is immoral. — Christoffer

Understanding is possible - beyond me, but professionals seem to manage it - some degree of compassion is possible - beyond me, but some religious seem to manage it - sharing the feelings is possible only for those with similar desires or experience (hence copycat killers and sadistic entertainments). Morality is irrelevant; emotions are not ruled by moral precepts.

Without the ability to empathically understand, we are unable to discern and investigate motive of an immoral act. — Christoffer

I disagree. People study and understand all kinds of things from virology to cosmology without any sort of identification with the objects they are observing.

And I'd say this is a key area to which society often fails when trying to fight crime, the inability, or the rejection of empathic thinking around a crime leads to societal actions that goes against what researchers tell society is the effective path towards reducing said crimes. — Christoffer

This is far to vast a blanket! There are crimes of so many different kinds, committed by so many different people for so many different reasons, nobody on earth can empathize with all of the perpetrators. But even without empathy, we can look objectively at the statistics, case histories, demographics, social environments, circumstances and make reasoned assumptions regarding their motivation and how to reduce the motivating factors.

Our empathy typically occurs more naturally towards those most like us. We are kind to our kind. Who our kind are is easily identifiable. They have our skin type, our facial features, and they speak in our accent, to name a few. It's not hard to figure out who the strange stranger is. — Hanover

That goes no way toward explaining the white civil rights activists or any of the outreach programs and social volunteering, or animal rescue and protection programs.

We are kind to our kind. — Hanover

Not so far as I can see. At least, civil war, drug trafficking, price-gauging and domestic violence don't indicate that. Some people are kind selectively; some are kind generally, some are kind universally. Some are unkind in the same way.

There was plenty of contention and some violent clashes between tribes of very similar people; primitives didn't usually travel far enough to encounter other races - that came much later, with nation-states that had entrenched religions and social orders. Many of these nations went to war against very similar neighbours, for the same reason prehistoric humans did - for territory, water and other resources - and sometimes for the self-aggrandizement of an aggressive leader. Even so, both in prehistoric times, and ever since, tribes and nations have also made treaties and trade agreements with others near, far, similar and different. Marco Polo did very well in China; Europeans were, at first, welcome in the New World.

Why was the evolutionary fence of tribalism erected and what truly happens when it is removed? — Hanover

It wasn't erected by evolution or some god. People lived in more or less isolated communities in small blood-related numbers. They did trade, negotiate for water rights and safe passage, meet at trade fairs that became festivals and intermarry with other tribes. Nor is that fence removed by some kind of decree. Strangers become acquaintances, neighbours, business associates, classmates, lovers - in the normal course of human interaction, gradual assimilation is inevitable. That's what happened to the lost tribes of Biblical Israel.
Some elites and privileged factions (political and religious) attempt to prevent this by keeping their community from the mainstream - separate schools, anti-miscegenation laws, housing and employment discrimination, enforced segregation, selective law-enforcement, etc. Yet some part of that population always find a way around or under that societal fence to associate with one another.

That sympathy is emotionally and intellectually agreeing with something, while empathy is emotional understanding of someone or some people. — Christoffer

I'm not sure about that distinction. One can understand things from a purely academic or clinical position, that requires no empathy. Once you recognize yourself in the other, you share their emotional state, 'feel' their pain, fear, hunger, anger; they are reacting as you would react in a similar situation.

Basically, I can empathize with the emotions that drove a murderer to commit murder, but I don't sympathize with any of it. — Christoffer

I doubt you can empathize with all murderers. The one who does it for sexual pleasure? A psychologist or criminologist may be able to understand that intellectually, and I may believe them, intellectually, but I sure can't feel it emotionally. Or one who kills for financial gain. I can understand the motivation, but neither share nor condone the mind-set. One who is driven in desperation to kill an attacker or abuser, I can understand, feel their emotions and share their state of mind to some extent, and also sympathize.

Empathy actually goes beyond sympathy. Sympathy is merely compassion for another, however alien they and they and situation are; empathy is putting oneself in their situation.
If you have it, it extends far beyond people just like yourself; it includes all living things.
However, in real life, this trait is associated with a certain kind of intelligence, the ability to observe closely and interpret, retention of memory from one's own experience, sensitivity and benevolence. It's all integrated withing the personality; cannot be inserted by an artificial device.

What we can do is nurture and reward those impulses in our children; support their empathetic side, at the same time discouraging selfish and aggressive behaviours. Unfortunately, if a society is dominated by the negative side of the human psyche, neither parents nor robotics can do very much to change it.

Empathy is, essentially, sharing: the ability to recognize oneself in another and thus to understand and sympathize with their feelings, their attitudes, their condition.
It goes a long way toward promoting compassionate and benevolent behaviour. But the single trait - let alone a computer chip that is unconnected to the personality - would not be enough to prevent destructive action toward entities that one does not encounter directly.

Due to all the suffering, unfairness and deaths in the world. I long to make all living things forever happy but I can't. — Truth Seeker

So, you preach to the choir, much as some of us write poems, novels and letters. Good enough.

What about veganism? — Truth Seeker

It seems not to suit everyone. Including myself: I don't eat meat, but I cook with eggs (they come from the free-range hens next door) and some cheese. So did Epicurus. I don't think strict veganism is necessary for a healthy diet, but I do take care cause as little pain as possible, within the confines of modern industrial life. Many people would feel utterly unfulfilled without their steak, bacon and fried chicken, so I'm not sure what dietary choices that do not contribute to ill humour or health are doing here.

So... why are you so keen to teach us how to live, anyway?