Scivillage.com Casual Discussion Science Forum

In the UK nearly 30% of men have a criminal record by the age of 30, source:- https://www.theguardian.com/money/2002/a...ashsection . We could go for a breakdown of the actual type of crimes but as a UK citizen I'm fairly sure they'll turn out to be mostly 'empathy fails'. There will (of course) be outliers born without a 'normal' amount of empathy - they might not even learn it that easily without the basics BUT that doesn't mean they'll turn into axe wielding murderers. More likely they're just going to go through life being confused (coincidence) by the ease with which others are able to interact. I have wondered whether someone with about as much empathy as a potted plant could ever become President of the United States and yes, I think such a thing is possible.

Quote:In-group empathy is innate, because it accounts for things like imprinting and familial cooperation. Out-group empathy must be taught.

LOL! There's only one empathy and it's innate. There's not two kinds of empathy.

Quote:Asking why some people do not learn certain things is ridiculously stupid. It's equivalent to asking, "If reading is learned, then how is it that illiterates don't learn it?" Yes, some illiteracy is due to an inherent inability, but ev en dyslexics can learn to read.

What a moron. You just refuted your previous claim by admitting illteracy is due to inherent disability. Sociopaths also have an inherent disability to empathize. And that can only happen if empathy is innate.

Quote:Or just consider this. Were you taught to share? Why did you have to be taught that?

No. I share because I empathize with the need of another person. There is no learned obligation in me to share.

(Jul 21, 2017 11:49 PM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]

Quote:In-group empathy is innate, because it accounts for things like imprinting and familial cooperation. Out-group empathy must be taught.

LOL! There's only one empathy and it's innate. There's not two kinds of empathy.

Empathy is generally divided into two major components:[49]

Affective empathy, also called emotional empathy:[50] the capacity to respond with an appropriate emotion to another's mental states.[49] Our ability to empathize emotionally is based on emotional contagion:[50] being affected by another's emotional or arousal state.[51]
Cognitive empathy: the capacity to understand another's perspective or mental state.[21][49][52] The terms cognitive empathy and theory of mind or mentalizing are often used synonymously, but due to a lack of studies comparing theory of mind with types of empathy, it is unclear whether these are equivalent.[53]

Although science has not yet agreed upon a precise definition of these constructs, there is consensus about this distinction.[54][55] Affective and cognitive empathy are also independent from one another; someone who strongly empathizes emotionally is not necessarily good in understanding another's perspective.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy#Types

Damn those pesky facts, huh?

The first type is innate and accounts for things like imprinting and familial cooperation, while the second is learned...hence "cognitive."

I can only assume you're completely lacking in the latter. Otherwise you'd already know this simple distinction. So it seems you think it's all innate because MR don't learn.

Quote:

Quote:Asking why some people do not learn certain things is ridiculously stupid. It's equivalent to asking, "If reading is learned, then how is it that illiterates don't learn it?" Yes, some illiteracy is due to an inherent inability, but even dyslexics can learn to read.

What a moron. You just refuted your previous claim by admitting illteracy is due to inherent disability. Sociopaths also have an inherent disability to empathize. And that can only happen if empathy is innate.

Maybe MR is illiterate himself. Dyslexics CAN learn to read.

Psychopaths do not lack empathy, rather they can switch it on at will, according to new research.

Placed in a brain scanner, psychopathic criminals watched videos of one person hurting another and were asked to empathise with the individual in pain.

Only when asked to imagine how the pain receiver felt did the area of the brain related to pain light up.

Scientists, reporting in Brain, say their research explains how psychopaths can be both callous and charming.
...
Now scientists have found that only when asked to empathise did the criminals' empathy reaction, also known as the mirror system, fire up the same way as it did for the controls. Without instruction, they show reduced activity in the regions of the brain associated with pain.

This mirror system refers to the mirror neurons in our brain which are known to activate when we watch someone do a task and when we do it ourselves. They are thought to play a vital role in the ability to empathise with others.
- http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-23431793

So there is no evidence of innate disability, only of selective empathy.
So that would make your ignorance of learned empathy willful.

Quote:

Quote:Or just consider this. Were you taught to share? Why did you have to be taught that?

No. I share because I empathize with the need of another person. There is no learned obligation in me to share.

So why is every child taught to share? O_o

You seem pathologically incapable of admitting to or understanding theory of mind. My first guess would be alcoholism.

Quote:The first type is innate and accounts for things like imprinting and familial cooperation, while the second is learned...hence "cognitive."

I can only assume you're completely lacking in the latter. Otherwise you'd already know this simple distinction. So it seems you think it's all innate because MR don't learn.

Dumbass. You were calling them in-group and out-group empathy. Now you switch to this totally different distinction, neither of which are claimed to be learned. Like I said, empathy, whatever form it takes, is innate. It is in both forms the ability to identify with another person. That is why they are both called empathy.

Quote:So there is no evidence of innate disability, only of selective empathy.
So that would make your ignorance of learned empathy willful.

"To say that a psychopath lacks “empathy” is to reach for a broader definition of the term. It is a definition of empathy that involves sympathy and an unselfish, altruistic impulse. It is an emotion that guides us towards feeling the pain of others and treating them as we would wish to be treated.

When it is said that a psychopath is lacking in empathy, what is actually meant is that they are lacking in compassion, kindness, and a shared vision of morality. It means they reserve justice for themselves and believe that fairness is measured by what is good for them.

Whether in a dark alley or a high-rise tower, the psychopath seeks to dominate others in order to satisfy their own desires. To deploy fear, shame or deceit to acquire your submission, the psychopath needs to know how you feel and how you will react. They do not care about you or empathize in that sense, but you should never doubt that they are feeling you."----http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-g-mat...87312.html

Sound familiar?

Quote:So why is every child taught to share? O_o

Same reason they're taught about God and Santa Clause and the tooth fairy I guess. To manipulate them into being good.

(Jul 22, 2017 04:34 AM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]

Quote:The first type is innate and accounts for things like imprinting and familial cooperation, while the second is learned...hence "cognitive."

I can only assume you're completely lacking in the latter. Otherwise you'd already know this simple distinction. So it seems you think it's all innate because MR don't learn.

Dumbass. You were calling them in-group and out-group empathy. Now you switch to this totally different distinction, neither of which are claimed to be learned. Like I said, empathy, whatever form it takes, is innate. It is in both forms the ability to identify with another person. That is why they are both called empathy.

You're a hopeless idiot. Come on, you can tell us. Are you drooling on yourself right now? O_o
In-group empathy is emotional empathy, as a ton of research demonstrates it is stronger toward one's own in-group. Out-group empathy is cognitive, as it requires a learned understanding of another's perspective to counteract primitive affective in-group favoritism.

The most important development in early childhood social cognition is the development of theory of mind. - http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/social...-childhood

Lying is a pretty sophisticated behavior. When you lie to someone else, you need to understand that when you tell them something that you know is not true, that they come to believe the false information. That means that you need to understand that their belief and your belief will differ.

Psychologists have studied this ability to separate your knowledge from your own beliefs from your knowledge of other people’s beliefs under the name theory of mind. The idea is that it requires understanding quite a bit about the way minds believe things in order to recognize that another person has a false belief.
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ult...-learn-lie

Sure little buddy, that doesn't sound learned at all.

Quote:

Quote:So there is no evidence of innate disability, only of selective empathy.
So that would make your ignorance of learned empathy willful.

"To say that a psychopath lacks “empathy” is to reach for a broader definition of the term. It is a definition of empathy that involves sympathy and an unselfish, altruistic impulse. It is an emotion that guides us towards feeling the pain of others and treating them as we would wish to be treated.

When it is said that a psychopath is lacking in empathy, what is actually meant is that they are lacking in compassion, kindness, and a shared vision of morality. It means they reserve justice for themselves and believe that fairness is measured by what is good for them.

Whether in a dark alley or a high-rise tower, the psychopath seeks to dominate others in order to satisfy their own desires. To deploy fear, shame or deceit to acquire your submission, the psychopath needs to know how you feel and how you will react. They do not care about you or empathize in that sense, but you should never doubt that they are feeling you."----http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-g-mat...87312.html

Sound familiar?

LOL! And?
So you're admitting "to reach for a broader definition of the term"?
Yeah, that's called equivocation...and it's intellectually dishonest.
But we already knew that about you.

Quote:

Quote:So why is every child taught to share? O_o

Same reason they're taught about God and Santa Clause and the tooth fairy I guess. To manipulate them into being good.

So where's the reward for sharing? O_o You know, since all the examples you compare include things like heaven, presents, and money.

Or are you just a sociopath, who assumes everyone either manipulates others or requires manipulating? O_o
That, or just an alcoholic...maybe a cocaine addiction.

Quote:You're a hopeless idiot. Come on, you can tell us. Are you drooling on yourself right now? O_o
In-group empathy is emotional empathy, as a ton of research demonstrates it is stronger toward one's own in-group. Out-group empathy is cognitive, as it requires a learned understanding of another's perspective to counteract primitive affective in-group favoritism

LOL! You're just making shit up again. There's not the slightest correlation of affective empathy with in-group empathy and cognitve empathy with out-group empathy. In-group involves idenitifying with people's ideas as much as with their emotions, and out group empathy involves identifying with emotions as much as with ideas. As I have already shown, empathy is innate in both cases, being...what were they again?..oh yeah! EMPATHY.

Quote:So you're admitting "to reach for a broader definition of the term"?
Yeah, that's called equivocation...and it's intellectually dishonest.
But we already knew that about you.

Yep..thats the broader definition. Imagine that. Words changing definitions depending on the context of their usage.

Quote:So where's the reward for sharing? O_o You know, since all the examples you compare include things like heaven, presents, and money.

Mommy and daddy's praise and love--the best reward of all. I don't suppose you got much of that. How sad..

Quote:Or are you just a sociopath, who assumes everyone either manipulates others or requires manipulating? O_o
That, or just an alcoholic...maybe a cocaine addiction.

You just turn into a raging insulting prick after a certain point don't you? What's wrong? Can't win the argument again so you take it out on me? Go ahead sweetie. I can take it. lol!

(Jul 22, 2017 06:57 AM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]

Quote:You're a hopeless idiot. Come on, you can tell us. Are you drooling on yourself right now? O_o
In-group empathy is emotional empathy, as a ton of research demonstrates it is stronger toward one's own in-group. Out-group empathy is cognitive, as it requires a learned understanding of another's perspective to counteract primitive affective in-group favoritism

LOL! You're just making shit up again. There's not the slightest correlation of affective empathy with in-group empathy and cognitve empathy with out-group empathy. In-group involves idenitifying with people's ideas as much as with their emotions, and out group empathy involves identifying with emotions as much as with ideas. As I have already shown, empathy is innate in both cases, being...what were they again?..oh yeah! EMPATHY.

Wow, you're an endless fount of blathering moronic crap.
So both in-group and out-group empathy are "identifying with emotions as much as with ideas"?
Affective empathy is emotional contagion due to mirror neuron activity...a mostly autonomic response.
Cognitive empathy is an intellectual understanding that not only others have internal worlds similar to your own but that they can also differ quite wildly from your own.
Affective empathy has little to do with ideas, while theory of mind can be facilitated by affinity.

Read some actual research on the subject for ONCE.

A few years later, social and affective neuroscience researchers began to examine the neural bases behind this phenomenon. The first of these studies by Xu et al. (2009) explored how viewing ingroup vs. outgroup members in pain would differentially activate empathic concern. They showed White and Chinese participants photographs of both White and Chinese individuals in painful and non-painful contexts. Thus, all participants (whether White or Chinese) viewed members of both their racial ingroup and their racial outgroup in typical empathy-inducing situations. Results showed that a neural region typically involved in empathy, the anterior cingulate cortex, was far more activated when participants viewed ingroup vs. outgroup members in pain.
- http://sites.tufts.edu/emotiononthebrain...pathy-gap/


Three experiments (N =370) investigated the effects of social categorization on the experience of empathy. In Experiment 1, university students reported their empathy for, and intentions to help, a student who described a distressful experience. As predicted, participants reported stronger empathy and helping intentions when the student belonged to an ingroup compared to an outgroup university. Experiments 2 and 3 demonstrated that stronger empathy for outgroup members was experienced following the activation of an ingroup norm that prescribed the experience of this emotion. Activating this norm also led to the expression of more positive attitudes towards the outgroup (Experiment 3), and empathy fully mediated this effect. These findings indicate that like other emotions, empathy is influenced by social categorization processes.
- http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.13...9/abstract


Social scientists have found that in-group love and out-group hate originate from the same neurobiological basis, are mutually reinforcing, and co-evolved—because loyalty to the in-group provided a survival advantage by helping our ancestors to combat a threatening out-group. That means that, in principle, if we eliminate out-group hate completely, we may also undermine in-group love. Empathy is a zero-sum game.
...
We can and do override our moral instincts using our more logical and deliberative mode of thinking, so the in-group vs. out-group opposition is not absolute. But we have limited cognitive resources, which rapidly become depleted. For example, keeping a nine-digit insurance policy number in mind without writing it down requires working memory, and can impair our ability to recall other information, like the phone number of the insurance agent. Similar constraints cause what is known as decision fatigue: Deliberating over an initial series of decisions can inhibit thoughtfulness in later decisions, as observed in judges deciding whether to grant prisoners parole earlier and later in the day.7 Similarly, full compassion requires inhibitory control (regulating our own emotions to distinguish them from another person’s emotions), self-reflection, externally focused attention, and recognition of another person’s suffering. These faculties, too, can tire.
- http://nautil.us/issue/35/boundaries/no-...r-everyone

Plenty of research demonstrating the link between affective empathy and ingroup favoritism.
And likewise for proscriptive (learned) norms in strengthening outgroup empathy and the cognitive effort necessary to do so.

Quote:

Quote:So you're admitting "to reach for a broader definition of the term"?
Yeah, that's called equivocation...and it's intellectually dishonest.
But we already knew that about you.

Yep..thats the broader definition. Imagine that. Words changing definitions depending on the context of their usage.

Yep, that's the completely flaccid arguments we've come to expect from you.

Quote:

Quote:So where's the reward for sharing? O_o You know, since all the examples you compare include things like heaven, presents, and money.

Mommy and daddy's praise and love--the best reward of all. I don't suppose you got much of that. How sad..

What's sad is your pathetic need to attempt emotional barbs that never land.
And that you seem to be implying your parents withheld praise and love for you not doing something as inconsequential as sharing. That is downright heartbreaking, and I truly pity the childhood you must have had. Explains a lot though.

Quote:

Quote:Or are you just a sociopath, who assumes everyone either manipulates others or requires manipulating? O_o
That, or just an alcoholic...maybe a cocaine addiction.

You just turn into a raging insulting prick after a certain point don't you? What's wrong? Can't win the argument again so you take it out on me? Go ahead sweetie. I can take it. lol!

Go look, deary....you started the insults. If you can't take it....
The fact that you're suddenly making an issue of it tells me you're lying about its effect on you. So which is it...alcohol or cocaine? I'm going to assume the latter, since you didn't pipe up when I mentioned alcohol earlier.

And in case you missed it, I brought it up because both impair theory of mind.

Quote:Affective empathy is emotional contagion due to mirror neuron activity...a mostly autonomic response.
Cognitive empathy is an intellectual understanding that not only others have internal worlds similar to your own but that they can also differ quite wildly from your own.
Affective empathy has little to do with ideas, while theory of mind can be facilitated by affinity.si

I never claimed otherwise doofus. What I said is that affective empathy and cognitive empathy are both involved in both ingroup and outgroup situations, thus refuting your idiotic claim that they are exclusive to each. I emotionally empathize with my brother AND strangers. I understand the POV of my sister AND people I've never met. It's all one thing called empathy. Nothing you posted addresses any of that. That's what happens when you can't comprehend the points being made.

Quote:What's sad is your pathetic need to attempt emotional barbs that never land.
And that you seem to be implying your parents withheld praise and love for you not doing something as inconsequential as sharing. That is downright heartbreaking, and I truly pity the childhood you must have had. Cry Explains a lot though.

LOL! Where did I claim that? Quote it or admit you're lying again.

Quote:Go look, deary....you started the insults. If you can't take it....
The fact that you're suddenly making an issue of it tells me you're lying about its effect on you. So which is it...alcohol or cocaine? I'm going to assume the latter, since you didn't pipe up when I mentioned alcohol earlier.

You do indeed assume alot of things I have neither said nor implied. What is wrong with you? Do you think ad homing me means you win the argument?

(Jul 22, 2017 09:55 PM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]

Quote:Affective empathy is emotional contagion due to mirror neuron activity...a mostly autonomic response.
Cognitive empathy is an intellectual understanding that not only others have internal worlds similar to your own but that they can also differ quite wildly from your own.
Affective empathy has little to do with ideas, while theory of mind can be facilitated by affinity.si

I never claimed otherwise doofus. What I said is that affective empathy and cognitive empathy are both involved in both ingroup and outgroup  situations, thus refuting your idiotic claim that they are exclusive to each. I emotionally empathize with my brother AND strangers. I understand the POV of my sister AND people I've never met. It's all one thing called empathy. Nothing you posted addresses any of that. That's what happens when you can't comprehend the points being made.

Where did I supposedly say they were "exclusive to each", hypocritical buffoon?
And yes, imbecile, you claiming that "there's only one empathy" certainly does appear to contradict that there are two widely accepted types of empathy. Are you now agreeing there are, indeed, two types of empathy? O_o
If so, it's about goddamn time.
I said the difference between ingroup and outgroup empathy is largely mediated by affective and cognitive empathy. "Largely" is not exclusive, but we all know your propensity for straw men and reading things that aren't there (must be a package deal with seeing ghosts and UFOs).
Of course you emotionally empathize with family and strangers. The point is that you have a stronger emotional bond with family, and that many studies have shown that this correlates to greater ingroup favoritism. Cognitive empathy has not been shown to favor the ingroup. To the contrary, a better understanding of theory of mind is what is necessary to counteract ingroup favoritism in order to encourage outgroup empathy.

Quote:

Quote:What's sad is your pathetic need to attempt emotional barbs that never land.
And that you seem to be implying your parents withheld praise and love for you not doing something as inconsequential as sharing. That is downright heartbreaking, and I truly pity the childhood you must have had. Cry Explains a lot though.

LOL! Where did I claim that? Quote it or admit you're lying again.

Who said you claimed anything? O_o
I'm just surmising from the fact that you would even posit the example. That a parent would withhold love for a child not sharing is so far beyond my experience that I wouldn't even pose it as hypothetical. That you get defensive seems telling.

Quote:

Quote:Go look, deary....you started the insults. If you can't take it....
The fact that you're suddenly making an issue of it tells me you're lying about its effect on you. So which is it...alcohol or cocaine? I'm going to assume the latter, since you didn't pipe up when I mentioned alcohol earlier.

You do indeed assume alot of things I have neither said nor implied. What is wrong with you? Do you think ad homing me means you win the argument?

Again, you started the ad homs, so you're either a bald-faced hypocrite or just projecting.
Not to mention you're deflecting the question.

Quote:Who said you claimed anything? O_o
I'm just surmising from the fact that you would even posit the example. That a parent would withhold love for a child not sharing is so far beyond my experience that I wouldn't even pose it as hypothetical. That you get defensive seems telling.

So iow it's just more shit you made up like that ingroup empathy and outgroup empathy distinction. I should've guessed that. You pretty much live in your own little fantasy world. Enjoy it while lasts.