Affective empathy as core moral agency: psychopathy, autism and reason revisited

Abstract

Empathy has become a common point of debate in moral psychology. Recent developments in psychiatry, neurosciences and social psychology have led to the revival of sentimentalism, and the ‘empathy thesis’ has suggested that affective empathy, in particular, is a necessary criterion of moral agency. The case of psychopaths – individuals incapable of affective empathy and moral agency, yet capable of rationality – has been utilised in support of this case. Critics, however, have been vocal. They have asserted that the case of autism proves the empathy thesis wrong; that psychopathy centres on rational rather than empathic limitations; that empathy is not relevant to many common normative behaviours; and that rationality is required when empathy fails. The present paper analyses these four criticisms. It will be claimed that they each face severe difficulties, and that moral agency ought to be approached via a multi-tier model, with affective empathy as a baseline.

Keywords:

• empathy
• affective empathy
• moral agency
• sentimentalism
• moral psychology

Notes on contributor

Elisa Aaltola works as a senior lecturer in philosophy at the University of Eastern Finland. She has published previously on environmental and animal philosophy, and her most recent publications include Animal Suffering: Philosophy and Culture (Palgrave MacMillan 2012). She is currently working on a book on empathy and moral agency.

Notes

1 Some seek to combine the cognitive and affective strands of empathy. For instance, Baron-Cohen maintains that empathy means the ability to identify with the experiences of others, and to respond to those experiences with an appropriate emotion (2011).

2. A further distinction concerns emotional contagion or ‘simulation’, wherein one instantly imitates the emotive states of others (see Gordon 1995).

3. ‘Rationality’ and ‘reason’ are used interchangeably in this paper. They are defined broadly as neutral, logical analyses which make use of valid reasons and seek to facilitate optimal choice. Crucially, they are detached from emotion and empathy.

4. The choice of term here is a matter of some contention; however, it can be argued that if indeed psychopaths fall outside the category of ‘moral agency’, they are amoral.

5. Vignemont and Frith argue that, although autistic individuals are capable of detecting emotion, their focus is on normative rules rather than emotion. Indeed, they may have difficulty in linking the two together (2008).

6. As long as it does not involve comprehension of intent, which would require theory-of-mind capacities unavailable to autistic individuals (Blair 2008).

7. It is here presumed that inference requires rationality and that cognitive empathy dependent on inference is thereby also dependent on rationality. It should be noted that lack of the affective component may also hinder rational ability; however, since this ability is evidently not lacking in psychopathy, such a link does not undermine the empathy thesis.

8. Here Maibom refers to studies by, for instance, R. Hare and R. Blair.

9. Importantly, these problems appear to be, at least partly, related to emotional defects. For instance, language used by psychopaths can be rigid, because they avoid the use of affective words (Söderström 2003; see also Kiehl 2006).

10. However, callousness is linked to low cognition. In consequence, studies on the links between intellectual ability and psychopathy have been somewhat inconsistent. Indeed, psychopathy may fall into different subtypes, differentiated from each other by related intellectual ability (Fontaine et al. 2008).

11. Indeed, studies show that one's moral ability can be severely impaired even when cognitive ability is perfectly normal (Oliveira-Souza, Hare, and Bramati 2008).

12. As pointed out to me by one of the reviewers of this paper, cognitive empathy alone may fail to make sense of many aspects of the moral agency of others; therefore its explanatory power faces clear limitations.

13. This form of empathy has, in fact, been acknowledged for some time; already Stein spoke of the ‘reflexive sympathy’ that takes place ‘when I empathically comprehend the acts in which my individual is constituted for him [the other person]’ (1989, 88).

14. An important issue, noted by one of the reviewers of this paper, is: why do we assume what the hypothetical observer would think of us? It is suggested here that even if empathy plays a constitutional role, also norms fulfil an important function: empathy helps us to create norms, but those norms also further direct that empathy. Therefore, in re-iterated empathy one would, in many cases, presume a set of shared norms as a background, and hence perceive the hypothetical observer as someone who would condemn given types of behaviour.

15. As suggested by one of the reviewers of this paper, it is precisely because of the same effect that one can empathise with the harm related to loss of life.