Social Empathy

One of the ways that might help to clarify the critical commonsense and "process" learning type is to look at contributions in society.

I'm thoroughly convinced that what I'm saying here is not new. My guess is that in sociology and psychology there are many attempts at explaining it. I hope that in the context of CCS what I'm saying is at least unique enough to help with clarity, if not wisdom.

I am generally considered a sociopath or a narcissist by rote thinkers. It pretty much happens everyday. I am considered this because I don't devote enough mental energy to individual people's needs. Whether they want advice, attention, affirmation, or just what they call "empathy," the end result in their minds is that I don't do enough.

What is individual empathy? It is when one person is concerned (roughly coined altruism) with another's wants and needs. What this concern (with individual needs, individual empathy) does not address very often is whether or not this empathy in the specific sense is warranted. Is this particular request for empathy good or bad. It is generally considered warranted (at least by the person requesting the empathy) if they want it. It does not often ask of an objective verification. "Just show me sympathy here even if you think my anxiety is irrational. It is my empathy. If you care about me and empathize, you will do so based on my need, not your evaluation of the particular need in a moral sense."

(Two notes here: One, most people, speaking this last quote, would not know to use those words or sentence structure. They would say something less coherent. And two, this problem is Ayn Rand's life work. It is the summation of her critique of the world socially and as is was defined by the altruist moral axiom).

But what if I told you that individual empathy is very difficult to objectivize? Even if you saw the importance in determining the worth of the request (please give me my crack!) this determination would be difficult. What if I told you that the value of a person is their social empathy?

What is social empathy in a critical sense? We cannot confuse it with individual empathy or religion and still remain philosophical. Why? Because our current social and moral language is built to simplify and obscure great questions to the extent that they become different. What if we REALLY ask what social empathy is?

Social empathy is the application of process methods (as they are defined by CCS and the synergism of stoic history) to the conception of "world" as connected and complex.

Again, we have to be careful of words like "connected" because they have meanings in the rote woo-woo world of nonsense as something other than critical.

If truth is shared, so is morality.

When Socrates heard his sentencing he said, and of course I paraphrase, I don't agree with this particular law or its application, but I have a greater commitment to the rule of law in the Greek society in which I belong. Therefore, I accept the consequences.

Why did Socrates do this to the dismay of his adherents? He did this because he saw value in the social contract and he knew that it was greater than his individual needs. He did not do this for one person and it was actually against the advice of his best friends. The reason he was sentenced in the first place, by the way, is because half the Greek people (or maybe half) believed he didn't value or empathize with their individual needs.

The result? He was put to death. That's the down-side. The up-side of his "correct" choice is that stoic Western philosophy was invented.

When I drive I look behind me in the mirror. I see the asshole coming too fast or turning in the wrong spot or tailgating. In a specific sense, what they are doing is objectively wrong and the asshole deserves to be run off the road. But in a general social sense, my participation in society and in the world of logic and reason, dictates that I adhere to general rules. One of these is to speed up on a one-lane road. So I do. But this is not the thing. The thing that becomes social thinking is the looking in the mirror in the first place. The urge to consider. What I see these morons doing instead of looking around them while driving is playing on their phones. The truth is apparent when they do this and sit at a green light and then drive off oblivious. It is not that they sat at a green light. It is that once they realize they sat at a green light they don't know they did anything wrong. The mistake served their individual needs and they are wholly unaware of a social need. They smile and keep texting. If you flip them off they are incredulous. And then you become the bad guy.

So who is the bad guy here? Me for not caring about individual needs or for the majority of the world, the rote thinkers, pretending to care about individual requests for sympathy uncritically? Who was at fault in ancient Greece? Socrates for pissing off the lawyers who wanted affirmation from the great genius or the lawyers pretending to know things about philosophy.

To know morality in a critical way is to become a great judger. It is also to become a great teacher. Combine judgment with reasoned consideration and you have process. Process if nothing else is the art of teaching. Teaching is the art of socializing.

The reason Howard Roark was so great at helping and teaching people is because his great achievement was not individual empathy but the greatest move of a social thinker, the expansion of unique self-defined process philosophy. When I spend the time to become great, the world reaps the benefit. When you donate to a charity you have $25 less in your bank account.

I include this last paragraph as Shaftesbury might to irk the rote. Please note that I am aware of that … socially. And I have no problem flipping them off.