Shared Belief and the Limits of Empathy

Simon Keller (Victoria University of Wellington)

(This paper is co-authored by Monika Betzler and Simon Keller, and will be presented by Simon Keller).

To empathize with another person is to share in her feelings or emotions. Emotions involve ways of seeing the world; fear of cats, for example, involves seeing cats as dangerous. To empathize with another person is, in part, to see the world as she sees it. Empathy, as a result, often places rational pressure upon beliefs; if I empathize with your fear of cats, then I come under rational pressure to believe that cats are dangerous. The connection between empathy and belief has far-reaching consequences for several debates about the moral and epistemic roles of empathy. Empathy carries distinctive epistemic dangers along with its epistemic benefits; there can be good reasons to avoid empathy; there are epistemic barriers to our ability truly to empathize with others, even those very close to us; the ideal of universal empathy is incoherent; and empathy cannot plausibly be taken to be the basis of morality.