Can Aspies develop empathy?

Page 4 of 5 [ 77 posts ] Go to page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Next

Previous topic | Next topic

johnnyh
Deinonychus

Joined: 26 Jun 2016
Age: 30
Gender: Male
Posts: 328

11 Sep 2016, 6:51 am

Amaltheia wrote:

johnnyh wrote:

I hope I have enlightened some of you!

Well, since you're here to enlighten us, perhaps you could explain something to me.

johnnyh wrote:

Empathy is the ability to put yourself in another person's shoes

When they say "put yourself in another person's shoes" do they mean:
A) imaginatively put yourself in their position and circumstances to see how you would feel and then project that feeling onto them?
or
B) imaginatively put yourself in their position and adopt a persona based on what you know about them to infer how they feel about it and then check with them to see if the inference is correct?

Based on my observations, most of the time when people talk about empathy they mean A. The empathy they display is most effective when dealing with people most like themselves and quickly breaks down as differences in culture and experience multiply. It certainly doesn't seem to be able to work across any neurological differences — otherwise they would presumably stop treating autistics the way they do.

If anything, I would describe A as just a form of narcissistic projection.

By contrast, when people do B, asking questions to check if their inferences are correct — which would seem to be a prerequisite for actually understanding what someone else is feeling — is labeled as showing a lack of empathy, implying that empathy is a form of knowing that requires no verification.

All this, I must admit, somewhat confuses me.

Any explanations that can help clear that up would be most welcome.

Neither, empathy is an automatic process requiring no conscious thinking. Their are processes in the brain dedicated to social interaction that we cannot use properly. Facial recognition as an example requires a separate part of the brain than recognizing objects, but some autistic when they see a face use the object recognition and has to consciously determine who they are looking at.

_________________
I want to apologize to the entire forum. I have been a terrible person, very harsh and critical.
I still hold many of my views, but I will tone down my anger and stop being so bigoted and judgmental. I can't possibly know how you see things and will stop thinking I know everything you all think.

-Johnnyh

Amaltheia
Snowy Owl

Joined: 18 Apr 2016
Age: 64
Gender: Male
Posts: 154
Location: Adelaide, South Australia

11 Sep 2016, 7:26 am

johnnyh wrote:

Neither, empathy is an automatic process requiring no conscious thinking.

So, neurotypicals just automatically know what other people are feeling and this is an innate feature, much like seeing or hearing. Is that correct?

If that's the case, then doesn't it mean that many neurotypical people are vicious sadists? I mean, when interacting with neurotypicals I always worked on the presumption they didn't know how I felt or responded to various things (loud noises, being touched unexpectedly, etc.), or assumed that my reactions would be just like theirs, and so they were acting in ignorance. However, if you're saying they all have this feature that allows them to know exactly how I feel about such things as I'm feeling them, then that means they were engaging in deliberate torture.

I'm not sure I like this idea. It's more than a little discomforting. I guess that I was just adopting a comforting illusion by assuming that people didn't have an innate sense of how others felt and had to make an effort to understand, so that most of the mean and nasty behaviour was due to thoughtlessness and ignorance.

Do you have any advice on how to best adapt to living in a world of vicious sadists, who know exactly what sort of pain and suffering they are causing, but who apparently just don't care?

johnnyh
Deinonychus

Joined: 26 Jun 2016
Age: 30
Gender: Male
Posts: 328

11 Sep 2016, 7:42 am

Amaltheia wrote:

johnnyh wrote:

Neither, empathy is an automatic process requiring no conscious thinking.

The system in the brain isn't perfect, when they see you are upset they can tell you are upset but sometimes do not care, that is true for a lot of people whether NT or not. Maybe it is hard to explain but science doesn't lie. When NTs engage in facial recognition they use their frontal lobe and amygdala while autistics use other parts of their brain mainly for object recognition. Sadist anyway is the wrong word, jerk is better, anyone can be a jerk. Also this system of empathy may be only tuned for neurotypicals, a computer can connect to another computer, but it cannot connect to a buggy computer. This "pre-programmed ability" with "empathy" and "ability to read" may only work on other neurotypicals by default unless they extend it (which if someone doesn't know about the existence of autism won't do).

Amaltheia
Snowy Owl

Joined: 18 Apr 2016
Age: 64
Gender: Male
Posts: 154
Location: Adelaide, South Australia

11 Sep 2016, 8:18 am

johnnyh wrote:

The system in the brain isn't perfect, when they see you are upset they can tell you are upset but sometimes do not care, that is true for a lot of people whether NT or not.

Isn't not caring referred to as "lacking empathy"? The terminology here seems a tad confused.

johnnyh wrote:

Also this system of empathy may be only tuned for neurotypicals, a computer can connect to another computer, but it cannot connect to a buggy computer. This "pre-programmed ability" with "empathy" and "ability to read" may only work on other neurotypicals by default unless they extend it (which if someone doesn't know about the existence of autism won't do).

Well, if neurtypicals have an empathy system only tuned for other neurotypicals — rather than for other members of the species in general — then maybe autistics have an empathy system tuned only for other autistics, so expecting them to have empathy for neurotypicals is unreasonable. It's just demanding a one-way street in terms of communication.

What do the brain scans show? What areas light up when people use empathy? And what are the differences between what areas light up depending on who the brain being observed is trying to empathize with?

And for what it's worth, most computers can only directly connect to similar computers — PC to PC, Mac to Mac, etc. To connect to a different type of computer, they need some sort of translator. The analogy works better for narcissistic projection than for empathy as you've described it.

Jayo
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 31 Jan 2011
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,309

11 Sep 2016, 11:05 am

You know, as the original poster of this subject, I can't help but wonder if the brain imaging studies that prompted the whole discussion were biased in some way, like what if they got some subject who was really withdrawn, misanthropic, etc, with little desire to connect to other humans or was so put off by their "world". The imaging study doesn't really take an "averaging out" of a sample of Aspies, at least, it doesn't present itself that way. There are other variables that need to be taken into account, like what was the life experience of the subject, or their determination or intellect or support, did they have a good psychologist and understanding family, etc. Clearly, those things could influence brain activity beyond the raw Aspie mind-state. It's almost like you would have to conduct some sort of multivariate statistical regression analysis or something! There are extreme outliers, like try to compare the brain patterns of someone like Adam Lanza, versus someone like John Elder Robison. And who knows what kind of subject they got for their study?? Don't let it discourage you.

thumbhole
Sea Gull

Joined: 5 Feb 2014
Age: 45
Gender: Female
Posts: 230

11 Sep 2016, 1:49 pm

Amaltheia wrote:

No, they don't automatically know what others are feeling. What you describe would be telepathy.

But it's true that a lot of them do indeed seem to be sadists.

Quote:

Do you have any advice on how to best adapt to living in a world of vicious sadists, who know exactly what sort of pain and suffering they are causing, but who apparently just don't care?

My coping strategy is to isolate myself and stay away from them. Being totally alone can get lonely, but being lonely in peace and harmony is infinitely preferable to being in the company of vicious sadistic bullies.

ToughDiamond
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 15 Sep 2008
Age: 73
Gender: Male
Posts: 14,534

11 Sep 2016, 2:30 pm

Amaltheia wrote:

Isn't not caring referred to as "lacking empathy"? The terminology here seems a tad confused.

The terminology, and the entire subject, is indeed nebulous. The word "empathy" has multiple definitions, which is a confounding factor in any attempt to discuss it. The word itself is absent from the DSM-V criteria for ASD. Research suggests a lot of things about the subject, but it's all very arguable and the research has given plenty of paradoxes. "Lack of empathy" is sometimes taken as synonymous with antisocial behaviour and failure to care about others, and some researchers seem to think they know as a scientific fact that ASDers (tend to) have their empathy impaired, so it's probably not surprising that it can be a thorny and controversial issue to discuss. Whatever anybody states about ASD and empathy, there's also likely to be some truth in the converse statement. Anybody who says they know what's going on, they probably don't.

Amaltheia
Snowy Owl

Joined: 18 Apr 2016
Age: 64
Gender: Male
Posts: 154
Location: Adelaide, South Australia

11 Sep 2016, 8:16 pm

thumbhole wrote:

Amaltheia wrote:

So, neurotypicals just automatically know what other people are feeling and this is an innate feature, much like seeing or hearing. Is that correct?

No, they don't automatically know what others are feeling. What you describe would be telepathy.

johnnyh wrote:

empathy is an automatic process requiring no conscious thinking.

So, it's automatic.

johnnyh wrote:

Empathy is the ability to put yourself in another person's shoes or to recognize what another person is feeling based on cues.

And it involves knowledge of what other people are feeling.

Ergo: automatically know what other people are feeling

The problem is that the claims made for empathy are such that it indeed comes across as a form of telepathy. This strikes me as unlikely, but given that I apparently don't have this faculty, I lack the authority to say those claims are wrong. All I can do is point out that is that if other people do, in fact, possess this faculty, they employ it in very restricted and selective manner. A version of tunnel vision, as it were.

ToughDiamond wrote:

The terminology, and the entire subject, is indeed nebulous.

You'd think that if they're going to use the term as a diagnostic criteria, they would come up with a precise technical definition, if only to, you know, ensure consistency in diagnosis.

johnnyh
Deinonychus

Joined: 26 Jun 2016
Age: 30
Gender: Male
Posts: 328

12 Sep 2016, 4:09 am

http://www.dana.org/Publications/Brainw ... x?id=43551

What's this mean to you guys?

auntblabby
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Feb 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 115,251
Location: the island of defective toy santas

12 Sep 2016, 4:21 am

^^^it makes sense to me. :idea:

Joe90
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 23 Feb 2010
Gender: Female
Posts: 26,492
Location: UK

12 Sep 2016, 11:07 am

I do hate these empathy threads.

_________________
Female

auntblabby
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Feb 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 115,251
Location: the island of defective toy santas

12 Sep 2016, 6:37 pm

why?

johnnyh
Deinonychus

Joined: 26 Jun 2016
Age: 30
Gender: Male
Posts: 328

12 Sep 2016, 10:32 pm

Not many people bring in science into these threads, its all speculation or armchair psychology, barely a drop of psychiatry and neuroscience. Empathy is not referring to any unique state of mind but a human ability that occurs from processes in the brain one that is key to human survival, even moreso in our earliest days. You can debate all you want but brain scans show the stuff that goes on does not go on as efficiently with us. We have consciences and the capacity for compassion and sympathy, but empathy is hindered in this sense, just imagine if it were true for a second and that there is nothing wrong with wanting to have more.

auntblabby
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Feb 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 115,251
Location: the island of defective toy santas

12 Sep 2016, 10:40 pm

in a Darwinian sense, how would the empathy deficit have helped us in caveman days?

Joe90
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 23 Feb 2010
Gender: Female
Posts: 26,492
Location: UK

13 Sep 2016, 2:54 am

auntblabby wrote:

why?

Because everybody seems to have a different definition of empathy and some definitions imply that empathy means "caring, understanding, considerate and respectful" and also "treat others how you like to be treated", which completely contradicts how nearly every Aspie here gets treated by NTs. (Not every NT, but the people who have bullied us and the people who make us feel insecure are mostly NT people).

_________________
Female

auntblabby
Veteran
Veteran

Joined: 12 Feb 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 115,251
Location: the island of defective toy santas

13 Sep 2016, 3:04 am

Joe90 wrote:

auntblabby wrote:

why?

thank you for that explanation :study:

I just try to ignore the NTs unless I am forced to pay attention to them. my only social interactions are with my quasi-aspie sister, brother, and my aspie group, other than WP.

Page 4 of 5 [ 77 posts ] Go to page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Next

Jump to:

Can Aspies develop empathy? Post Reply New Topic

Can Aspies develop empathy?