This was fantastic. I think perhaps, what is needed in his definition of empathy, was the idea that an empathetic person not only imagines themselves in the other’s position, he not only “knows” and resonates with the other person, but desires the circumstances, the space, for that other person to become fully human. This would make a clear demarcation between someone who is a life promoting empath and someone who is a dark empath. Clearly we need another name for the kind of empathy that simply feels what another person is feeling, as it can be used either to manipulate to the other’s demise, or self-soothe within the comfort of inaction, while the suffering continues. Empathy needs to be defined by its resultant effect on the humanity of the other person. Just as the empath imagines himself from the point of view of the other, the definition must be from the point of view of the other. To define empathy from the point of view of self, seems to be the crux of the problem and the very definition of self-defeat.
I would say that Ethics, Morality, Justice, Compassion, and Empathy may be discussed without referring to Religion and to God and one may keep the discussion to a secular one. Even in a secular state, this issue is still very complex as every human individual has a body and mind which can operate at diverse levels and grades, and so not every individual would be able to process and interpret and operate at the same level within these qualities. If a person is almost deaf, then he will never be able to appreciate that other people can suffer from the music being played at high volume at 2am when others need to sleep, He will never understand how sensitive others are around him. If we assume a perfectly healthy body with perfectly sensitive and selective sensors to pick up external information, then it is the capacity of the " mind memory bank" and the "mind processing bank" which will decide at what level the human mind can operate to reach a conclusion on how he feels about the state of the situation around him. If one person has 10 memory units and the other has 100 memory units, even if they both own and had gained the Kernels of life's experience with which to compare the incoming information, the person with 10 memory units cannot ever handle a situation where the new information needs more than 10 memory units holding capacity, before the mind procession analysis on it would start. The same would happen if the processing capacity of two persons has not reached the same level of activity. One preacher, preaching to a group of people could not ever expect an equal outcome from all members of the audience. Regarding the formation of Ethics, this can come about due to how people can react to the sensation of pain and pleasure. If the body sensors are calibrated by evolution and inheritance, to detect a level of pain, the human memory bank will hold that while the processing bank will work on it regarding the source that caused the pain, relative to the level of pain and the consequences to the body and to the inner emotions. Once a person experiences pain, that person has added a new Kernel that describes pain and its consequences, and the processing mind would conclude that one should not conduct the activity that causes the pain to others. An equivalent Kernel relation is set up if the sensation was that of pleasure. It is this combination of sensing and memorizing and processing pain and pleasure that would build the Ethics and Morality that enable a group of people living in the wild, to stay together build their shelters, their protections, and raise and share their food. Having a higher memory bank and a higher processing capacity, emphaty, compassion, and consciousness would also follow. If Jesus, as a human, suffered flagellation and crucifixion, then he would have felt and experienced the most painful Kernels there are in this world, and so he would be in a position to know the levels of the sufferings of others. It is said that a doctor cannot know the suffering of his patient as long as he does not have his ailment. Some say that no man can know the suffering of childbirth as he is not a mother! Staying discussing the issues of Ethics and Empathy on a secular basis, a person with long experiences of pain and pleasure backed by a perfectly functioning body and mind with enough memory and processing capacity can reach a stage when that person can live happily with a similar person, till one of them does not evolve with a distorting body and mind to influence his conclusion to become a FANATIC with an unstable mind. The human mind can also be distorted, by drugs, drinks, being tired, propaganda, and art and emotional materials. Two persons listening to Adolf Hitler would follow a path depending on their own characteristics. One could have a lower level of mental processing abilities and so he would be impressed by Hitler and could eagerly go to join the Nazi SS party, while the other with a higher processing capacity would see through Hitler and would detect that the orator Hitler was sick in the mind and would find a way to escape this influence. If God is permitted to enter the discussion then it is the body and mind capacity of the human individual that will eventually select the God that is needed to take part in the discussion and the solution. I personally feel that Jesus referred to the Energy around him as "His Father" and so Jesus was his son. Hence we are all made in the image of God. This was the Energy God that Albert Einstein meant in the equation E= mc^2, This was also Baruch Spinoza's God as nature and the universe. It was also James Clerk Maxwell's God Electromagnetic energy that travels as Curl ( Electric) = - d( magnetic)/dt where three separate phenomena join into one as (E field) cross ( M field )= Power. where E field and Mfiled and Power are three in one energy phenomena. Jesus did say," I am a son of God" and not, " I am the only (son) of God" The pain we discussed to conclude on Ethics and Morals and Empathy was related to the mass of the human body, which when we all die, we will all resurrect from mass to energy according to Albert Einstein's God where E= mc^2. the Energy that existed since time began. The " other God" is a derivate or an integral function of the God that Einstein , Spinoza and Maxwell and Faraday and Merz, and Tesla spoke about. We shall talk about the " other God" who created the energy E , some other time.
