People do sometimes write LW posts about things that aren’t, like… serious problems in their own personal lives.
I felt like the post was written in a tone describing a personal issue. And if this is not a personal issue for OP and they have some easy way of dealing with it, that seems like a weird thing to omit from the post.
I don’t really know why so many commenters are talking about things like a “psychological need to have people to feel empathy towards”. Where does OP talk about having any such thing…?
That was pure inference on my part. I do think having people to feel empathy towards makes me happier. I felt sad when I was grappling with similar questions years ago as OP, and I had to accept that I won’t be able to feel empathy towards most people, I should just model them as part of the external world, and not try to imagine myself in their place.
If OP has some other reason for wanting to empathize with people, I would like to know, because I can’t really imagine other important reasons.
I felt like the post was written in a tone describing a personal issue.
That was not my reading.
And if this is not a personal issue for OP and they have some easy way of dealing with it, that seems like a weird thing to omit from the post.
What do you mean by this…? What’s to “deal with”? OP describes, as I said, a pattern, and comments on that pattern. I don’t see that anything has been omitted.
I do think having people to feel empathy towards makes me happier. I felt sad when I was grappling with similar questions years ago as OP, and I had to accept that I won’t be able to feel empathy towards most people, I should just model them as part of the external world, and not try to imagine myself in their place.
If OP has some other reason for wanting to empathize with people, I would like to know, because I can’t really imagine other important reasons.
Ok, now this is actually really weird. You’re saying that the only reason you can think of to want to feel empathy toward other people… is to make yourself happier…?
Or am I misunderstanding something?
In any case, OP does not say anything about “wanting to empathize with people”, as far as I can tell. There is this line, at the end:
But subject to that constraint [of becoming stronger rather than weaker, and not lowering standards], I would certainly like better ways of relating to people.
But it seems like the whole point of the post is to rebut the presumption that this must necessarily involve “more empathy” or any such thing.
Ok, now this is actually really weird. You’re saying that the only reason you can think of to want to feel empathy toward other people… is to make yourself happier…?
I do most things in my life to try to make myself happier. (And I think this is the revealed preference of most people, even if they don’t admit it, because being seen as “selfish” is sometimes socially not tolerated well.)
(But I don’t have a fully fleshed out moral philosophy, and I would not feel confident in asserting that “I do everything only to make myself happier”. E.g. I do notice myself being nicer to people in general than what would naively be predicted under the “100% selfish” model.)
I felt like the post was written in a tone describing a personal issue. And if this is not a personal issue for OP and they have some easy way of dealing with it, that seems like a weird thing to omit from the post.
That was pure inference on my part. I do think having people to feel empathy towards makes me happier. I felt sad when I was grappling with similar questions years ago as OP, and I had to accept that I won’t be able to feel empathy towards most people, I should just model them as part of the external world, and not try to imagine myself in their place.
If OP has some other reason for wanting to empathize with people, I would like to know, because I can’t really imagine other important reasons.
That was not my reading.
What do you mean by this…? What’s to “deal with”? OP describes, as I said, a pattern, and comments on that pattern. I don’t see that anything has been omitted.
Ok, now this is actually really weird. You’re saying that the only reason you can think of to want to feel empathy toward other people… is to make yourself happier…?
Or am I misunderstanding something?
In any case, OP does not say anything about “wanting to empathize with people”, as far as I can tell. There is this line, at the end:
But it seems like the whole point of the post is to rebut the presumption that this must necessarily involve “more empathy” or any such thing.
I do most things in my life to try to make myself happier. (And I think this is the revealed preference of most people, even if they don’t admit it, because being seen as “selfish” is sometimes socially not tolerated well.)
(But I don’t have a fully fleshed out moral philosophy, and I would not feel confident in asserting that “I do everything only to make myself happier”. E.g. I do notice myself being nicer to people in general than what would naively be predicted under the “100% selfish” model.)