Darrell
If I represent the ignorant segment of society that doesn't understand empathic
thinking, then I can only assume you represent the segment that's poor at
articulating it.
But besides an ad hominem rejoinder to yours (something I swore off long ago),
I do have something constructive to say.
Wading through the idiosyncratic vocabulary I'm unfamiliar with, as far as I
can see, empathic thinking looks to be fairly closely aligned to what Rorty
called an ironist stance towards vocabularies. Since the archives are down
I'll reprint two sections that talk about what I'd already wrote on the
subject:
>
> Rorty believes that "the self is a centerless web of beliefs and
> desires. This web includes a set of words which they employ to justify
> their actions, their beliefs, and their lives. These are the words in which
> we formulate praise of our friends and contempt of our enemies, our
> long-term projects, our deepest self-doubts and our highest hopes. They are
> the words in which we tell, sometimes prospectively and sometimes
> retrospectively, the story of our lives. I shall call these words a
> persons final vocabulary." (from Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity)
>
> In dealing with
> final vocabularies, Rorty describes two kinds of people: metaphysicians and
> ironists. An ironist (1) "has radical and continuing doubts about the
> final vocabulary she currently uses, because she has been impressed by
> other vocabularies, vocabularies taken as final by people or books she has
> encountered; (2) she realizes that argument phrased in her present
> vocabulary can neither underwrite nor dissolve these doubts; (3) insofar as
> she philosophizes about her situation, she does not think that her
> vocabulary is closer to reality than others, that it is in touch with a
> power not herself." (Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity) The opposite of
> irony is common sense and common sense is the watchword of metaphysicians.
> Metaphysicians take terms in their final vocabulary as refering to
> something real that has an essence. They see the word "truth" in their
> final vocabulary and assume it must refer to something real and essential.
> The ironist sees words in her final vocabulary as contingent to the
> language games she learned as she grew up.
So, it would seem to me, that empathy, as a process of thinking, is the
"impressedness" an ironist feels towards other vocabularies. It is closely
related to dialogic thinking (which runs on the playing off of terms on one
another) and "copia" thinking (thinking that is fueled by a multitude of
descriptions rich in detail and variation).
Indeed, I can only agree when you say that "consciousness is a communications
process," insofar as we communicate with ourselves and we communicate with
others. We are constantly in communication with ourselves, reinforcing our
beliefs, convincing ourselves that they are true, and in communication of
others, either reinforcing our beliefs or contesting them. A metaphysician
doesn't waiver from his final vocabulary, while an ironist appreciates and
empathizes with other people's vocabularies, picking and choosing the parts
that she likes best (here's that aestheticism, Platt, if you're reading this
strand).
But, this is only what I could gather from your post. Reading your post
without guessing at the general drift would leave me blind on the subject, for
you never really gave a description of what empathic thinking is, other than
its manifestation with our interactions with others. You say a lot of things
in the past two posts about what empathy does and the problems it evades, but
nothing on what empathy, and specifically empathic thinking as a process,
actually is. If you could supply a little bit more on what empathic thinking
looks like, maybe I would be more likely to pick it up in my own final
vocabulary.
Matt
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