Category: philosophical counseling
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Some very awkward truths about empathy
In the last handful of posts, I have sought to demonstrate some rather uncomfortable and infelicitous things about our near-universal celebration of empathy. One is that it is based on a false metaphysical picture of human beings as weak, suffering creatures. Another is that it has been raised from a ‘local virtue’ into an ascetic ideal, with the…
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Being virtuous without being empathetic
So far, I have argued (1) that the ascetic ideal of empathy has sprung forth from a false metaphysical picture of human beings as weak, suffering creatures and (2) that it leads to the conclusion that when we speak, we not do often lodge claims that can be examined with a view to changing our basic conceptions…
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Empathy as an ascetic ideal
Why would empathy not be a supreme virtue? By ’empathy,’ I mean what most laypersons mean: either feeling what another is badly feeling or acknowledging what the other is badly feeling. By ‘supreme virtue,’ I mean the virtue of virtues, one that is ripped free of context and raised to a principle. That principle would…
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Philosophical portraiture: ‘What the eyes cannot see’
In Aleksandra’s recently completed philosophical portrait (visible below), the man exhibits soft concentration while the woman exudes a soft composure attained through experience and contemplative practice. Both appear to be thinking together about the non-discursive. The allusion in the title is to an early Daoist text called Inward Training. In Verse 4, the authors write, As for the Way: It…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 
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