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A review by dkrane
Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion by Paul Bloom
2.0
tl;dr empathy—the act of feeling what another person is feeling—has distorting influences and is an unwieldy spotlight that doesn't work as well for issues of morality as rational compassion.
Can't say I disagree there—I've been sold on a decent amount of the import of effective altruism/consequentialist thought from books like Larissa MacFarquar's brilliant "Strangers Drowning". But Bloom is a tad too discursive, with logical loops that left me lost at times, particularly in thinking through the importance of empathy in intimate relationships (and the relationship to cognitive empathy, or the ability to understand what other people are thinking, something he is much less critical of.) Have no idea what he'd think about the ramifications of his work for art.
Broader points about grounding policy in argument and not in stories is worthwhile food for thought.
Can't say I disagree there—I've been sold on a decent amount of the import of effective altruism/consequentialist thought from books like Larissa MacFarquar's brilliant "Strangers Drowning". But Bloom is a tad too discursive, with logical loops that left me lost at times, particularly in thinking through the importance of empathy in intimate relationships (and the relationship to cognitive empathy, or the ability to understand what other people are thinking, something he is much less critical of.) Have no idea what he'd think about the ramifications of his work for art.
Broader points about grounding policy in argument and not in stories is worthwhile food for thought.