Empathy and Altruism

(To appear in The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Empathy; ed. by Heidi Maibom)

Thomas Schramme

Introduction

Altruism is the opposite of egoism. In a philosophical context altruism and egoism are

regularly discussed as contrasting theories regarding the ultimate motivation of human

behavior. Psychological egoism claims that any conduct, even if on the surface it

promotes the welfare of others, can ultimately be traced back to the motive of promoting

an agent's self-interest. Altruism is hence not a reality, according to psychological

egoism. Once the debate is reduced to such a contrast, focusing on ultimate motives of

human conduct, important theoretical decisions have been made that then also affect the

discussion around the impact of empathy on altruism. Even where psychological egoism

is rejected, discussions are aligned along the problem whether a person's motive is to

benefit or increase the welfare of another person.

But altruism need not be reduced to its opposition to egoism. In this chapter, altruism is

discussed as a psychological basis for moral conduct more generally, not just in terms of

motivations to benefit others. Here, altruism stands for the capacity to take the moral

point of view and to be disposed to act accordingly. It is argued that empathy indeed

might have an important role in the development and maintenance of such a disposition.

The chapter sets out to provide, first, a conceptual landscape regarding the notion of

altruism. It seems obvious that only on the basis of conceptual precision it is possible to

eventually query the significance of empathy for altruism. We will draw several

important distinctions, most importantly between psychological, behavioral, and

biological altruism. For the purposes of philosophical debate in moral theory the

psychological perspective is the most relevant.

Second, I will introduce two kinds of explanations of the relation between empathy and

altruism. Descriptive theories aim to explain empathy's causal contribution to altruism,

either in individual instantiations of altruistic motivation or in developmental terms,

regarding the maturation of an altruistic disposition as aspect of the personality of a

person. This is mainly the perspective of psychologists. Normative theories of altruism,

which are discussed in philosophy, are usually laid out in terms of a theory of practical

reason. Again, empathy might play a role in accounting for reasons for action. Several

examples of these kinds of explanations are briefly introduced.

Finally, some objections to linking empathy and altruism are critically examined. We will

see that many of these objections are based on particular conceptions of the relevant

terms, which are only of limited interest to the psychological account of the capacity for

altruism. Because these objections therefore miss the target set in this chapter, they do

not undermine the claim that empathy has a significant role for altruism.

Throughout the chapter it will become obvious that an important problem of a

straightforward discussion regarding the relation between empathy and altruism is due

to a widespread confusion over the relevant terms. Before determining the role of

empathy in altruism and morality, we must therefore get a clear grasp of the conceptual

landscape.

Altruism as taking the moral point of view

Moral demands often oppose our own self-concerned desires. We are regularly required

to do, or to refrain from doing, certain acts, which we would like to (not) do, as a matter

of morality. Since self-concerned desires can be called egoistic, the demands of morality

can be described in opposition to egoism. According to this picture, morality and egoism

are opposing forces acting on the agent. Moral rules and demands are initially external

to us; we need to internalize them before they gain psychological force. This process can

be described as individual development of altruism, here using the term that was

originally introduced as a contrasting term to egoism in the 19th Century by Auguste

Comte. Seen this way, altruism is a short word for the psychological phenomenon of the

internalized pull of morality, or of taking the moral point of view. An altruistic person

takes the normative force of moral demands into account. Altruism requires the

acknowledging of moral demands in the form of being ultimately motivated by a concern

for others (Nagel 1970: 16, 79; Joyce 2013). But the concept of altruism need not be

restricted to the category of motives. It might also contain elements of recognizing

another person as someone who counts morally, or of feeling with another being. So the

notion of altruism describes a psychological stance, which might contain affective,

cognitive and motivational elements. Still, the main and often exclusive focus in the

philosophical debate is on motives. As we will see, other disciplines have their own

conceptualizations of altruism that are also linked to empathy, most notably biology and

economics. These conceptions of altruism are not restricted to psychological features,

but mainly concern overt behavior and its consequences.

To have an altruistic disposition does not always mean that a person acts altruistically in

a given situation. After all, there might be other aspects of the situation that prevent a

person from doing what is morally required, such as stress or ignorance. Also, since

altruism is only one force that operates on the agent, it is not certain that it will win

against any egoistic or otherwise undermining forces that may be present in an agent.

The way altruism has been presented so far needs some defense. Above it was identified

with a moral stance quite generally. In contrast, many people would probably regard

altruistic conduct as helping behavior more specifically. For example, a person

sacrificing her life to save another person would be altruistic on this view. Other, less

extreme examples of moral behavior – say when a person returns a borrowed item to

another person – would usually not be deemed altruistic, because there seems to be no

active promotion of the welfare of another person involved. The fact that we can

understand altruism both as referring to moral behavior quite generally and as

restricted to a more specific set of helping behavior may lead to confusion. But note that

we described altruism above as a psychological notion. So it is not the kind of conduct

that makes it altruistic or not, but its psychological basis. Returning a borrowed item

might be called altruistic, if it is done because the agent deems it the kind of action,

which will protect the welfare – broadly conceived – of the person who lent the item. It

can be called altruistic conduct, because it is done for the sake of the other person and

not for any other reasons, such as fear of punishment or loss of esteem. The latter kind

of reasons would be deemed to be egoistic, and hence conduct based on such motives

could not properly be called altruistic. As we will see, this description fits the discussion

in moral psychology. In conclusion, altruism can be understood in contrast to egoism

and is not restricted to helping behavior.

Possible links between empathy and altruism

Empathy comes into play as a kind of psychological mechanism that might account for

moral motivation. Indeed, both common sense and moral psychology frequently assume

that there is a strong link between empathy and altruism. We have to be wary, though, of

conceptual confusion. Sometimes empathy is identified with a "feeling with" another

person, or with "empathic concern". This then seems to straightforwardly account for

altruism. But note that in such an account empathy is roughly the same as sympathy.

The potential moral role of empathy might then be smuggled into the theory by a

conceptual move, because sympathy by definition involves a concern for others. Such a

conceptual shortcut ought therefore to be avoided, though admittedly the way we use

concepts in theories is rarely completely neutral.

The relationship between empathy and altruism can, first, be described in factual terms.

For instance, moral psychologists Daniel Batson and Martin Hoffman explain altruism

and moral development, at least partially, in terms of the psychological mechanisms

related to the general concept of empathy. This makes the connection between empathy

and altruism mainly empirical and hence testable. More specifically, despite theoretical

differences Batson and Hoffman both think that empathy or empathy-related

psychological mechanisms have a causal role in the development of altruistic

motivation.

An alternative, second, model draws a connection between empathy and altruism in

normative terms. A common way to account for a normative perspective on the force of

morality is in terms of reasons for action. Why should I be moral? This is a basic

question that is asked in moral philosophy. According to this framework the question is

whether empathy can play a role in providing altruistic reasons for action. This makes

the connection between empathy and altruism mainly a conceptual and theoretical

matter, because it is based on an account of practical rationality, or acting for reasons.

The two ways of looking at a connection between empathy and altruism cannot always

neatly be separated, of course. After all, they are merely two different perspectives on

the same phenomenon, namely individual agency. Yet it will be seen in this chapter that

some terminological confusion might stem from not properly distinguishing between

the descriptive and the normative project.

In addition to a factual as opposed to a normative project of explaining the connection

between empathy and altruism, there is another important distinction that has been

alluded to before. It concerns the difference between an isolated motivation of an act

and a psychological disposition to act. The latter can be described as a character trait of

a person. It seems that the already mentioned terminology of "being moral," which is

often used in moral philosophy, is helpful in this respect. It allows for two different

readings, which are both important, though they need to be distinguished: First, being

moral might mean to be motivated, in a certain situation, to act in accordance with what

is morally required. We might then ask what role empathy might play in such

instantiations of altruism. Being moral might also mean, second, to be a moral person

who is disposed to act altruistically. Empathy might play a role in achieving such a

disposition. The distinction between individual acts of altruism and individual

instantiations of empathy in contrast to a disposition for altruism and for empathic

reactions is important. Indeed, as we will see, several objections to seeing a strong

connection between empathy and altruism only focus on the former interpretation in

terms of individual acts and their psychological bases.

To make things even more complicated, there are of course various interpretations of

the notion of empathy. This is a recurrent theme within this handbook. Depending on

which interpretation of empathy is subscribed to, the specific role of empathy in

morality might support a specific metaethical position. In moral philosophy, empathy is

widely regarded to be a kind of feeling. Accordingly, it is often assumed that if empathy

indeed somehow grounds altruism, moral sentimentalism is supported, as opposed to its

rival, moral rationalism. Moral sentimentalism sees a significant role for emotions and

affective elements in morality, moral rationalism denies such a role and accounts for

morality in terms of rationality or the human capacity to reason. The kind of argument

in favor of sentimentalism just mentioned, however, is of course based on a particular

reading of empathy, namely on an interpretation of empathy as a kind of affective

feature of the mind. But, as readers of this volume will be aware, an interpretation of

empathy in terms of affective or emotional psychological mechanisms is not the only

convincing option. If cognitive elements are emphasized, the link between empathy and

morality might also be used in favor of moral rationalism.

Occasionally philosophers discuss specific psychopathologies in order to establish a link

between empathy and altruism. Two mental disorders are of considerable interest in

this regard, because they involve a lack, or a serious defect, in empathy and, arguably,

impairments in moral capacity as well. These cases are psychopathy and autism. Some

scholars have argued that the respective empirical findings can indeed be used to test

ethical theories and to solve certain metaethical problems. In addition to the debate

between moral sentimentalism and rationalism, psychopathological findings have been

used as arguments in discussions about moral motivation. According to motivational

internalism, a particular belief that it is morally right to do a certain thing involves a

motivation to do it. In contrast, motivational externalism holds that moral judgment and

moral motivation can come apart. Since psychopaths seem to know right from wrong

but are not motivated to act accordingly, they seem to refute internalism. Yet, it might

not be straightforward to determine whether psychopaths indeed make full-fledged

moral judgments. This depends on an interpretation of the notion of moral judgment

(Sinnott-Armstrong 2014). Hence, the philosophical debate between internalism and

externalism cannot be decided on empirical grounds only. It requires conceptual

commitments.

From what has been said so far it is clear that the way we conceive of the relationship

between empathy and altruism has important repercussions on debates in moral

philosophy. Yet it still has to be seen how we can best account for the link between

empathy and altruism. There is some hope that empirical findings will contribute to

debates in moral philosophy, but there are also considerable conceptual issues involved.

Three concepts of altruism

An important source of confusion is the fact that different disciplines use the term

altruism in different ways. In the scholarly literature it has become common to

distinguish three concepts of altruism: psychological, behavioral and biological (or

evolutionary) altruism (Clavien & Chaupisat 2012; Batson 2011: 23ff.; Kitcher 2011:

18ff.). Each of these kinds of altruism will be briefly introduced in this section, but the

focus of this chapter is psychological altruism, as this version is usually used in

philosophical approaches. Very briefly, psychological altruism refers to "a motivational

state with the ultimate goal of increasing another's welfare" (Batson 2011, 20). This

definition is useful as a starting-point, though later some problems will be pinpointed.

Psychological altruism is regarded as psychological because it refers to mental states of

agents, such as intentions, motives, and the like.

Behavioral altruism is connected to approaches that look into outcomes of psychological

states, namely particular acts. If some given behavior benefits other beings and is

somehow costly (all things considered) for the agent, it is regarded as altruistic. For

instance, Dominique de Quervain and his collaborators, describe altruism in that way

(de Quervain 2004: 1254). There is no direct reference to the motives of agents. Other

publications in similar research areas arguably acknowledge motives as being important

(Fehr and Fischbacher 2005: 8), though it is contested whether this reference to motives

bears any substance (Peacock et al. 2005). Psychological theories also discuss

individually costly behavior, of course, but they would then usually avoid the term

"altruism" and rather refer to prosocial behavior (Eisenberg and Miller 1987).

Biological altruism, which is also sometimes called evolutionary altruism, refers to

behavior that is costly in a biological sense, for instance reducing reproductive success

over the life-span of an animal and conferring a benefit to another animal, usually a

group or species member. This notion is obviously not congruent with accounts of

altruism we find in philosophy, as it does not even require intentionality. It is closely

related, though, to behavioral altruism. It mainly differs in its account of costs and

benefits, which are purely biological in case of biological altruism. Costs and benefits

within this research paradigm are usually fleshed out in terms of reproductive success.

One might argue against such an approach that the language of altruism is necessarily

motivational and that evolutionary biologists "hijacked" the terminology (deWaal 2008:

280). Similarly, it is common for philosophers to object that biological altruism is in fact

not about altruism at all, but rather concerned with complicated and convoluted stories

of selfishness. After all, the motives for this kind of behavior seem self-regarding. Indeed,

fairly often what biologists talk about would perhaps better be described as cooperation

(Okasha 2008).

Biologists reply that if we reserve the term altruism for what philosophers see as "real

altruism," we will not be able to explain how altruism could evolve at all. After all, it is a

major task of evolutionary biology to give an account of non-selfish behavior (Sober and

Wilson 1998: 6). It would therefore be detrimental to this task if we give up the notion of

biological altruism. To be sure, a more pluralist view can highlight the difference

between ultimate, i.e. evolutionary, and proximate, i.e. psychological, causes of behavior.

There is no contradiction in using both perspectives on altruism, though it can obviously

lead to misunderstandings. For instance, to call mutually beneficial, i.e. cooperative,

behavior altruistic seems to stretch the notion too far. Such kind of behavior seems

clearly based only on self-interest, if only in a complicated way, as it includes future

beneficial events that have a certain probability. So "reciprocal altruism," as still used in

biology, seems to be a misnomer. Even biologists themselves occasionally acknowledge

this (West et al. 2007: 420). There are however some differences between biological and

psychological accounts of altruism, which cannot be explained away by misuses of

terminology. These are due to different research interests or different foci of explanation

(Kitcher 2011: 86f.). Probably it would therefore help to sort out potential cross-

purposes by distinguishing between altruism generally and human altruism more

specifically, or to stick explicitly to the mentioned distinctions between psychological,

behavioral and biological altruism.

Some worries regarding common conceptions of altruism

As just explained, a recurrent theme within the literature is that altruism requires on

balance some cost for the agent (e.g. West et al. 2007: 422). This is mainly a perspective

we find in theories of biological and behavioral altruism, but it bears relevant similarity

with psychological accounts. According to such a view, whenever there is a long-term or

all-things-considered gain for the supposedly altruistic agent that would make the action

overall beneficial for the agent, it should not count as altruistic. Interestingly, this seems

to be the flip side of a traditional debate in philosophy regarding the actual possibility of

altruism. Here it is a common move of so-called psychological egoists to highlight ever

more hidden and indirect benefits to the agent, and use these as basis for their assertion

that there is no such thing as real altruism. The latter is a kind if recursive strategy,

because it can be used over and over again in case someone comes up with stories of

putative altruism (Stich et al. 2010). But this ends up in a linguistic quandary: "If

psychological egoists (…) refuse to accept any (…) examples of unselfish behavior, then

we have a right to be puzzled about what they are saying. Until we know what they

would count as unselfish behavior, we can't very well know what they mean when they

say that all voluntary behavior is selfish. And at this point we may suspect that they are

holding their theory in a 'privileged position' – that of immunity of evidence (…)."

(Feinberg 2007: 192)

By virtue of the recursive strategy, psychological egoism achieves a kind of

invulnerability, but this comes at a price. To lose such an important distinction as the

one between altruism and egoism by insulating the latter from falsification seems clearly

unhelpful and there has been accordingly a plethora of critics of this move in moral

philosophy. To merely focus on benefits and costs therefore seems unhelpful. After all, it

is always seems possible to give an account of an overall benefit of actions to the agent, if

only in terms of immaterial gains. Indeed, when drawing the distinction between egoism

and altruism in terms of the aggregated costs and benefits involved, a terminological

arms race about the welfare of the agent is started. The problem here is one of simply

opposing altruism and egoism and to define the former as overall welfare cost and the

latter as overall welfare gain for the agent. Consequently, on the basis of an

interpretation of altruism in terms of costs to the agent, we cannot allow an altruistic act

to be altogether beneficial for the person herself. But this result seems unwanted.

Especially when people act benevolently because they want to be that kind of person,

they seem to be both helping others and benefitting themselves. Hence it appears more

sensible to focus instead on other significant aspects of altruism than merely overall

costs to the agent.

The psychological account too considers benefit to others as a decisive element of

altruism but it is less the actual result – a benefit – that counts, but the intent or motive

of an agent to benefit someone else. Altruism here means to do something because of a

concern for other persons' welfare. In addition theorists often claim that the aim of

benefiting someone else needs to be pursued for its own sake (Frankena 1963: 21) or as

the ultimate aim of an action in order to be altruism proper. This is required, because we

can benefit other people by our actions without having a concern for their welfare. It

might simply happen that to benefit others is the road to take when agents pursue their

own wellbeing. To be sure, an agent may gain in terms of welfare as a kind of by-product

when acting to the benefit of someone else, for instance in form of the proverbial "warm

glow" of such an action. Such an indirect benefit is consistent with the psychological

account of altruism. But the ultimate aim, according to the standard view, needs to be

the welfare of someone else.

The reference to ultimate goals (Batson 2011: 20; Feinberg 2007: 190) or ultimate

desires (Stich et al. 2010) might cause confusion. The idea of ultimate goals, both in

psychology and philosophy, is based on the general idea of instrumental actions.

Ultimate goals are seen as the final ends of actions, which are served by other goals of

actions. Hence instrumental goals are opposed to ultimate goals in this perspective. For

example, an agent might help a person in need, but her ultimate aim might not be to

benefit the other person, but to earn esteem and gratitude.

It is often assumed that all human behavior follows such a pattern, where we can

distinguish instrumental aspects, usually called means, from final ones, usually called

ends. Since ends can be means to other ends we get a picture of action where we assume

a final end, something that is, in philosophical parlance, done "for its own sake."

Altruistic action, as we have seen, is usually regarded as something that is done for the

sake of benefiting others. This aspect explains why theories of altruism regularly refer to

motives instead of actual behavior. According to common theories of psychological

altruism, we need to know what the agents aim at in order to find out whether they act

altruistically. However, this is a highly stylized picture of human action. Fairly often

people do something because they value it intrinsically and see an instrumental value in

it as well. To define altruism as being based on an ultimate goal or desire therefore does

not seem to help to distinguish real altruism from fake altruism. This is not only a

problem of actually identifying the psychological states of agents but also a deeper

problem of modeling altruism. The common model requires a kind of motivational

purity, which simply does not exist in the real world.

There is another concern that has to do with the notion of aiming at the welfare of

someone else. There seem to be two aspects involved here, or two ways of aiming at the

welfare of others, which were mentioned earlier. We can interpret altruism as a positive

concern for others, which leads people to increase the welfare of others. This is, for

instance, in line with Batson's definition. Alternatively, it might be enough for altruism

to respect others' welfare and to omit engaging in any harmful behavior (Schmidtz

1993: 53). Again, for some philosophers, most notably Philip Kitcher, the second motive

– respect for others or "normative guidance," as he calls it – is a kind of fallback capacity

in case of failures of genuine altruism (Kitcher 2011, 67ff.). Now, it is true that lack of

respect calls for normative guidance, which is usually related to some kind of sanction.

Fear of sanctions makes the motivation not to harm others a non-altruistic one. But in

contrast to a restricted and demanding account of altruism, it seems that at least some

cases of not harming others, especially in situations where one could easily get away

with it, can plausibly be deemed examples of altruism. This then seems to allow for less

demanding instances of behavior to be outcomes of genuine altruism. Altruism is then

basically identical with taking the moral point of view, i.e. an individual appreciation of

the normative force of morality. Admittedly, such a close connection of general moral

motivation and altruistic motivation is sometimes explicitly rejected (Batson 2014: 46),

but it can certainly be found in the philosophical debate.

Empathy and altruism: Descriptive explanation

The descriptive perspective on the relationship between empathy and altruism focuses

on possible explanations of the presence of altruistic motivation in agents and

specifically the role that empathy has in this regard. Although it has just been called a

descriptive approach it should also be clear that any such scientific explanation relies on

conceptual commitments, which might contain normative elements. Most importantly,

what altruism is – as opposed to egoism – is a philosophical problem, which apparently

is at least partly determined by a particular account of moral agency. We have just

learned about some of the intricacies of the conceptual landscape.

Descriptive explanations might focus on the proximate causes of altruistic conduct,

which are usually psychological mechanisms in individual instantiations of such

behavior, or they might aim at an account of the ultimate causes. The latter perspective

is taken in developmental theories of altruism. Again, these might differ in that they can

focus on evolutionary aspects in phylogeny or on the development of individual

personality, especially during childhood and adolescence.

A well-known and hugely influential theory that explains altruism by reference to

empathic concern is Dan Batson's empathy-altruism hypothesis, which he has developed

with his team over a couple of decades of research. His theory is psychological, and it

focuses on the proximate causes of behavior, i.e. individual motives. The hypothesis

states that "empathic concern produces altruistic motivation" (Batson 2011: 11). Note

that Batson refers to emphatic concern, which seems a different idea than empathy.

Indeed, the former seems to already have a normative stance – a focus on other's

welfare – built into it. Batson interprets empathy, or rather empathic concern, mainly as

an emotional phenomenon, as a kind of feeling. His account is inconclusive regarding the

cognitive elements of empathy, although he seems to partially account for them in terms

of "antecedents of empathic concern" (Batson 2011: 37f., 43f.), since these include

perceiving the other as in need and valuing the other’s welfare. Finally, his research is

mainly pursued in a negative fashion. It aims at undermining interpretations of certain

conduct – studied in carefully devised laboratory experiments – in virtue of egoistic

motivations. For instance, some experiments allow subjects to easily escape a morally

demanding situation, which would be deemed the egoistic option. When they do not try

to escape, but rather help, this seems to support an interpretation of the underlying

motive as altruistic.

The aforementioned features of Batson's thesis – that it is expressed in terms of

altruistic concern; that it understands empathy as affective phenomenon; and that it is

pursued in opposition to egoism – make his theory somewhat hard to assess within the

landscape of the philosophical debate on the role of empathy for altruism. Even when we

disregard the quarrel over the empirical evidence for ultimate altruistic goals (Stich et al

2010; Sober and Wilson 1998: 232), the result regarding the link between empathy and

altruism is in any case fairly modest, as has been acknowledged by Batson himself. After

all, there is no evidence for empathy being necessary or sufficient for instantiations of

altruistic behavior. There might always be circumstantial and other psychological

aspects undermining the motivational impact of empathic concern, hence empathy

might not be sufficient for genuine altruism. In addition, there might be other

motivational routes to overtly altruistic behavior, if not to altruistic motivation, such as

distress by the plight of others. In sum, it should be noted that Batson's theory is

targeted at a descriptive explanation of the presence of altruistic motivation by

empathic concern. He does not explain overtly altruistic, i.e. helping behavior, or moral

behavior more generally (Batson 2014).

Other important psychological developmental theories regarding the link between

empathy and altruism have been offered by Nancy Eisenberg and her collaborators, by

Carolyn Zahn-Waxler and her team, as well as by Martin L. Hoffman (Eisenberg and

Miller 1987; Zahn-Waxler et al. 1992; Hoffman 2000). In contrast to Batson, these

researchers do not focus on the proximate causes of individual behavior but on the

development of altruistic concern during the maturation of individual personality. It

should also be noted that they do not explicitly distinguish between altruistic motivation

in particular and moral or pro-social motivation in general. Accordingly, their research

does not establish a descriptive explanation of the link between individual instantiations

of empathy and altruism, but deems empathy to be a significant developmental

contributor to an altruistic, or moral, disposition. Again, there is also no assumption of a

necessary or sufficient role of empathy in developing such disposition in the relevant

psychological literature. This is important, because for philosophers a mere contingent

correlation is usually not of particular interest. They regularly direct their interest on

theses that explain a necessary role for empathy in altruism, either on an empirical or a

conceptual basis. Hence there is again a potential occasion for misconceived dialogue

between philosophers and psychologists.

There are also developmental approaches to the link of empathy and altruism that focus

on ultimate causes of behavior, most notably in evolutionary terms. It has already been

stressed that these descriptive explanations are not easily adaptable to the philosophical

point of view. After all, they target different purposes and levels of explanation (Joyce

2013).

Empathy and altruism: Normative explanation

It has been emphasized above that in the philosophical debate altruism often stands for

moral motivation more generally, and not just for a specific motivation to increase

others' welfare. This has to do with the fact that philosophers often contrast moral

motivation and egoistic motivation. In a Kantian tradition, we find a similar contrast

between genuinely morally motivated conduct and conduct that is only in conformity

with moral requirements. The latter kind of conduct might well base on self-interested

concerns, most notably fear of sanctions. Philosophical theories that explain and justify

the demands of morality in virtue of these mechanisms, i.e. sanctions, are usually aligned

with psychological egoism. Hence the common dichotomy of egoism and altruism leads

naturally to an identification of altruism with a general and genuine moral motive, not

just a specific motive to benefit others.

In contrast to the empirical explanations, in moral philosophy altruism is usually

explained by theories of practical rationality. Since human agency is here conceived

under the guise of norms of rationality, the kind of explanation is normative. An

explanation of altruism, as opposed to egoism, requires reference to motivating and

justifying reasons that account for genuine moral conduct. But if there is no specific

moral motive, then morality seems to be based only on a generic characteristic of human

beings, that is, on practical rationality. This seems to naturally lead to an explanation in

terms of what is good for the agent, hence apparently to an egoistic account.

We have already seen, though, that it does not seem right to insulate egoism from any

counter-examples by conceptual moves. Accordingly, it is not right to simply define

practical rationality in terms of self-interested agency. When we aim at a normative

explanation, the main focus should be on providing the most convincing philosophical

theory of practical rationality and reasons for action. Such a theoretical problem cannot

be solved by defining the relevant concepts in a particular way.

Different theories of practical rationality may take recourse to the phenomenon of

empathy. As has been alluded to before, when empathy is understood as a kind of feeling

with the other, it can be used in terms of a sentimentalist account of explaining altruism.

In the tradition of moral philosophy, such a perspective has been aligned with David

Hume. Modern moral philosophers follow this lead; probably Michael Slote is most

explicit here in his commitment to empathy (Slote 2011: 13ff.).

Other aspects of empathy, especially the element of perspective-taking, can be used in a

rationalist theory. In his book The Possibility of Altruism, Thomas Nagel argued, for

instance, that the "possibility of putting oneself in the place of another" (Nagel 1970: 83)

leads to a judgment involving the recognition of others; a judgment that anyone who is

practically rational would make. In other words, perspective-taking allows the

universalization of moral demands. Hence cognitive empathy, though not explicitly

mentioned by Nagel in these terms, can here be seen as a formal feature of practical

rationality, which makes altruism possible. Altogether, both a reference to an emotional

aspect of empathy and to a cognitive aspect of empathy may therefore account for a

normative explanation of altruism.

In a similar vein, Stephen Darwall has developed a theory of care and respect in terms of

reasons for action, which bases both mentioned normative attitudes, care and respect,

on empathy and sympathy (Darwall 2002: 15f.). Morality's demands, according to

Darwall, are due to the second-person standpoint, and rely hence on claims of particular

persons against each other. Again, empathy plays a crucial role in accounting for the

second-person standpoint (Darwall 2006: 43ff.; 151ff.).

Objections to the link between empathy and altruism

Many objections have been leveled against empathy making any significant contribution

to altruism and morality. As we will see shortly, almost all of these concerns are based

on a particular understanding of both empathy and morality, which are not necessarily

the ones that are, or need to be, put forward by defenders of such a role for empathy.

For the purposes of this chapter, we can disregard objections that aim to undermine the

very possibility of empathy. For instance, Peter Goldie argued that we cannot really

imagine being another person (Goldie 2011). This is a point about the insurmountability

of the first-person perspective. Whether convincing or not, it is not a specific problem of

empathy in its relation to altruism. It is true, of course, that if taking the perspective of

someone else from their subjective point of view is impossible, and if we as agents

erroneously assume that we do have such access to other person's minds, we might end

up with a faulty basis for certain decisions, including decisions about what to do in a

moral situation (Slaby 2014). Still, the potential fault here is not specific to morality and

it is not a problem with empathy per se, but with a particular assumption about

empathy's functions and results.

More to the point it has been objected that empathy might lead us astray in certain

situations (Prinz 2011a; 2011b; cf. Maibom 2014: 35ff.). Certain biases, say due to the

urgency of a need perceived in one person, as opposed to an abstract entitlement of

another person, might cause an unjust moral judgment. There are also demands of

morality that cannot be based on empathy, because there is no particular person

involved to emphasize with. Problems of distributive justice, which are usually

concerned with groups of people, are examples to this point. These kinds of objections

target specific situations where a moral agent comes to a wrong moral judgment

because of empathic feeling. But we have seen before that many researchers who claim a

significant role for empathy in morality discuss general moral dispositions, not specific

judgments or actions. Surely they would agree that instantiations of empathy in

particular situations cannot guarantee the morally right judgment, never mind the right

actions, and might even occasionally undermine moral motivation. In addition,

defenders of the moral significance of empathy point out that empathy needs to be

discussed in its proper form (Song 2015). Like other skills empathy should be developed

and honed. So it is not empathy as such, but a qualified version of empathy, which is

supposed to strengthen empathy in humans. More specifically, it is said that empathy

needs to be "regulated" (Kauppinen 2014), or "morally contoured" (Carse 2005).

So the main point of critical debate should be empathy's role in the development of the

moral point of view in agents. Some authors claim that moral development can be

explained without reference to empathy and indeed better explained in other terms

(Prinz 2011a: 221f.; 2011b: 216ff.). But it seems that the jury is still out in this respect.

Indeed, without a clear view on the conceptual landscape – on what exactly altruism is,

and what exactly the different forms of empathy are – we will probably never identify

the proper role of empathy in the development of morality.

Conclusion

Although empathy by itself is not a moral phenomenon (Maibom 2014: 33), it has been

argued in this chapter that it does have an important role in the development of the

moral point of view of agents. It seems that empathy is significant in both its cognitive

and affective aspects. To be able to take the perspective of others – if not from their very

own perspective – seems to be important to ground the judgment that other persons

count normatively. Similarly, to be able to feel with another person, especially feeling

their pain and needs, seems important to ground the moral motivation to alleviate their

suffering. In terms of moral agency, empathy might therefore have epistemic and

motivational roles. All of this, however, is highly speculative. In the future it needs to be

seen, from the point of view of empirical and normative explanations of the role of

empathy within altruism and morality, just how important empathy really is and what

roles, exactly, it might have in accounting for human (and perhaps other animals')

morality.

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Further Reading

Bagnoli, Carla (ed.). 2011. Morality and the Emotions. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Blum, Lawrence. 1980. Friendship, Altruism, and Morality. London: Routledge & Kegan

Paul.

D'Arms, Justin ; Jacobson, Daniel (eds.). Moral Psychology & Human Agency: Philosophical

Essays on the Science of Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Davis, Mark H. 1996. Empathy: A Social Psychological Approach. Boulder, CO: Westview

Press.

Decety, Jean (ed.). 2012. Empathy: From Bench to Bedside. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Deigh, John (ed.). 1992. Ethics and Personality: Essays in Moral Psychology. Chicago and

London: University of Chicago Press.

Miller, Christian. 2013. Moral Character: An Empirical Theory. Oxford: Oxford University

Press.

Narvaez. Darcia; Lapsley, Daniel K. (eds.). 2009. Personality, Identity, and Character:

Explorations in Moral Psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Rottschafer, William A. 1998. The Biology and Psychology of Moral Agency. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press.

Roughley, Neil; Schramme, Thomas (eds.). 2015. On Moral Sentimentalism. Newcastle

upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Roughley, Neil; Schramme, Thomas (eds.). 2017. Forms of Fellow Feeling: Empathy,

Sympathy, Concern and Moral Agency. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

(forthcoming).

Schramme, Thomas (ed.). 2014. Being Amoral: Psychopathy and Moral Incapacity.

Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.