The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society

by Frans de Waal

We’re in suspense watching a high-wire artist, said Theodor Lipps (1851–1914), because we vicariously enter his body and thus share his experience. We’re on the rope with him. The German language elegantly captures this process in a single noun: Einfühlung (feeling into). Later, Lipps offered empatheia as its Greek equivalent, which means experiencing strong affection or passion. British and American psychologists embraced the latter term, which became “empathy.” We identify with a high-wire artist to the point that we participate in every step he takes. I prefer the term Einfühlung since it conveys the movement of one individual projecting him- or herself into another. Lipps was the first to recognize the special channel we have to others. We can’t feel anything that happens outside ourselves, but by unconsciously merging self and other, the other’s experiences echo within us. We feel them as if they’re our own. Such identification, argued Lipps, cannot be reduced to any other capacities, such as learning, association, or reasoning. Empathy offers direct access to “the foreign self.”