But this is not an argument in favor of empathy. To get this appreciation, you don’t need to actually mirror another’s feelings. There is a world of difference, after all, between understanding the misery of the person who is talking to you because you have felt misery in the past, even though now you are calm, and understanding the misery of the person who is talking to you because you are mirroring them and feeling their misery right now. The first, which doesn’t involve empathy in any sense, just understanding, has all the advantages of the second and none of its costs.
This is all fair - sort of just addressing a weak objection though.
