Have you no empathy for the tasty things the snail will now consume??? - An empathy sequel...
In a recent article on empathy I made a case for trying to empathize with those who are most different from us, including non-humans, plants, and even non-living things. I used the following little story to illustrate how this might work
[ Coming across a snail creeping through Mals garden, Mal stops and ponders what this snail might be hoping for Mal gingerly picks up the snail holding it very gently in his teeth carries it off to another area far from his garden carefully sets it down ]
There you go little fella I think there are some very tasty things to eat over here I hope you have a really nice supper.
[ Mal wanders back to his garden ]
Hal A. Lujah responded to that fictional anecdote by posing the question used in the title of this article.
Have you no empathy for the tasty things the snail will now consume???
I thought this was a fantastically relevant question, and it inspired me to think about empathy in a completely new context. In fact, I think this question is so relevant that I decided to use it and my reply as the basis of this sequel...
Life consumes life... that is part of the natural order of things. Indeed I consume things that were once living. If I move the snail, I may have saved one thing (which I happen to want to eat myself) and put others in peril. Because I have introduced this change, in part to serve my own interests, does that mean I have no empathy for the things I may have put in peril that they might not otherwise have seen??? In a word, No!
Having empathy for something does not necessarily mean we change our actions. Many people assume that empathizing will inevitably lead us to change our actions. But that is not what I suggested in the first article. The title of the first article describes empathy as "an informative experience." The information we gain throughempathyis only one part of all the information that may be available to us. We use ALL the information we have gathered as the basis for deciding what we will do. Self-interest may be among the considerations steering our actions. We must, for the sake of our own survival, consider our own needs. That is another part of the natural order of things.
So to answer the question posed by Hal A. Lujah Yes I do have empathy for the tasty things the snail will now consume.
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Chomp... Slurp...
Hi Hal,
I'm glad you found this...
That is pretty much what I have been saying... with emphasis on "CAN"... I have spent quite a bit of time trying to describe what constitutes empathy from my perspective... Even though the central point of the original article was to suggest that the world would be a better place if we all TRIED to empathize more often.
The inspiration for the original article came from my long standing frustration with the intransigent ideological conflict that is so common these days.
[Mal looks at the wise fish through squinted eyes...]
Mal is detecting a hint of sarcasm from the fish...
Recently two good friends of mine died, bring to the fore of my thoughts how we deal with the remains of the dead... It has always been my wish to have my deceased body place out in the wilderness where other creatures might be able to nourish themselves from my remains.
That is an especially good example... It is true that I wouldn't think twice, in the moment, about obliterating that mosquito mother. But in retrospect, I can appreciate her objectives and even her "right" to do what she must for her own benefit and the benefit of her species. Still, even having considered the merits of her actions, I also weigh in with the merits of my own needs.
I share your views about the actions of profit motivated capitalist...
Indeed... and when I contemplate that rock I also think about the creatures who may have built a home under it... I also think about all the other rocks that we humans so blithelymove around with our bulldozers... I think, "Do I really want to contribute to the human plunder of the planet???"
The issue about which I am most passionate is the plundering of the planet by humans and how that impacts non-human creatures. I have written about it many times... If you are interested, I will see if I canresurrect one of my old articles on the topic.
Every thing we are comes from our Mother Earth and in death we will return to her all she has given us.
For me, empathy has to do with self awareness. You must first be aware of yourself, before you can be aware of others. I doubt that the snail has any self awareness. It's actions are from millions of years of evolution. It's motions are reactive. It serves a purpose in the cycle of life, but so do viruses, and I think that very few of us would want to give any empathy to them.
There are animals in our midst that are sentient beings. Because of that, they probably feelempathy. They are a higher order of life. And while I think that it is sweet to move the snail, I doubt the snail realizes anythingexceptmaybe the plant you moved it to.
Recently I learned that plants have feelings. That mowed lawns have that certain smell, as a warning to grass nearby, that they are in danger. Grass near by will try to turn their blades to prevent being harmed by cutting. Do we stop cutting our lawns? Is grasssentient? I doubt it. These are nothing more than chemical reactions.
What I think is at the real crux of this, is how we treatsentient beings. If we could just be better to them, that would be half the battle.
Oooo... That is an even better example thanmosquitoes...
Well, who knows what we may yet learn... After all, youonly recently "learned that plants have feelings."
A little known fact... Before Mal studied mechanical engineering and software engineering, Mal studied psychology, specializing in physiological psychology. I got news for ya Perrie... The thing that each of us describes as self... our sentience... It arises from a bunch of chemical reactions... sodium sloshing back and forth across neuron cellmembranes,neurosynaptic transmitters floating across the gap between one neuron and the next... That's right, WE "are nothing more than chemical reactions." Upon discovering this, I had a little personal crisis... Thankfully, I got over it.
I agree that our first priority should be to sentient beings... But the central point of both these articles is that the world would be a better place for all of us, including ourselves, if we gave more thought to what we do... toEVERYTHING.
I guess this would be a fitting episode of Lost in Space:
Yes we are a bunch of chemical reactions, but what goes on within those reactions actually yields empathy. The grass isn't worrying about the grass next door. It is doing only what evolution designed it to do. There is no self awareness.
Well there I have to agree. If for no reason, than at the end of the day, what goes around comes around... which is really under the category of self preservation.
As are we... We do operate on more than pure instinct... but all that we are and all that we do "evolved" from our ancestors...
Perhaps so, but I prefer to think of it in a more altruistic light... Saying that everything I do is ultimately tied in some way to self-interest is a little too Ayn Rand-ish for me.
I think you are kind of missing my point. As biological based animals, how our systems function is by chemical reaction. In that way we are no different than the plant. But in terms of evolution, we are far from the plant as we actually have the capacity of self awareness, which should also help us empathise.
Ugg... This was not what I meant or where I wanted to go. What I was trying to say, even if a person doesn't apply higher thought likeempathy, they should do the right thing for the wrong reason, which is selfpreservation.
[Mal wags agreement with Perrie...]
How do you know that the grass is not self aware?
Mal,
As I see it, plants have a self-awareness, as I will term it, given to them to aid survival from 'smaller' bugs and creatures, assumably, before the larger creatures' existence. The larger creatures' existence seems to have instilled more defense mechanisms, eg: poisonous substance, irritants, offensive odor, sticky exterior, thorns - that may or may not be a hindrance to the smaller predator, but would be to the larger.
You already addressed the point I'm making, " Life consumes life... that is part of the natural order of things."The point that stands out to me is to ensure viability in the smaller things, so that life in the larger genomes prevail - to support or protect something else. I think that's why evolution occurs; we see the changes in sequencing as needs change. Everything supports or is supported by something else. I think the role of empathy in this chain of events comes in with where it falls in the 'supporting or is supported by' such that we are showing empathy if we leave the natural topography as is. It has been shown that the habitat of micro-organisms is wiped out if the trees are removed. There were colonies of organisms that through the hierarchy of supporting or being supported allowed their existence for? ..many other organisms' existence, and the trees. When we change one part, we've essentially changed every part - but that has positives and negatives, as I see it. We have an opportunity to help sequencing and new development, because new defense mechanisms will be created for survival. Empathy survives because change creates change.
Just my thoughts.
Nice to see you again!
Dear Friend MalamuteMan: Empathy need not change what is necessary to sustain life. It can and does change how we respect it, and approach taking only what we need, in a manner which does not defile it or trivialize its dignity, This is the basis of thelaws of Koshruut (Kosher) or purity.
Asur levashel egil bah chalav eemo. It is forbidden to boil the kid in the milk of its mother. This is the first kosher law. We need protein in our diet. For some that comes from meat. A goat child may be eaten for its nutrients, provided it is slaughtered in a humane way. Later kosher law deals with this.
The primary law here is not tocook an offspring in the milk of its mother. That is considered by the Rabbis as an act of the ultimate disrespect. We do need to it.
We do not need to prepare animal based entrees in its own mothers milk. That is seen as insensitive to the animal, and corroding and corrupting of our souls through disrespect. We need what we need to survive. There is no call to add insult to injury in how we prepare meals.
Peace, Abundant Blessings, and Due Respect for All Life Forms.
Enoch.
Someone once said that all of life was a conjugation of the verb "to eat".
Having empathy for whatever is going to get eaten does not mean that you won't let it get eaten. As an example, I like crickets, but don't want them in my house. We had crickets in our basement. I finally remembered at the grocery store, to get a bug bomb, but when I got home and went downstairs to set it up, there were no crickets. The spiders had moved in and eaten them all. (Note: the bug bombs were never used.)
I like spiders. They are my first line of Pest Control, because they eat all the bad bugs that I don't want around. This was not an infestation, but there were a lot of spiders... But then, the food source went away and so did they. Sometimes, you just have to let nature take its course and stuff works out.
Lots of things eat snails, finding them quite delish. I don't mind a few snails in the garden, as long as I don't step on them barefooted when I'm darting out to take out the garbage. But, then, if you have lots of snails, you likely also have lots of birds and lizards, and things... Watching snails mate is like watching snot grow. In fact, seeing mating snails is about as nauseating a thing as I've ever seen in nature.
Everything has its place in the wheel of life. Most of the time, things just naturally take care of themselves. Nature doesn't really care much how I feel about it, one way or the other.
How utterly moral and humane.
Respect is the key of life, isn't it? Empathy for the rock, for the snail, for the goat kid, is a form of respect, I think.
Perhaps empathy and respect are not the same things, but they are closely related.
Very well said, Enoch. I agree.
I like spiders too, Dowser... so long as they don't get ON me... We have lots of slugs... and about a decade or so ago we got snails... probably came with some new plant... We have tons of birds... Ducks love the snails and slugs, but they are shy, and because of the fence which is meant to keep the deer and rabbits out and the Malamutes in... the snails and slugs have a kind of sanctuary inside the fence.
True. Having patience (and tolerance for what we don't agree with from someone that lives in a different area, with a bevy of things to tolerate - as an example) is one of the most difficult to accept. I've come to realize that having a strong degree of patience is directly related to our experiences.
It doesn't have a nervous system or even a brain. There are actual animals that have more.. and are not self aware.
Self awareness may not be all its assumed to be ...
That assumes that we actually know what a sense of self awareness is. Not to long ago, it was assumed that one thing that separated man from Beast was this same sense of awareness. Animals were relegated to the soulless and unthinking realms of reactivity and instinct. Now, in this very article, they are assumed to have self awareness.
It is a conceit to think of plants as not having awareness because we do not know that they have no awareness: It is an assumption based on the prejudice of the so called higher functioning beings. How Could we know if they have a sense of self, not being able to communicate with them ?