Empathy seems like a good quality in human beings.
同理心似乎是人類的一項(xiàng)美好品質(zhì)。
Pure and simple.
純粹又簡單。
It allows us to consider the perspective of others — to put ourselves in their shoes and imagine their experiences.
它使得我們能夠考慮到別人的視角——讓我們自己站在他人的角度，想象別人的感受。
From that empathetic vantage point, only good things can come, right?
從這種同理心好處的角度來看，它是有利無弊的，對(duì)嗎？
Not necessarily, according to author Fritz Breithaupt.
然而在作家弗里茨.布里紹特看來，并不一定。
"Sometimes we commit atrocities not out of a failure of empathy but rather as a direct consequence of successful, even overly successful, empathy," he writes in his forthcoming book The Dark Sides of Empathy.
“有時(shí)候，一些惡行的出現(xiàn)并非因?yàn)槿狈ν硇?，恰恰是因?yàn)橛型硇纳踔潦峭硇倪^度，”他在自己即將上市的新書《同理心的黑暗面》中寫道。
Breithaupt, who directs the Experimental Humanities Lab at Indiana University, argues that empathy is a morally ambiguous capacity, one that can lead us astray if we don't understand its many sides.
布里紹特是印第安納大學(xué)人性實(shí)驗(yàn)室的主任，他認(rèn)為同理心是一種道德層面比較模糊的能力，如果我們沒能全面地認(rèn)識(shí)它可能會(huì)把我們引入歧途。
"Empathy is a riddle," Breithaupt says.
“同理心是一個(gè)謎，”布里紹特說道。
While it can enrich our lives, Breithaupt says our ability to identify with others' feelings can also fuel polarization, spark violence and motivate dysfunctional behavior in relationships, like helicopter parenting.
盡管它可以讓我們的生活更豐富，布里紹特說，我們能夠感覺別人的感受這種能力也可能會(huì)帶來各種關(guān)系匯總的兩極分化，引發(fā)暴力，或者引發(fā)行為紊亂，比如溺愛子女。
Breithaupt, who reviews the cultural and scientific history of empathy in his book, explains that empathy is a relatively new concept.
布里紹特在書中回顧總結(jié)了同理心的文化和科學(xué)歷史，解釋說同理心是一個(gè)比較新的概念。
The term only emerged in 1909, when it was translated from a German conception of "feeling yourself into a work of art," he says.
這個(gè)術(shù)語在1909年才出現(xiàn)，它是從德國的“把自己融入藝術(shù)品”的概念翻譯過來的，他說道。
In the past 40 years, it has risen to prominence as evolutionary biologists started to explore its role in shaping the human brain.
在過去四十年間，它開始得到了重視，因?yàn)檫M(jìn)化生物學(xué)家開始探討它在改變?nèi)祟惔篝[方面的作用。
Since then, it's become a core psychological concept, and part of what biologists think makes us distinctly human.
從那以后，它開始變成了一種心理學(xué)的核心概念，也被生物學(xué)家們認(rèn)為是使人成其為人的部分原因。
Since empathy is baked into our very being, Breithaupt argues that we must be aware of the good and bad it can enable.
既然同理心根植于我們?nèi)诵灾校祭锝B特認(rèn)為我們必須要認(rèn)識(shí)到它可能帶來的好處和壞處。
Jonathan Lambert spoke with him about empathy's biological and moral dimensions.
喬納森.蘭伯特跟他進(jìn)行了同理心的生物和道德層面的談話。
The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
以下是這次采訪的簡要?dú)w納。
How does science define empathy, and what light does that shed on on more philosophical conceptions of it?
問題一：科學(xué)界是如何定義同理心的，這對(duì)其哲學(xué)概念又有什么提示呢？
For a while neuroscientists thought there was an empathy center in the brain, some little spot somewhere.
曾經(jīng)神經(jīng)學(xué)家們認(rèn)為大腦中有一個(gè)同理心中心，是位于某處的一個(gè)點(diǎn)。
They thought we could understand this spot and then understand empathy.
他們以為理解了這個(gè)點(diǎn)，就能理解同理心了。
But then they came to a much larger realization: Empathy is not in one place in our brains; it's everywhere.
但后來他們有了更多的認(rèn)識(shí)：同理心不是大腦中孤立的點(diǎn)，而是遍布其中。
Imaging studies showed that we use every part of the brain both for our own actions, our own feelings, but also for the observation of other people.
圖像研究表明我們會(huì)用到大腦的各個(gè)部分來指導(dǎo)我們的行動(dòng)，我們的感覺，同時(shí)也用于觀察別人。
So basically the whole brain does empathy.
所以整個(gè)大腦基本上都參與了同理心。
That changes a lot of things.
這帶來了很多事情的改變。
It shows us that empathy affects all our thinking.
它表明同理心會(huì)影響我們所有的思維。
It's with us every moment.
它無時(shí)無刻不伴隨著我們。
I think that means that empathy is so important to us that it's something we can't neglect.
我認(rèn)為這就意味著同理心是如此重要以至于我們無法忽視它。
Yes, we're biologically primed for it, but we also have to cultivate it, and cultivation is something that can [be a] lifelong learning task.
是的，我們從生物學(xué)上天生就有同理心，不過我們也需要對(duì)它進(jìn)行培養(yǎng)，而這種培養(yǎng)是終生的任務(wù)。
It never ends.
永不停止。
So science seems to suggest that empathy is sort of baked into our being. I think most people might assume that's a good thing. Why is it not necessarily?
那么科學(xué)似乎表明同理心從某種程度上根植于人性之中。我認(rèn)為大部分人可能都會(huì)認(rèn)為這是件好事，為什么你說并不一定如此呢？
I'm not going to try to convince you to say that empathy is bad or that we should be against empathy.
我并不打算說服你同理心是壞的或者說我們應(yīng)該逆同理心而行。
I think it's fundamental for us.
我認(rèn)為它對(duì)我們來說是非常重要的。
It's absolutely something that we have to understand to know how we operate.
我們肯定得理解它才能知道我們是怎樣行為的。
I also think that in most cases empathy does more good than bad things.
我還認(rèn)為在大部分情況下同理心都是利大于弊的。
I want to put it in proportion — there are dark sides to empathy.
我只想把它按比例劃分——同理心也是有不好的一面的。
People assume that empathy is good because it is good for the recipient of empathy — I'm actually skeptical about this.
人們認(rèn)為同理心很好是因?yàn)樗鼘?duì)同理心的接收方有好處——而我實(shí)際上很懷疑這一點(diǎn)。
Empathy might be a little bit more selfish than many people assume.
同理心其實(shí)比大部分人以為的要更自私一點(diǎn)。
The empathizer feels less alone, they share experiences, they learn something.
給出同理心的人會(huì)更感覺不那么孤獨(dú)，他們會(huì)分享體驗(yàn)，學(xué)到東西。
So we should ask for whom is [empathy] good?
所以我們應(yīng)該問，同理心到底是對(duì)誰有好處？
It's actually the empathizer in most cases.
實(shí)際上在大部分情況下是對(duì)給出同理心的人有好處。
How is empathy good for the empathizer?
那對(duì)于接收方同理心有什么好處呢？
Beings without empathy live in their own world.
沒有同理心的人會(huì)處于自己的世界之中。
They can't really understand that other beings are out there with minds of their own.
他們不能理解周圍的人也有跟他們類似的思想。
But beings with empathy understand that there are all these different minds around [that] have different experiences and different feelings.
但是有同理心的人就可以理解周圍的人有不同的思想，不同的體驗(yàn)和不同的感受。
They can participate in them.
他們就可以參與其中。
Someone with empathy lives more than one life.
有同理心的人不止過著自己的生活。
Of course, sometimes that means that you have to carry the suffering of others, but in many cases their joy becomes your joy.
當(dāng)然，有時(shí)這就意味著你也要感受到別人的遭遇，不過大部分情況下別人的快樂也會(huì)成為你的快樂。
So it's a richer, much more complex life.
所以你的生活會(huì)變得更加豐富多彩。
And in that sense,of course empathy is wonderful for you.
按這個(gè)道理說來，同理心當(dāng)然對(duì)你有好處。
But there's a flip side too, right? In your book you talk about something you call "vampiristic empathy." What do you mean by that?
但它也有反面，對(duì)嗎？在你的書中，你提到了一個(gè)“吸血鬼式的同理心”概念，這是什么意思呢？
Vampiristic empathy is a form of empathy where people want to manipulate the people they empathize with so that they can, through them, experience the world in such a way that they really enjoy it.
吸血鬼式的同理心是指的這樣的同理心，就是人們想要操縱他們所同理的人，以便于通過他們，能夠體驗(yàn)到自己喜歡的方式。
An extreme case of this is helicopter parenting.
這方面的極端的例子就是父母的溺愛。
Helicopter parents are constantly trying to steer their kids in the directions they think are the right directions.
溺愛的父母總是想把孩子導(dǎo)向他們認(rèn)為正確的方向。
Of course they want the best for their children.
當(dāng)然，他們也是為了孩子好。
Very understandable; I have kids and I want what's best for them too.
這是讓人非常理解的，我也有孩子，我也想要給他們最好的。
But I think there's something else seeping in.
但我想這里還摻入了其他的東西。
There's this sort of living along with the kids, imagining how it must be like to have a life that's marked by successes, where obstacles disappear and life can be enjoyed.
在孩子們中有這樣一種生活，想象一下?lián)碛羞@種人生是怎樣的，充滿了成功，沒有任何障礙，生活全是享受。
But that also means that the parents are co-experiencing that life, so they start taking over ... they basically want to use the child almost as a pawn.
但這也意味著父母也可以一起體驗(yàn)這樣的人生，所以他們就開始來控制干預(yù)...基本上可以說他們把孩子當(dāng)成了棋子。
In a sense, extreme helicopter parents are robbing their kids of a selfhood so that they can basically project their own self into these kids.
從某種層面說，極度溺愛的父母剝奪了孩子們的自我，以便于他們能夠把自己投射到孩子身上。
You write that empathy can actually make us more polarized instead of bringing us together. How can that happen?
你還寫道同理心會(huì)讓我們更加孤立而不是更加團(tuán)結(jié)。怎么回事呢？
People imagine that empathy can help resolve tensions in cases of conflict, but very often empathy is exactly that thing that leads to the extremes, that polarizes people even more.
人們以為同理心可以在發(fā)生沖突時(shí)緩和緊張，但同理心其實(shí)經(jīng)常就是帶來這種沖突的原因，會(huì)讓人們更加孤立。
It can happen this way, be it a family feud or something that escalates to a civil war.
有可能會(huì)發(fā)生這種情況，無論是家庭爭端，還是可能升級(jí)成內(nèi)戰(zhàn)的情形。
Humans are very quick to take sides.
人們會(huì)迅速開始站隊(duì)。
And when you take one side, you take the perspective of that side.
當(dāng)你站到某一隊(duì)后，你就會(huì)采取這一隊(duì)的立場。
You can see the painful parts of that perspective and empathize with them, and that empathy can fuel seeing the other side as darker and darker or more dubious.
你會(huì)看到這張視角下的苦難的部分，對(duì)其產(chǎn)生同理心，這種同理心會(huì)使得你把另一隊(duì)看得更黑暗更可疑。
One example of this comes from Northern Ireland, which has a long history of conflict.
其中的一個(gè)例子就來自北愛爾蘭，這里有很長的內(nèi)亂歷史。
In the early 2000s school administrators there tried to resolve the conflict between the Catholic and Protestant youth by bringing empathy into the curriculum.
在21世紀(jì)早年時(shí)，學(xué)校管理層曾試圖在課程中加入同理心的概念來解決天主教和新教的年輕人之間的沖突。
They emphasized that students would learn both sides, and the atrocities committed by one side or the other were always put into context.
他們確保學(xué)生能夠了解到兩方，這兩方的 各種惡行也放入了課文中。
Students learned this curriculum, but follow-up studies showed that this new generation was more polarized than the one before.
學(xué)生們學(xué)習(xí)了這樣的課程，但后續(xù)調(diào)查表明這樣的新一代比之前還要更加偏激了。
So what this group had internalized was there's always two sides and, in the end, they know their side.
所以這群學(xué)生們明白總是存在兩種立場，最后，他們都知道自己的立場。
So they reorganized this information to empathize with people on their side and withdraw from the other side.
于是他們會(huì)重組信息，更加理解自己這種教的人，遠(yuǎn)離另外一種教的人。
So Northern Ireland had to abandon this project.
于是北愛爾蘭不得不放棄了這個(gè)項(xiàng)目。
The other case is that of terrorists.
另一個(gè)案例則是恐怖分子。
I think a lot of terrorists may not lack empathy.
我想很多恐怖分子并非缺乏同理心。
Rather, they see some plight of a group they identify with — they see them suffering and see it as something horrible, and that becomes more extreme and activates them to become active terrorists.
相反，他們看到了自己民族的困境——他們看到了他們的苦難，知道其可怕，這會(huì)使得他們更加極端，變成更積極行動(dòng)的恐怖分子。
Are there other downsides to empathy?
同理心還有別的什么壞處嗎？
[Empathizers] may overextend themselves.
給出同理心的人可能會(huì)過度延伸自己。
If you are a medical doctor who sees a lot of suffering and pain every day, it can very quickly become too much.
加入你是一個(gè)醫(yī)生每天看到很多的病痛，很快你可能就會(huì)崩潰。
Something like a third of medical doctors suffer from "empathy burnout" that is so severe that it affects their functioning as doctors and their personal life.
大概有三分之一的醫(yī)生會(huì)患上“同理心過?！?，折痕嚴(yán)重以至于會(huì)影響他們行醫(yī)以及他們的個(gè)人生活。
They become the victim of feeling empathy.
他們就成了同理心的受害者。
In the end though, doesn't empathy cause more good than harm?
不過最后，同理心還是利大于弊的嗎？
In one sense, yes.
從一個(gè)層面說，說的。
Empathy is weakly correlated with altruistic behavior.
同理心跟利他性行為是弱相關(guān)的。
So there is a connection.
所以這之間存在一種聯(lián)系。
I do think empathy can help people help each other, and that makes us human.
我們確實(shí)也認(rèn)為同理心會(huì)幫助人們?nèi)椭鷮?duì)方，而這使得人成其為人。
My core argument here is that in many cases of altruistic help or humanitarian aid, people actually don't really empathize as much with the person in need.
我在這里的主要觀點(diǎn)是在很多利他性幫助和人道主義援助的情形中，人們實(shí)際上并沒有都給需要幫助的人足夠的同理心。
They identify more with the helper, the hero, the person who intervenes even if it's an imaginary helper.
他們會(huì)更多地認(rèn)可援助者，英雄，那些采取行動(dòng)的人們哪怕只是想象中的援助者。
It can be good when it leads to good action, but it can have downsides.
最后可能會(huì)帶來好的行為這就是好的，不過也有不好的一面。
For example, if you want the victims to say 'thank you.'
比如，假如你想要受害者說“謝謝你”。
You may even want to keep the people you help in that position of inferior victim because it can sustain your feeling of being a hero.
你甚至可能會(huì)想讓你幫助的人一直處于弱勢受害者的位置因?yàn)檫@會(huì)延續(xù)你當(dāng)英雄的感覺。
If you want recognition and if that doesn't come, it can turn into resentment.
假如你想得到認(rèn)可，而又沒能得到時(shí)，可能會(huì)帶來怨恨。
That's an unfortunately common impulse.
這就是一直常見的不幸的想法。
On the political scale, I think it happened in Germany.
從政治上，我認(rèn)為它曾經(jīng)發(fā)生在德國。
In 2015 Germany opened its borders, very laudably, to refugees.
2015年德國曾很受贊賞地打開國境歡迎難民。
Initially there was a wave of huge enthusiasm, and then suddenly a huge drop in enthusiasm and a lot of resentment.
一開始他們充滿熱情，不過很快就下降了，還帶來很多怨憎。
What are your big takeaways about empathy?
關(guān)于同理心你又什么建議呢？
I think we can learn to use empathy in a somewhat controlled way.
我認(rèn)為我們可以學(xué)著以可控的方式來使用我們的同理心。
We can learn when to block it, when to not allow empathy to be manipulated and when to fully turn it on.
我們可以學(xué)會(huì)什么時(shí)候該抗拒它，什么時(shí)候不能讓同理心被利用，什么時(shí)候又該讓它完全展現(xiàn)出來。
Yes, we are born with empathy, but it needs constant practice [to know] when to use it and when not to use it.
是的，我們天生具有同理心，但我們需要持續(xù)的聯(lián)系什么時(shí)候該用什么時(shí)候不該。
So the dark sides are so important to know because they teach us that in some cases you shouldn't empathize.
這些黑暗面也是很重要的，因?yàn)樗虝?huì)我們有時(shí)候不應(yīng)該展現(xiàn)同理心。
But when it's good, we should embrace empathy, because it can lead to such richer, fuller lives.
但當(dāng)它有好處時(shí)，我們應(yīng)該擁抱自己的 同理心，因?yàn)樗鼤?huì)帶來更豐富更完整的人生。
問題
文中沒有提到一下哪一項(xiàng)同理心的不利面呢？
A.父母溺愛
B.醫(yī)生崩潰
C.浪費(fèi)時(shí)間
D.難民怨憎
留言回復(fù)正確選項(xiàng)，前十名朋友可以獲得紅包哦，趕快來試試吧！
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