Other people's shoes - The anatomy of empathy - Doing good - The politics of empathy - Intimacy - Empathy as the foundation of morality - Violence and cruelty - Age of reasonĪccess-restricted-item true Addeddate 14:10:29 Boxid IA40296514 Camera Sony Alpha-A6300 (Control) Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier Includes bibliographical references (pages 247-272) and index Without empathy, Bloom insists, our decisions would be clearer, fairer, and-yes-ultimately more moral.'-Dust jacket flap With precision and wit, he demonstrates how empathy distorts our judgment in every aspect of our lives, from philanthropy and charity to the justice system and from medical care and education to parenting and marriage. Basing his argument on groundbreaking scientific findings, Bloom makes the case that some of the worst decisions made by individuals and nations-whom to give money to, when to go to war, how to respond to climate change, and whom to imprison-are too often motivated by honest, yet misplaced, emotions. We are at our best when we are smart enough not to rely on it, but to draw instead upon a more distanced compassion. It muddles our judgment and, ironically, often leads to cruelty. Far from helping us to improve the lives of others, empathy is a capricious and irrational emotion that appeals to our narrow prejudices.

In Against Empathy, Bloom reveals empathy to be one of the leading motivators of inequality and immorality in society. Nothing could be farther from the truth, argues Yale researcher Paul Bloom. Many of our wisest policy-makers, activists, scientists, and philosophers agree that the only problem with empathy is that we don't have enough of it. 'We often think of our capacity to experience the suffering of others as the ultimate source of goodness.

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