Split from "A Different Apology"...

Connor L. wrote: Wow, you're totally right. I can't believe I switched them. (It's been a long day).

I've fixed it in the original post, but yes, Sociopathy is the acquired one. Sorry about that.

No worries

[As a side, side note, if you haven't read it you should totally read 'the Psychopath Whisperer' by Kent Kiehl. I've read some of his papers as he's one of the big researchers into psychopathy.. very interesting stuff he's got going there.]

Sounds like fun! I'll have a look at it.

OK. Someone's going to have to explain to me how anyone can ever claim to be an empath, especially without prior similar experiences, and how this can be taught.

Furthermore, empathy can be taught. We teach it to children every day. "Would you like it if they took your last cookie? Then why would you take theirs?" and "When we hit, it hurts. Do you remember what it felt like when brother hit you? Do you want someone else to feel that way?" are used consistently throughout childhood to coach empathy in young minds.

congratulations on providing examples for the golden rule (covered by the doctrine), not so much for empathy.

Those who have not learned this have become, to quote Donald Glover, wind up as tiny Hitlers.

But of course. Hitler didn't hate jews, he simply had no feelings for them. That would explain why he wanted all of them dead so badly.
It's all those people who feel nothing who are consumed with hatred and revenge and whatnot. After 10 years of following a path based on Star Wars, how could I have missed such crucial life-changing information from the movies?!!!! Thank you so much!!!!!

An empath as I know it to be can't be taught. Empathy can be learned, but being an empath is is a little different. Empathy is the ability to understand and relate to someone else's emotions, whereas being an empath means you actually feel someone else's emotions when they do.

You're right to correlate the Golden rule with empathy Ren, but empathy is a bit deeper than that. The golden would say "Don't hit someone because you don't want to be hit," while empathy would say, "don't hit someone because you've been hit before and you know it doesn't feel good and you don't want to make someone else feel that way." The golden rule doesn't necessarily require that you understand the other person's emotion.

... And that's why I don't think those examples, or this new one, fit empathy (and fit, instead, the golden rule). empathy is the ability to feel what someone else feels, using dictionary definitions (and quite frankly the etymology gives it away).

What this: "don't hit someone because you've been hit before and you know it doesn't feel good and you don't want to make someone else feel that way." teaches is to apply your own feelings to someone else. that's the golden rule.
You felt that way therefore they will feel that way too.
Empathy goes the other way around. They feel a certain way therefore you can feel that certain way as well. It's not about extrapolating your memory of a feeling onto them, but about observing their feelings.

I do not see how this "observation" of feelings can be measured, and if deemed insufficient, taught to someone. The "light" part of the doctrine encourages compassion, which is in direct conflict with the core, "generic" part.
Many knights and above have chosen to completely ignore parts of those core "generic" teachings and feel perfectly fine doing so.
Connor (although only very few people know to what extent) is under no circumstances in more need of being "taught" values and morals of any kind than many others, and is free to make up his own mind on which conflicting parts of the Doctrine are the most relevant to him, a "right" given to him by that very same doctrine.

I find the order's blatant disregard for its own teachings far more worrying than the meaning of empathy, whether this guy has enough of it or whether it can be taught to him. It shouldn't be required, it shouldn't be enforced as it is subject to belief and understanding of the doctrine. Far less confusing ideals are being completely ignored for populist purposes. If that's what people want from religion, or if it is what they call "spirituality", then forget about this place, and go find the nearest religious building. They do this very same thing over there too.

Religion and spirituality are not the same thing, and religion is bound to get lost somewhere along the lines simply because it is not the "thing".

No teachings, no doctrine etc will "teach" values and morals. All it does is try to verbalized the ones that some believe are important, but I do not believe you can adopt values that you don't already have on some level.

Brenna wrote: No teachings, no doctrine etc will "teach" values and morals. All it does is try to verbalized the ones that some believe are important, but I do not believe you can adopt values that you don't already have on some level.

Just like you can't teach drawing, or writing, or oratory, or logic, or debate, or math, or science, or history if your brain isn't already hardwired for it, right?

steamboat28 wrote:

Brenna wrote: No teachings, no doctrine etc will "teach" values and morals. All it does is try to verbalized the ones that some believe are important, but I do not believe you can adopt values that you don't already have on some level.

Just like you can't teach drawing, or writing, or oratory, or logic, or debate, or math, or science, or history if your brain isn't already hardwired for it, right?

Values are not the same as a skill set.