Rethinking Empathy, Caring, and Hope
Empathy and caring are fundamental to our human experience, guiding our interactions and decisions in countless ways. But what happens when our internal compasses, or rather “care-o-meters,” for empathy and caring fall short for global challenges? We can’t really grasp, or fully embody, the amount of suffering our world has – we just can’t care enough. As the scope of the problem grows, our empathy often struggles to keep pace. We're bombarded with statistics about global poverty, environmental degradation, and other cause areas, but these numbers often fail to bring about the same emotional response as a single personal story.
This phenomenon is called scope insensitivity — it shows a fundamental limitation of our capacity for empathy. We may intellectually understand the magnitude of suffering in the world, but we can’t really grasp this emotionally1. Our “care-o-meter” is not good enough for the problems we face.
Why is this? Many people, despite their good intentions and their motivations often remain tethered to the immediate need of social satisfaction from external validity rather than the vastness and real need of global suffering. However, when realizing the limitations of the internal care-o-meter, you can recognize that your unconscious meter fails to capture the meter’s true scale. We put false faith in our care-o-meter. But what do we do about this? It requires us to confront uncomfortable truths and make rational decisions based on evidence and impact.
But objectivity is not all there is to it – we need hope. But hope is not just a simple concept: there is epistemic hope versus emotional hope. Epistemic hope reflects our belief in the likelihood of a plan's success, while emotional hope stems from our subjective feelings of optimism or enthusiasm.2 While these two types of hope often align, they can also diverge — we have to make sure we have a balance. We don’t necessarily need hope to work towards making a difference, but it sure makes things a whole lot easier.
So, how do we put all this into practice? It starts with a shift in mindset—a willingness to trust and use research with gut feelings and to prioritize evidence-based interventions with the greatest potential for good. It means acknowledging that our caring capacity is limited but that our capacity for rational action is much higher.
By using objectivity and rationality, coupled with the hope it takes to get us there, we can get past the limitations of our internal care-o-meters and make a tangible difference in the lives of those who need it most.
Bibliography
So8res. “On Caring.” Www.lesswrong.com, www.lesswrong.com/posts/ur9TCRnHJighHmLCW/on-caring. Accessed 3 Feb. 2024.
Akash. “Fighting without Hope.” Www.lesswrong.com, www.lesswrong.com/posts/w2gYsWF3CLBXZkHfg/fighting-without-hope. Accessed 3 Feb. 2024.