Why do normal people lack empathy?

Before I start this topic, I want to define what I think empathy is.
Empathy is the ability to understand(with few glances) what state a person is in mentally, to understand what the person is going to do, to read the emotions of the person, and understand the persons behavior.
From my experience, normal people lack this ability.
To elaborate: I think 90-95% of the people I met every day are normal people. I guess I see more than 50-60 people each normal day, where I can get a look into 10-15 of them.
These people lack the ability to understand other people, I have seen cases where they would talk with foreign people, and they where completely be unable to comprehend the foreign people(s) actions.

The dilemma is: I am a bit austistic, got this confirmed from a brainshrink, and recently I think I have gained to insight to be partially able to see this difference of my behavior compared to normal people.
However, I am better then most of them normal people at understanding other persons, and adjusting socially.
So why do normal people lack empathy?

Hard stats. I cant work with personal experience.

^

: Your not getting any, this is a exchange of opinions and not something born out of truth.

Then the the title is misleading and their can be no sane exchange of information of truth is not involved. Normal people lack empathy because they are really dragons.

edited 22nd Apr '11 3:16:01 PM by TheDeadMansLife

The title? How does the title imply...hard stats?

Why do normal people lack empathy?

The implication is that a question is being asked that has support. Measuring empathy levels in individuals is not something someone can eyeball. If I started a post that said "Gays are overthrowing America; how do we stop them?" implies I have proof of a gay conspiracy.

The lack of hard stats make the entire premise questionable. The topic is not a question that can easily be answered, because we don't have the OP's life experiences. In my experience, empathy is normal.

Personally, I think only the dragons have empathy. The ones without empathy are the non-dragons.

How much empathy do humans have? Stanford prison experiment The Holocaust Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust The Singer Solution to World Poverty Sexual assault statistics wage slavery discrimination war We seem to be more like chimps than bonobos. Although it occurs to me that this might be because of civilization.

edited 22nd Apr '11 4:09:41 PM by LoveHappiness

Empathy only counts if you view the creature as having the same type of mind you do.

That why us dragon humans can not understand you far more inferior monkey minds.

Love Happiness: We can attribute that to the moneky sphere theory.

Bobby: But seriously, I am the only one who has seen people I know completely failing at understanding what another person wants them to understand, when the communication is a bit more than words?
A example: We have a foreign teacher here at my school and he teaches language, I have seen several people completely fail at understanding his gestures. They saying "He must be mad at me" or "He must be laughing about me", when he is doing neither nor is there any indication he even did that.
Ic an't be the only one who has seen this.

I've seen misunderstandings and confusions, of course, but on the whole, people seem to be able to empathise with one another just fine.

^^ How do you know it's not you who's misunderstanding instead of them?

Define gestures. From the mental images I am getting you are talking about culture differences and not empathy.

Empathy would still be to be able to see those difference, and properly interprent them.
Hence why I defined the word in the OP.

Ettina: The answer is that then the teachers next axctions would start making sense, or they would look extremely confused at me when I explained it to them what they misinterprented?

edited 22nd Apr '11 4:14:30 PM by del_diablo

Most humans are not psychic, yes.

Actually, all humans have a latent sixth sense. If we weren't so separated from nature it would be much stronger. Joking.

edited 22nd Apr '11 4:22:42 PM by LoveHappiness

What, proprioception?

I thought that was the 7th. 6th would be balance.

@OP

I think a more accurate title would be: Why do some people lack empathy?

I've worked supporting people on the autistic spectrum, and there are a fair few that lacked empathy/found it incredibly hard to understand the feelings and emotions of others.

Edit:

We have loads of senses; balance, pain etc.

edited 22nd Apr '11 4:21:51 PM by IanExMachina

Ian Ex Machina: Then what is then non-autists who have problem grasping that the person they speak to is not saying what they think they are saying, and someone who is suppose to be worse at empathy is surpassing them?
Topic tittle is correct :P

A) How do you know you're right? Have you checked? They might know more than you. Surprisingly this was not part of your evidence.

B) People who study things that don't come naturally are often more aware of the quirks. Someone who grows up speaking a language tends to know less about its grammar and idiosyncrasies than someone who learns it as a second language.

Clarste: Yes I checked it afterwards. Otherwise I could never have reached my conclusion.
As for studing it makes a person better than someone who knew it? It does not make any sense when you think of what being autistic is suppose to entail, compared to what a normal person is suppose to entail in the art of empathy.
Why do normal people then lack empathy if we still claim they have it?

This is wrong on multiple levels. One, humans have more than five senses dozens if you really want to start breaking them down. Two, bullshit on psychic powers.