[It’s graduation time!! Will new graduates enter a world of greed or of empathy?? Here’s a commencement address to UC Berkeley Psychology students by Dacher Keltner, director of the Greater Good Science Center.
Dacher basically talks about the importance of creating a culture of empathy and compassion. He contrasts a culture of greed v. a culture of empathy and reviews some of the latest science that supports empathy. I encourage you to read it. ]
“We can care because we have evolved the capacity to rise above the loud demands of the internal voice of self-interest, and imagine the minds, interests, and concerns of others. This empathic flight is enabled by mirror neurons and large portions of the prefrontal cortex of the brain…
We are separated by the boundaries of our skin, we are separate constellations of trillions of cells, but in the reaches of our mind we are connected to one another. Other people’s gains and costs can become our own. And in these acts of empathy, where we see the world through the eyes of others, we come to understand that we all suffer, we all yearn for the happiness of our children. We come to see that we share a common humanity.”
