The Neuroscience of Empathy

Our brains are constantly in the business of simulating the experiences of other people. This leads to empathy, the experiencing of another's emotions. Empathy is what counterbalances appetite for power and tribalism and violence. In 1780, Lord Gordon marched a crowd of 50,000 people to the houses of Parliament in London. He had nothing but hatred for his Catholic neighbors. The answer paints a fundamental fact about human nature: our tendency to form in groups and out groups.