Perhaps... what's "empathy"? The dictionary says:
The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.
So, how do I parse your question with this in hand. I would think you do not mean to ask whether I share or understand the feeling of deadness more in the case of someone closer to me. Would it be fair to recast your question thus: "do you (ravi) feel sadder when someone close to you dies?" ... I am not sure, but perhaps, yes. But that's "sympathy" isn't it?
Also, a quick note: my epigrammatic ;-) response to the good Mr. Monroe perhaps sacrificed clarity for attempted wit, for it was not intended to convey that *I* do not selectively empathise but that not "all of us" do... or we need not assume that we all do.
> And how does one get through life without yelling
> at relatives or stepping on an ant?
Leap away at the right moment, when confronted by either species (as Durrell might say).
> The mandarin parable anticipates the development
> of Rastignac's character. Balzac wants to show
> that in bourgeois society it is difficult to
> observe moral obligations, including the most
> basic ones. The chain of relations in which we
> are all involved can make us at least indirectly
> responsible for a crime.
Yes, but then there is "plausible deniability". As in the oft heard cry from the western leftist: I have nothing to do with my country's atrocities. I stand blameless! To the contrary, dare I say, I bear the brown man's burden! ;-)
> <...> and at this
> moment, as I speak, the most charming woman is
> there being burnt but you have had coffee for
> breakfast all the same?'
Singer (there, I did it!) makes the same point with his various analogies, including one where he wonders why you have not yet put the book down and made the donation to Oxfam.
Thank you for the snippet! It was a good read.
--ravi