Resumen de The Notion of Empathy According to Edith Stein
Miriam Dolly Arancibia de Camels
The doctoral thesis of Edith Stein focuses on the problem of empathy. The main problem is the question of empathy as experience of foreign subjects and their experiences. The complete work contains a strictly historical exhibition of previously studied problems: the aesthetic empathy, empathy as a source of knowledge of the experience of others, and empathy ethics. Stein realized that these problems appeared mixed and both not separated: in the theoretical knowledge aspect and in the descriptive and psychogenetic aspects of the problems in question. In that mix, Stein found the reason why those problems had yet unresolved. Unfortunately, this first part is probably lost. In the second part outlined the essence of the concept of empathy discussing with Theodor Lipps and Max Scheler. In the third and fourth parts, the more systematic, Stein treated the problem of the constitution of the individual psychophysical and empathy as understanding of spiritual persons.According to Stein, the problem is that the traditional philosophical speech was dedicated to pure “I” and to subject of experience but not necessarily to another. Nevertheless, that is one of the central interests of Stein in dealing with the problem of empathy.The objective of this article focuses on the empathy as comprehension of spiritual persons. Specifically, it pursues to elucidate the conditions of possibility of empathy between people according to Edith Stein.
