I Empathy as a Foundation for Morality: Adam Smith’s Moral Sentimentalism

In keeping with their sentimentalist roots, Smith and Hume maintained that sentiment rather than reason constitutes the foundation for morality. On their accounts, our sympathetic responses to others form the basis of our moral judgments and underpin moral motivation. Moral judgments are grounded in ‘moral sentiments’ of approval (‘approbation’) or disapproval (‘disapprobation’) that arise through sympathy with others’ feelings. As Hume argued, the fact that our moral judgments are rooted in sympathy explains why they are strong motivators for us to act. Reason alone cannot form the basis of our moral judgments, for, if it did, our judgments would possess none of their characteristic motivational force. ^{Footnote 10} For Smith, as it was for Hume, reason has a role to play in morality, albeit a minor one: instrumental reason is needed to discover the facts of a situation, or to discern the means to satisfy a particular desire or passion. ^{Footnote 11} However, it remains the case that reason alone is unable to discover moral distinctions or to generate feelings that move us to action. ^{Footnote 12} This capacity lies uniquely with sympathy, defined by Smith as the mechanism through which we experience ‘fellow-feeling’ with others’ lived experiences (for example, compassion for their suffering or happiness for their joy). ^{Footnote 13}

Smith is explicit that our fellow-feeling often hinges upon whether and to what extent we find the other’s response to be fitting to her situation. If we judge the agent’s response to be appropriate (both in terms of its character and intensity), then we “entirely sympathise” with her through a full-blooded experience of fellow-feeling:

Smith notes that, when we are confronted with cases where one person is harmed by another, we ‘divide’ our sympathy between the feelings of the sufferer and the motives of the actor (TMS I.ii.3.1). ^{Footnote 14} Actions and the motives that produced them are then judged right or wrong on the basis of sentiments of approval or disapproval that arise from imaginatively ‘bringing home’ each person’s situation “in all its minutest incidents,” (TMS I.i.4.6) and making a judgment as to whether we find their conduct to be warranted by their situation. Smith acknowledges that we will never be able to exactly replicate another person’s experience in imagination, owing in part to the fact that we cannot literally inhabit others’ bodies (TMS I.i.1.2). As such, our sympathy will always be “extremely imperfect” (TMS I.i.1.9). Nevertheless, in his view, we are able to develop and refine our capacity for sympathetic understanding through being well informed about the relevant facts of others’ circumstances and through educating ourselves about others’ perspectives (TMS I.i.4.6. See also TMS V.2.9).

Smith’s account of the role of sympathy in guiding moral agency raises the question of what motivates individuals to step outside of their perspectives and their spheres of personal concerns in order to vividly imagine others’ lived experiences. Smith claims that most people harbour a natural desire for harmony, equilibrium, and tranquillity. Discord and conflict is experienced as unpleasant and jarring. The harmony, or what Smith refers to as the “concordance” of feeling (TMS I.i.4.7) that is produced when spectators imaginatively enter into and experience fellow-feeling with others, is a source of pleasure for all parties involved, and provides spectators with an incentive to exercise their capacity for imaginative perspective taking. ^{Footnote 15} Smith notes that agents have an added motivation to imaginatively adopt the perspectives of spectators. This is because observing others’ hearts “beat time” with the agent’s own has the cathartic effect of alleviating his suffering, and satiates his natural and intense desire for others’ approval (TMS I.i.4.7). This has a strong disciplinary effect on the agent’s behaviour: the pleasure of receiving others’ sympathy motivates him to flatten the intensity of his response to a level that a spectator is able to enter into. Therefore, just as the spectator projects herself into the agent’s situation, so too the agent reflects on his situation from the perspective of the spectator. This leads him to view his situation in a “candid and impartial light” and to moderate the “tone” and “pitch” of his response:

As Karen Valihora puts it, Smithean sympathy involves “a complex activity of reciprocal perspective taking,” wherein the agent imaginatively adopts the point of view of the spectator, who is also considering the agent’s point of view. ^{Footnote 16} For Smith, the “concordance” of sentiments that is produced by this exchange is central to motivating moral behaviour, and to creating and sustaining harmonious social communities (TMS I.i.4.7).

II Reflective Empathy: Smith’s Impartial Spectator

Smith recognised that, while our capacity to enter into and identify with others’ feelings is central to moral agency, it is liable to be influenced by an array of factors, including physical proximity, shared socio-cultural standing, and self-interest. We are likely, for example, to be more strongly affected by our own minor hardships than by the serious plight of distant others (See, for example, TMS III.iii.4). We are also more likely to wholly sympathise with those who share our cultural customs and values (See, for example, TMS V.2.7). The effect of these biases may be to distort our moral judgments and to inhibit ethical concern for others’ suffering.

The partiality and parochialism that Smith acknowledged to be characteristic of our sympathetic responses have been well documented in the empirical literature on empathy. ^{Footnote 17} Recent studies have suggested that the various biases to which our empathic responses are subject have serious practical consequences, including marked disparities in criminal sentencing and in medical treatment for pain. ^{Footnote 18}

How, then, does Smith suppose that something as variable and fluctuating as sympathetic feeling is able to support moral agency? Smith’s answer lies in the ability of individuals to regulate their feelings through embodied practices of critical self-reflection. This capacity for critical self-reflection finds expression in Smith’s device of the impartial spectator. Smith presents impartial spectatorship as an activity of critical self-assessment that draws on our capacity for imaginative perspective taking. In his view, we are capable of adopting a more impartial perspective, free from the distorting influence of bias, through imaginatively abstracting from our particular standpoint. An exercise of impartial spectatorship relies on our capacity to imagine into existence a “fair and judicious” spectator (TMS III.iii.38) who has no particular connection to, or special interest in, the parties or circumstances involved. By adopting the perspective of an impartial spectator and viewing ourselves through his or her eyes, we adjust our feelings to a level that we imagine this “great judge and arbiter” could go along with (TMS III.iii.4). In this sense, the process of reflecting on and correcting for our biased sentiments involves a sympathetic exchange between ourselves and a hypothetical spectator—one that mirrors the kind of sympathetic exchange that takes place between actual spectators and agents.

On Smith’s model, our drive to sympathise with the perspective of the impartial spectator derives from the same source as our drive to sympathise with the perspectives of actual spectators: a desire for approval. Smith explains that, just like the agent who is motivated to adjust her feelings in order to receive the sympathetic approval of spectators, the pleasure of winning the approval of the impartial spectator within motivates us to adjust the “tone” and “pitch” of our sentiments. It is these corrected sentiments that ground our moral judgments, and that motivate moral behaviour. In sum, Smith’s device of the impartial spectator represents, in Valihora’s words, “a means of judging judgement … of impartially judging the self so as to make one’s judgments expressive of a distinctly moral point of view.” ^{Footnote 19}

Importantly, ensuring that our judgments are adequately informed and impartial on this model does not require us to adopt the kind of highly abstract and idealised standpoint that is characteristic of contemporary ‘ideal observer’ theories, which posit a purely disinterested, dispassionate, and omnipercipient standpoint from which to formulate reliable and unbiased moral judgments. ^{Footnote 20} The perspective of the impartial spectator is not equivalent to a God’s Eye view: adopting the impartial standpoint produces moral judgments that are well informed and responsive to all of the relevant facts of the situation, but which are not necessarily perfectly informed. Furthermore, while Smith refers to the impartial spectator as an “indifferent” or “cool” spectator (I.ii.3.8, I.ii.4.1), this figure is not indifferent or disinterested in the sense of being wholly unemotional; the impartial spectator may not have the same degree of emotional investment as situated spectators in the relevant circumstances, but this kind of emotional detachment or distance is precisely what is required for impartial judgment. The feelings of the impartial spectator are engaged, yet are free from the overwhelming and corrupting influence of self-regarding emotions (such as envy or jealousy) that may stem from being too close to the circumstances and parties involved. ^{Footnote 21} Finally, adopting the perspective of Smith’s impartial spectator does not require individuals to do what is essentially impossible; that is, to adopt a purely objective, disembodied standpoint that exists outside the self. The standpoint that spectators and agents employ in the process of moral deliberation is “self-referential.” ^{Footnote 22} As Smith writes:

For Smith, we “never have, nor can have,” any other means of judging the feelings and conduct of another than by bringing her case ‘home’ to ourselves through an exercise of imagination, and judging by our own standards as to whether her response is appropriate to her circumstances. Since, as we have seen, Smith was well aware that our situated judgments risk being inflected with bias or prejudice, we engage in a process of self-division and self-examination, and reflect on whether and to what extent an impartial observer (“the examiner and judge”) could sympathise with our response:

This kind of self-division allows us to gain a degree of critical self-distance and to view our feelings in a more detached, candid, and impartial light.

III Jesse Prinz’s Critique of Reflective Empathy: A Smithean Reply

In his reflections on empathy as a moral resource, Prinz briefly acknowledges Smith’s device of the impartial spectator as a potential corrective to our empathic biases. ^{Footnote 23} However, he argues that adopting the position of this “ideal observer” is extremely demanding and that individuals rarely have epistemic access to this “truly ideal position of observation.” ^{Footnote 24} In other words, Smith’s “ideal observer” is too cognitively demanding as a regulative device, in Prinz’s view: attempting to access this viewpoint exceeds our everyday epistemic capabilities.

Of course, Prinz is right to point out that exercising impartial spectatorship may be demanding; however, his description of Smith’s impartial spectator as an ‘ideal observer’ is misguided if by this he has in mind an all-seeing, all-knowing figure whose standpoint we must adopt if our moral judgments are to be reliable and impartial. As I have established in this paper, Smith’s impartial spectator is not ideal in this sense. Ensuring that our feelings come to reflect a moral viewpoint is a matter of engaging in sufficiently informed (though not perfectly informed), attentive, and critically self-reflective exercises of imaginative perspective taking—exercises that enable a less ‘imperfect’ and unbiased sympathy with others.

Nonetheless, one could argue in a similar vein to Prinz that reflective empathy is incapable of playing a substantive role in moral thought and action, to the extent that engaging in informed, disciplined, and reflective exercises of imaginative perspective taking (either concurrently or after the fact) is simply too complicated and too time consuming, and that the practical demands of everyday life do not allow for such practices. Smith, I suggest, has the resources to respond to this issue. Some of his remarks in The Theory of Moral Sentiments suggest that, with sufficient corrective experiences over time, the task of reflecting upon and correcting for our uninformed and biased empathic responses can be carried out more spontaneously. In one passage, Smith writes that the “wise and virtuous” person who continually works to refine his capacity for moral deliberation and judgment:

The idea that we may come to automatically and consistently identify with our conscience through the repeated experience of correcting for the bias embodied by our feelings inspires the thought that reflective empathy need not always involve a conscious and deliberative effort, and that the process of reflecting on and correcting for our immediate feelings can become more habitual and automatic with practice over time. ^{Footnote 25} This possibility finds support from numerous empirical studies that reveal that the regulation of our feelings can occur with or without conscious effort, ^{Footnote 26} and that show that habitually engaging in conscious regulative practices may engender more implicit exercises of emotional regulation. ^{Footnote 27}

Further issues arise, however, when we consider the viability of reflective empathy as a corrective to modern forms of social bias and prejudice that commonly manifest as unconscious, implicit attitudes rather than as explicit judgments, and that influence our behaviour without our awareness and in ways that may be in tension with our standing beliefs. ^{Footnote 28} As such, we have reason to doubt a person’s ability to independently acknowledge that her feelings in a given situation may be distorted by bias and prejudice, and require adjustment.

I suggest that the issue of implicit bias need not wholly undermine an appeal to reflective empathy as a moral resource. Rather, it serves to highlight that the activity of exercising impartial spectatorship cannot be an entirely individualistic practice. Acquiring critical self-awareness will often rely on interactions with different others who may alert us to the prejudicial assumptions and lack of understanding embodied by our sentiments. The conception of impartial spectatorship as a social, dialogical practice is supported by Smith’s remarks in the following passage, where he acknowledges that the embodied presence of others—particularly those with whom we have no particular connection—is often required to jolt us into awareness of the bias embedded in our sentiments, and of the need to adjust our perspective through critical self-reflection:

The claim that impartial spectatorship must often take the form of a more social, dialogical practice rather than an individualistic, introspective exercise in light of the issue of implicit bias raises questions about how to facilitate interaction and communication between different groups of people in society, particularly when pervasive social prejudices may lead people to unconsciously avoid contact with members of certain social groups. It also leaves open to question how individuals may, of their own volition, overcome the difficulties they are prone to experience in the process of exercising their capacity to imagine things from their interlocutor’s perspective. As Smith himself notes, there is real potential for exercises of imaginative perspective taking to generate discomfort and resistance, since engaging in such exercises may compel us to confront a jarring and undesirable image of ourselves. He claims that such an experience frequently leads us to refrain from exercising our capacity for reflective empathy:

In such cases, self-interest overwhelms the second-order pleasure that one derives from achieving a harmony or ‘concordance’ of feeling with others.

While the problem of implicit bias and resistance to empathic engagement present significant obstacles to relying on empathy as a moral resource, these obstacles are not insurmountable. This becomes particularly clear when we consider the real potential for institutions to support empathic engagement with different and unfamiliar perspectives. The need for institutional structures and practices to develop and refine our capacities to empathise with difference is explicitly acknowledged by Smith in his later work, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776). ^{Footnote 30} Here Smith argues that participation in the commercial and artistic life of society plays a key role in familiarising individuals with the lives and perspectives of differently situated others, and in cultivating sociability and civility. For example, Smith notes that the commercial marketplace facilitates embodied encounters between different groups of people in society, and encourages individuals to acquaint themselves with others’ distinct perspectives. In his view, a thriving marketplace in which everyone has the opportunity to participate on fair and equal terms establishes relations of co-operation and interdependence between differently situated individuals. Such relations compel individuals to recognise and engage with the perspectives of those with whom they deal. Smith claims that commercial self-interest (for instance, the desire among buyers to accumulate goods at a cheap price) provides a strong incentive for buyers to imaginatively adopt the perspective of the seller, and to regulate their conduct in light of the seller’s interests. ^{Footnote 31}

Apart from commercial societies in which individuals are able to participate on rough terms of fairness and equality, Smith argued that literature, poetry, theatre, and painting are crucial to the moral education and development of citizens, and ought to be supported by the state (WN V.i.g.15). Smith often speaks of modern tragedies and romances as conjuring up vivid depictions of human predicaments and lived experiences that serve to expand the (limited) imaginative capacities of their respective audiences and to elicit compassion for distant suffering (TMS I.ii.2.2–I.ii.2.4). ^{Footnote 32} Smith also acknowledged the capacity for great works of art to sensitise individuals to important contextual factors—those “different shades and gradations of circumstance, character and situation” (TMS VI.ii.i.22)—that may frequently escape their attention, or which they may be tempted to overlook, in their everyday interactions with others. By inviting audiences to attend to the nuances and complexities of human lived experience, artistic productions assist, in Smith’s view, in expanding and refining people’s capacities for sympathy, fellow-feeling, and moral judgment. ^{Footnote 33}

In finishing, Smith’s work provides a compelling case for why the obstacles to reflective empathic engagement need not entail a rejection of an empathy-based morality. By presenting a close reading of Smith’s impartial spectator, I have sought to demonstrate the viability of impartial spectatorship as a corrective for empathic bias. While it may be true that the task of engaging in critical self-reflection and correcting our pre-reflective feelings represents a robust capacity, I have argued contra Prinz that it is not so robust as to stretch the capacities and resources of everyday individuals entirely beyond their limits. Critical self-regulation of the kind described by Smith can become more habitual and less time consuming with practice over time—or so the empirical evidence suggests. Nevertheless, as Smith himself recognised, the ability of individuals to enter into the experiences of others and adjust their own feelings may only extend so far. This is particularly true in contemporary contexts where implicit bias and empathic resistance pose significant challenges for reflective empathic engagement. In this paper, I have endeavoured to show how Smith’s work is able to constructively engage with these issues, first by offering an innovative interpretation of Smithean impartial spectatorship as a social, dialogical practice, and second by exploring Smith’s illuminating account of structural supports for sympathy. These overlooked aspects of Smith’s moral sentimentalism provide valuable resources for thinking through how to support empathic engagement across difference.