We value being quick and efficient. But in a world where an artificial intelligence (AI) model can crunch millions of data points in seconds, an aspect of slow, immersive understanding will be increasingly valuable – empathy.
AI will likely replace many of our “thinking” jobs in the coming decades, such as analytics and summarisation. By not getting swayed by emotions, AI may also be able to make more unbiased and rational decisions, especially when executing routine processes, replacing many bureaucratic jobs.
The power of AI is fundamentally based on processing inputs codified in the form of words, numbers and symbols. Its massive processing power allows AI to simultaneously give processed outputs to billions of coded inputs. So, any human job that relies on processing codified inputs – be it text or numbers – is at risk of being replaced by AI in the next few decades.
However, human beings do not learn through words. We experience the world around us and life within ourselves rather non-discreetly. Much of this experience – for example, what the sweet taste of a Malda mango is like, or what it is like to be a victim of discrimination – cannot be fully transmitted through words.
Computers can be fed the transmitted descriptions, but the very nature of experience is such that we cannot communicate it in its entirety.
Humans, having experienced something in full, have the privilege of a more complete form of knowledge, which computers do not. Philosopher John Searle’s “Chinese Room” example illustrates this, arguing that computers are like a language translator that can perfectly translate a language like Chinese by processing symbols in one form to another, but it does not understand what these symbols mean in the way that humans do.
In the 21st century, our understanding of intelligence is changing. Intelligence grounded in empathy, lived experience and, more importantly, unique experiences cannot be replaced by AI. Those who bring such lived and unique experiences to the table will always have great value to offer to the knowledge economy.
Empathy is our ability to stand in someone else’s shoes and see the world from their perspective without our judgements creeping in. It is easy to empathise with – or understand the perspective of – someone much like us. But it takes practice and time to listen to the stories of and empathise with those who are different from us.
We often caricature “others” who are not like us and simplify their experiences into one-liners when we know intrinsically that our lives cannot be simplified the same way. Every time we make a racist, casteist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic or other such parochial remark about anyone or any community, we walk away from intelligence, as we paint a very shallow picture of someone’s life. Not only is such snap and reductionist judgment immoral, but it is also profoundly unintelligent. It indicates a lack of empathy, as our understanding lacks insight and depth.
Living with empathy is a skill that allows us to have a higher-resolution understanding of someone else’s life and their stories. Not having this skill means walking through life with a pixelated understanding of others.
There is some debate on whether empathy can be genuinely taught or if it is intrinsic to some people and not to others. Evidence suggests that empathy indeed can be taught. Many religions emphasise the importance of developing empathy, compassion and kindness through various practices, such as the Metta meditation in Buddhism. In the Metta meditation, the learner first develops understanding and compassion for oneself, then towards a friend, then towards a neutral acquaintance, then towards someone perceived as an enemy, and finally towards all four of these people at once. It is said that Gautama Buddha would do the Metta meditation first thing in the morning as he woke up, such was his belief in its effectiveness.
However, could the adoption of these practices be self-selection? That is, more empathetic people see the value in these practices more than others, and hence, they adopt them in their lives. If we went around teaching empathy-developing practices randomly to people, would it bear any fruit? Field experiments, such as Canada-based Roots of Empathy, suggest empathy can be learnt.
An accredited programme for children below eight years of age, Roots of Empathy teaches empathy to children with “babies as teachers”. In the programme, an infant and their parent visit local classrooms with a trained instructor multiple times for a year. The students observe the baby and its development, labelling the baby’s feelings and intentions, and then reflect on their own. The programme has been tested in numerous randomised controlled trials across countries and cultural contexts, and the approach has been found to reduce aggression like bullying and increase cognitive (perspective-taking), emotional (sharing the feelings of others) and compassionate (prosocial behaviours like helping) empathy.
A practical way to integrate a seemingly “soft” concept like empathy in our hard-nosed world of business and management is by developing the art of immersive listening. Immersive listening requires us to sit with someone or a group and give patient attention to their stories and emotions, suspending judgment and holding genuine conversations that allow us to immerse ourselves in their worlds.
Immersive listening can only work if it involves a suspension of presumptions and judgements that we make about ourselves and others. We are all judgemental, and often, these judgements are subconscious, i.e., implicit. A salient example of implicit bias is homophily, our liking for someone similar to us. These biases affect all of us and require awareness and attention to keep them from clouding our judgment.
Genuine conversations also require us to be watchful of power dynamics. For example, an employer holds inherent power over their employees, influencing how comfortable employees may feel in expressing themselves and opening up in a conversation under such asymmetric power dynamics. Authentic, immersive listening is possible only when an equal – secure and genuinely friendly – power dynamic is nurtured between the listener and the speaker.
The method of immersion in someone’s world resembles the ethnographic approach. During the colonial period, European ethnographers would actively immerse themselves in the worlds of their colonial subjects to “understand” their world better. However, the insights generated from such studies were coloured by prejudice, often perpetuating racism and expanding the colonial enterprise by portraying subjects as “barbaric”. Today, creating hierarchies across cultures and ‘races’ is considered a pseudoscience, and we have developed an appreciation for the wisdom of so-called “primitive” societies. For example, we are learning from the water harvesting and soil conservation practices of forest-dwelling societies, and about multiple genders and “twin” souls from the Native American people, realising that our ideas about society and progress are often socially constructed and constantly evolving based on who is in power.
Excerpted with permission from Atypical: Five Strategy Rules for a New World, Prateek Raj, Westland.
