108. The evolution of empathy

Less brutish, still short
Sep 3rd 2009 From The Economist print edition

The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society. By Frans de Waal. Crown 304 pages $25.99 and ￡19.99. Buy from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk

108-1-500
EVERY day the world seems more like Aesop's "Fables". Rooks are found to use ingenious tools dolphins are overheard talking to whales and pigs, while not yet flying, play a passable game of footballat least according to the BBC. As for apes, they would hardly make headlines any more if they were found to be adept at composing limericks.
Frans de Waal, a primatologist in the psychology department of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, is perhaps best known for his studies of bonobosthe so-called "politically correct" apes who are somewhat feminist, often resolve disputes by making love instead of war, and with whom humans share as much of their DNA as they do with chimpanzees. His new book, "The Age of Empathy", looks at altruism and sympathetic fellow-feeling in both humans and other animals.
His title has a double-meaning: empathy is both very old and freshly topical. It is as ancient as the entire mammalian line, he argues, engaging areas of the brain that developed in our distant ancestors over 100m years ago. And we are also entering a new age of empathy, he thinks, brought on by the financial crisis (the product of a selfishly oriented system), and marked by America's election of President Barack Obama, who has re-emphasised the importance of compassion and helping one's neighbour.

A. 어휘
evolution 進化(진화). empathy 感情移入(감정이입).
brutish 야만적인, 잔인한, 거친. fable 寓話(우화). rook 까마귀.
ingenious 精巧(정교)한, 현명한. overhear 엿듣다, 도청하다.
as for ...에 관해서는. adept 熟練(숙련)된. limericks 俗謠(속요), 戱詩(희시).
compose 작곡하다. primatologist 영장류동물학자.
the psychology department 심리학과. resolve 해결하다, 결정하다, 분해하다.
disputes 분쟁. altruism 이타주의. fellow-feeling 동정, 공감, 동료의식.
topical 화제가 되는. entire mammalian line 전체 포유동물의 혈통.
engage 관계하다, 참여하다. ancestor 조상. bring on 가져오다, 초래하다.
financial crisis 금융위기. mark 특징짓다. emphasise 강조하다.
compassion 동정, 연민.

108-2-501
The book is a polemic, and its main target is what Mr de Waal takes to be a distorted idea of human life as relentlessly selfish and ruthlessly competitive. As an antidote to this picture, he offers plenty of evidence of apparently selfless sacrifice, unforced sympathy, co-operation and even a keen sense of fairness in our closest animal relatives, who evolved to reap the benefits of mutual aid. In other words, his answer to Thomas Hobbes's famously gloomy statement that man's existence tends to be "nasty, brutish and short" is, in effect, that it is unfair to brutes. Beasts are not actually all that beastly, and so we need not be either. Nature does not force us to be selfish.
But what exactly is the moral relevance of empathy and altruism in non-human animals? Ethicists have a name for the confused idea that moral conclusions can be deduced from scientific evidence: they call it the "naturalistic fallacy", and it cuts two ways. If it is a mistake to justify human selfishness on the basis of the alleged selfishness of nature (as one strain of "Social Darwinism" tried to do in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and some right-wing columnists do now), then it is equally mistaken to espouse altruism merely on the basis that chimps can be assiduous at sharing food and at being good buddies to one another.

A. 어휘
polemic 논쟁적인, 논쟁. take 간주하다. distorted idea 왜곡된 생각.
relentlessly 무정하게, 잔인하게. ruthlessly 무자비하게, 무정하게.
competitive 경쟁적인. antidote 해독제. apparently 명백하게. keen 예민한.
unforced sympathy 자발적인 동정심. fairness 공정함. relative 친척.
evolve 진화하다. reap 수확하다. benefit 이득, 이익, 혜택.
mutual aid 상호 원조. Thomas Hobbes(1588-1679) 영국의 철학자.
gloomy 어두운, 우울한. nasty 몹시 더러운. in effect 실제로는. brute 짐승.
relevance 관련, 적절함. empathy 感情移入(감정이입). altruism 이타주의.
ethicist 윤리학자. confused 혼란스러운. deduce 推論(추론)하다, 演繹(연역)하다.
fallacy 誤謬(오류). cuts two ways 양쪽에 통하다. justify 정당화하다.
alleged 주장되고 있는. strain 혈통, 家系(가계). espouse 받아들이다, 채택하다.
assiduous 헌신적인, 근면한. buddy 동료, 단짝.