Interesting piece. However, the article conflates psychopathy meaning “people with smaller amygdalas” and psychopathy meaning “people with smaller amygdalas who display anti-social behavior”. The former group is not necessarily in the latter group. For example, you may have a smaller than average amygdala and genuinely respond less to the fear and distress of others but not become a social predator that manipulates people.
And as you point out, it’s not clear how this study relates to EAs. It could be that EAs have relatively normal amygdala size but are disproportionately interested in rationality and ethics and hence recognize the good they can and should be doing in the world.
I agree. It would be interesting to know how EAs score on standard measures of empathy, relative to the general population or to other relevant subpopulations (such as psychopaths or hyper-empathetic folk).
Interesting piece. However, the article conflates psychopathy meaning “people with smaller amygdalas” and psychopathy meaning “people with smaller amygdalas who display anti-social behavior”. The former group is not necessarily in the latter group. For example, you may have a smaller than average amygdala and genuinely respond less to the fear and distress of others but not become a social predator that manipulates people.
And as you point out, it’s not clear how this study relates to EAs. It could be that EAs have relatively normal amygdala size but are disproportionately interested in rationality and ethics and hence recognize the good they can and should be doing in the world.
I agree. It would be interesting to know how EAs score on standard measures of empathy, relative to the general population or to other relevant subpopulations (such as psychopaths or hyper-empathetic folk).