Compared to the average human? Yes. Most people are distressingly bad at empathy to the point where just repeating what they just heard back to an interlocutor in a stressful situation could be considered an advanced technique. The average standard of empathy isn't that far away from someone who sees beatings as a legitimate form of communication. Humans suck at empathy, especially outside a tight in-group. But even in-group they lack ability.

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lynx97 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

I am sorry for you. You must surround yourself with a lot of awful people. That is pretty sad to read. Get out of whatever you are stuck in, it can't be good for you.

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roenxi 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

The stats are something like 1 in 10 people experience domestic violence. Unless someone takes a vow of silence and goes to live in the wilderness there is no way to avoid awful people. They're just people.

The average standard is not high. Although I suppose an argument could be made that wife-beaters are actually just evil rather than being low-empathy but I think the point is still clear enough.

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dmurvihill 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

What you are saying is that 9 out of 10 never experience domestic violence despite cohabitating with 10-20 other people during their lifetime.

	▲	roenxi a day ago \| parent [-]
		No, what I'm saying is that around 6-8 out of 10 people are worse at empathy than a chatbot, in my estimation. And even if that gets knocked down a little I still don't see how people would argue that humans have some unassailable edge. Chatbots are an AGI system. Especially the omni-models.

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lynx97 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't know why you picked that particular example to make your point. I do notice though that you framed it in a pretty sexist way. You realize the dark figure of men getting abused by their wives is higher then the media reports? In any case, my point is, violence in relationships happens both ways.

Why that confirms that humans are in general not capable of being empathy is beyond me. My point still stands. You cant fix the whole world. BUT, you definitely can make sure you surround yourself with decent people, at least to a certain extend. I know the drill. I have a disability, and I had (and have) to deal with people treating me in a very inappropriate way. Patronisation, not being taken serious, you name it, I know it. But that still didn't make me the frustrated kind of person you seem to be. You have a choice. Just drop toxic people and you will see, most humans can be pretty decent.

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roenxi 2 days ago | parent [-]

> You realize the dark figure of men getting abused by their wives is higher then the media reports? In any case, my point is, violence in relationships happens both ways.

Yes. That is in fact pretty much exactly what I'm arguing. People are often horrible.

> BUT, you definitely can make sure you surround yourself with decent people...

People generally can't. Otherwise there'd be a bunch more noticeable social stratification to isolate abusive spouses instead of it being politely ignored. And if people could, you would - you note in the next sentence that you can't being dealt with in an inappropriate way.

And you aren't even trying to identify people who are generally low empathy, you're just trying to find people who don't treat you badly.

> me the frustrated kind of person you seem to be.

The irony in a thread on empathy. What frustration? Being an enthusiastic human-observer isn't usually frustrating. Some days I suppose. But that sort of guess is the type of thing that AIs don't tend to do - they typically do focus rather carefully on the actual words used and ideas being expressed.

	▲	lynx97 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		An AI (LLM) neither focuses on words nor on ideas. What you are promoting is plain escapism, which sounds rather unhealthy to me. To each their own. But really, get some help. There are ways, many ways, to deal with a depression, other then waiting for a digital god.

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2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

[deleted]

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gregoryl 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Truly, you need to spend time with literally anyone other than the people you currently engage with.

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roenxi 2 days ago | parent [-]

If you object to HN you didn't have to create an account. And I still reckon even a sycophantic AI would still have managed more empathy in its response. They tend to be a bit wordy and attempt to actually engage with the substance of what people say too.

	▲	Capricorn2481 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		> If you object to HN They didn't even mention HN. Are you saying the people you associate with are just on HN? Don't spend all your time on HN or weigh your opinions of humanity on it. People on here are probably the least representative of social society. That's not rejecting it, that's just common sense.