Salje, L. (2025) Minding the Children: Carework, Empathy, and the Phinneas Gage Effect. Philosophy, 100 (1). 26 -49. ISSN: 0031-8191
Abstract
In this paper I argue for a specific and highly challenging form of empathy involved in caring for young children – empathy that is an active and normally temporally extended exploration of the target subject’s complex and dynamic emotional life, guided by an epistemic aim of psychological understanding. I further argue that engagement in this empathetic work is liable to disable the caregiver’s normal emotional functioning in a way that can give rise to a sense of self-alienation. I end the paper by identifying three ways in which engagement in this special form of empathetic activity can also serve to enrich the caregiver’s life, or contribute to her flourishing.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s), 2025. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science (Leeds) > School of Philosophy (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 21 Jun 2024 09:33 |
Last Modified: | 05 Aug 2025 11:36 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Cambridge University Press |
Identification Number: | 10.1017/S0031819124000251 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:213727 |
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Licence: CC-BY 4.0