Based on this and on all the heated posts going around here, Aspies can be quite sympathetic, but empathy is a little more difficult. For those of you looking for more fuel to add to your "this article is BS" fire, most of the definitions do not make any requirement of action, except for the cultural one, and the wording of that one makes it seem like an occasional reaction even for neurotypicals.

So then what really is empathy? How can we know neurotypicals express it properly? How can we know that Aspies don't express it properly? The brain is a remarkably adaptive organ, as we've seen. How can one look at it and say that Aspie brains don't function properly when clearly they are functional human beings albeit a little unorthodox on the social and sometimes sensory sides? A Ford is a functional car just as Toyotas are functional cars. They are mostly just wired differently.

Another question: if NTs are so empathetic, then how is it that NTs seem to have no empathy with Aspies? (My hypothesis: NTs can sometimes sympathize, but not empathize, because apparently Aspies cannot project their personalities in a way that NTs can empathize with. It's a different language. I think some of these definitions sound a little bit like empathy is some form of subconscious astral projection.)


Now it's driving me nuts that so many people confuse those the terms "sympathy" and "empathy."