Sympathy or Empathy For Inanimate Objects???

[HidinginPlainSight]

So you believe there is some extra-sensory mechanism by which you can feel what someone else is feeling? Perhaps, but you can never know that. It's always something you do and something you experience.

You project in imagination (or mirror neurons reflect) what you suppose the other person is experiencing and 'empathise' with that projection. Just as you can do this with a character in a film, you could do it with a chocolate brownie. It's no different in that in neither case does it rely on the empthee's actual experience.

Look empathy means a lot of different things to a lot of different people so take whichever take on it you like. Here is how it is defined:

em·pa·thy
/ˈempəTHē/
noun
noun: empathy
the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.

The brownie has no feelings to understand nor share.

 

[Kalinychta]

What you’re talking about is related to empathy and how it’s processed/experienced by people with autism.

There are three types of empathy: affective, cognitive, and compassionate. Most autistics struggle with deficiencies in cognitive empathy but quite a lot of us experience affective and compassionate empathies to a heightened—often intensely heightened—degree.

Your brownie problem is the result of heightened affective empathy, so I copy/pasted an explanation of it below for you to read (note the last section about autistics feeling bad for inanimate objects and/or forming deep emotional attachments to them). I also pasted the link to the website in case anyone wants to read more about empathy and autism.

Autistic people & empathy: what’s the real story?

Affective Empathy

This is an unconscious, automatic response allowing you to feel what other people (and other living beings) are feeling, and is absolutely not something autistic people lack.

For example, it’s very common to find people on the spectrum who feel intensely connected to all species of animals, birds, insects etc. and the bonds they form – with creatures who live free from the endless restrictions of human social rules – can be quite extraordinary.

In the case of affective empathy, rather than having too little, autistic people can often have way too much – a condition known as ‘hyper-empathy.’

Hyper-empathic people find that even the thought of anyone or anything suffering causes them intense emotional, psychological and often physical pain. They can be highly sensitive to any changes in atmospheres, picking up on the slightest tension between people, and becoming more and more upset as they anticipate things escalating.

Since processing these powerful feelings can be really hard for them, they’ll often withdraw or go into meltdown over something that’s perfectly valid to them, yet a complete mystery to those around them.

Another way this shows itself is in the extreme personification of objects: forming deep emotional bonds with everyday items like pencils or rubber bands.

There are many examples of personification in the language we use every day (time waits for no-one/the camera loves her etc.) and also in our culture, with films such as Beauty and the Beast being very much enhanced by its singing, dancing, emoting kitchenware, but what I’m describing here is something much more overwhelming. Autistic people can become extremely upset if they feel, for example, that a specific crayon or hairbrush isn’t being used as often as the others, because it might be feeling left out. I can imagine how that sounds to anyone who’s unfamiliar with autism, but believe me, to many, many autistic people, this really does make perfect sense.

 

[OrdinaryCitizen]

It sucks! I can't even eat a brownie without feeling bad and wanting to cry! My stupid mind just keeps thinking "you're hurting that poor brownie" when I'm trying to ignore it and think "it's just food". I need help! On the internet, people claim it's an autism thing, but no one says how to get rid of this feeling. I don't want this to stop me from eating!

Stop being a consumer and become a human. Two of my ex girlfriends were not autistic and they show more love to furniture and laptop that they show to me.

 

[hiraeth]

I would seek out wisdom traditions and teachings in older cultures - which there are many, though how many are still well documented and held living today I am not sure - that taught an intuitive, embodied awareness of the living essence of plants and animals (among others kinds of "edibles", but we can start there), as well as the fact that as human beings our bodies need to eat them - that is, "end" their lives - in order for ours to continue. Having deep respect and empathy for the lives of other physical forms do not need to conflict with that of our own. And feelings or concerns around that perhaps they are in conflict, have been around for as long as humans have. There is nothing "wrong" with it, but I understand that it can be very distressing. Unfortunately, our cultural framework does not offer anything to help us process this kind of experience, nor does it in the first place recognise its validity. But it has not always been that way - and I hope it won't always be, either.

 

[Shenandoah]

I have that...cars often feel more human that humans. My kayaks as well. Toys, old toys that my kids have in abundance are difficult to get rid of.

 

[Soleil]

So I've heard that some autistic people have strong attachments to objects. But what about personification of inanimate objects, attributing feelings and emotions to them?

For example, one time I drew a picture of all my stuffed animals racing, with Hot Dog Dog taking the win. But then I redrew it as a tie so I wouldn't hurt the others' feelings. This may sound reasonable-ish, since I was a kid back then.

So another example: I had to buy a new cell phone a few years ago. But I never got rid of the old one, partly because I don't want it to feel like I've abandoned it.

When I'm changing the trash at work, I sometimes rearrange the trash cans a little, and I wonder how they like it. Do they hate being split up, or were they arguing and now they feel better not being neighbors?

It sounds crazy to say that my plushies have feelings, but if I say they don't, then I might hurt their feelings.

Is anyone else like this? Is this an autistic thing, or am I just weird?

 

[Judge]

I don't believe this is confined to autism or any particular neurological condition.

Can't say I've ever personalized an inanimate object, though the first time I ever even heard of Asperger's Syndrome involved a tv show about a man on the spectrum who was in love with an anatomically correct doll. He was one of a handful of people chronicled on a National Geographic tv show called "Taboo: Forbidden Love".

Of course this goes beyond mere personification. I also recall a woman literally in love with the Berlin Wall, as well as a man who was more than passionate about his Volkswagen Beetle. For a more clinical understanding of such things, you might start here:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/in-excess/201307/intimate-and-inanimate

 

[Misery]

I threaten electronics and related things sometimes, if that counts.

Really, if Bob the Bloody Stupid USB Cable doesnt want a scissors-related incident, it should just do it's one and only job properly (spoiler, Bob met the scissors in the end).

And yes, I actually do sit there and threaten inanimate objects with a pair of scissors. It's not a joke. It's also not an empty threat.

Just electronic things that dont work right though. Other things I'm a bit more kind to.

 

[Ezra]

I pretty much only personify things I stub my toe on. I get angry with it and want to take a hammer to it.

 

[PastelPetals]

Yeah I do that. I also collect many collectible toys and stuffed animals and I personify them. I also personify nature. At times I feel more connected to objects, bugs, and trees than I do to people and animals.

 

[Thinx]

Well, I do think there's something here I think is related to my autism. I relate to places, familiar places that I love, seem like they are there for me in a way that people aren't.

Also animals, I say hello to cats in particular, but not people. Also I do quite like cute little toy animals, and yes, if I let myself go there, I do think about their potential feelings. As I say that, I m wondering if this is a way of putting aspects of myself into the toy, then relating.

 

[SusanLR]

Yes, the same connection with odd nature things. Bugs, a certain type tree, animals.
I can relate to feeling this with certain plush toys also. A life size standing Snoopy and my
purple unicorn that sleeps beside me with it's head on my pillow.
Sometimes with my head under his and my hand in it's mane.

 

[NothingToSeeHere]

I've never experienced this myself but I have an autistic acquaintance who feels that some objects have thoughts and emotions. He identifies as an animist and objectum-romantic and is in a mutual (or so he believes) committed romantic relationship with his car. He genuinely believes that his car is just as deeply in love with him as his is with it. I don't think this sort of experience (delusion?) is restricted to autistic people though.

 

[menander]

I guess it's not out of the realm of the Possible. We are all atoms and made of the same stuff. Because we register consciousness in one way and attribute that to neurons, how do we know nueons are the only form that can produce consciousness? We just think that because we are measuring all consciousness ("possible" or "impossible") based on our own experiences. That's flimsy.

Aren't there religions that believe we are all one, every atom, etc.

 

[NothingToSeeHere]

The possibility of Panpsychism (the belief that everything material, however small, has an element of individual consciousness) is actually becoming increasingly popular (by increasing popular I mean it's slowly going from mocked and ridiculed to being considered a genuine theory worth of study, it's still very niche and controversial) among philosophers and neuroscientists who study the nature of consciousness.

The question of why consciousness exists and what creates it is pretty impenetrable when you really consider it deeply. "consciousness exists in some form in everything from the smallest atom" may be just as probable as "consciousness suddenly comes into existence for some unknown reason once a system becomes complex enough" or "consciousness suddenly comes into existence for some unknown reason when organic brains become complex enough".

 

[Soleil]

My feelings towards these objects are neither sexual nor romantic, but it's interesting to see I'm not the only one who's like this.

I suppose it's somewhat understandable to personify plushies and living things like trees, but to also consider the feelings of things like tables or buildings (as I do sometimes) seems taking it a step further.

 

[Jumpback]

I've never experienced this myself but I have an autistic acquaintance who feels that some objects have thoughts and emotions. He identifies as an animist and objectum-romantic and is in a mutual (or so he believes) committed romantic relationship with his car. He genuinely believes that his car is just as deeply in love with him as his is with it. I don't think this sort of experience (delusion?) is restricted to autistic people though.

I thought that I had seen that such things are more common with autistic spectrum people. In a way it makes sense, human desires for companionship and a loved one and so on don’t disappear just because people are too complicated to deal with

 

[Aspychata]

After my fifth car accident, l really felt like my car saved my life. One really bad accident was in LA. I could have wiped out even worse then l did. So then l felt like my car was a temple. I had to give it up to Goodwill because it symbolized my horrible divorce in LA. Now my trusty jeep protects me because l have my own idiot patrol of bad drivers. lol

 

[SDRSpark]

I was a lot like this as a kid. Less so now as an adult, though I do still get more attached to objects than many people (I think...I can't see inside their heads so I really don't know lol.)

 

[mw2530]

I definitely do this at times. Almost as if I have some sort of relationship with the object. For some reason, they always seem to agree with me, lol!

As others have said, I don't think this is unique to those on the spectrum, although it may be more likely.