Simon Baron-Cohen, expert in autism and developmental psychopathology, has always wanted to isolate and understand the factors that cause people to treat others as if they were mere objects. In this book he proposes a radical shift, turning the focus away from evil and on to the central factor, empathy. Unlike the concept of evil, he argues, empathy has real explanatory power. Putting empathy under the microscope he explores four new ideas: firstly, that we all lie somewhere on an empathy spectrum, from high to low, from six degrees to zero degrees. Secondly, that deep within the brain lies the 'empathy circuit'. How this circuit functions determines where we lie on the empathy spectrum. Thirdly, that empathy is not only something we learn but that there are also genes associated with empathy. And fourthly, while a lack of empathy leads to mostly negative results, is it always negative? Full of original research, "Zero Degrees of Empathy" presents a new way of understanding what it is that leads individuals down negative paths, and challenges all of us to consider replacing the idea of evil with the idea of empathy-erosion.

作者

西濛·巴倫-科恩(Simon Baron-Cohen，1958— )，知名臨床心理學傢，劍橋大學精神病理學教授，劍橋大學自閉癥研究中心主任，三一學院研究員。畢業於牛津大學、倫敦國王學院和倫敦大學學院。代錶作有《惡的科學》《心盲》《關鍵的區彆》《自閉癥與阿斯伯格綜閤徵》等。

譯者

高天羽，筆名“紅豬”。長期任《環球科學》雜誌與果殼網翻譯。齣版譯作有《遙遠地球之歌》《魚為什麼放屁》《世界為何存在》《神經的邏輯》《惡的科學》《打開一顆心》等二十餘種。