ABSTRACT
The concept of sympathy has become important in current discussions of evolutionary psychology and moral philosophy. This chapter shows that in what sense sympathy a fundamental form of moral understanding is not reducible to subjective feeling and why natural selection cannot put pressure on it. It explores why it does not make sense to think that natural selection affects moral behaviour. This involves showing how sympathy differs from all other feelings in that it is not self-related but in an unspecific way other-oriented. The chapter then focuses on Edward Westermarck's sentimentalist theory of morality. It shows that morality is constituted by something that is morally prior to the dichotomy between egoism and altruism, namely 'sympathy'. The chapter also presents some of the confusions and insights in Kant's project and shows how they hint towards the crucial moral role of sympathy.
