The Bridge

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Last night I had a dream of a world gone awry. It started with a newspaper report showing multiple cars driving off a bridge that had collapsed. When I went to the scene (arriving instantly in my dream, of course,) I saw car after car going over the edge into the water. Many people saw the problem, but no one was trying to warn the drivers. The rest of the dream had more scenes of people unwilling to help each other even when all it would take was holding out a hand.

When I awoke I thought hazily about this quality of empathy that was missing from the people in the dream. Empathy is something all humans - and perhaps many animals - share. We would try to help someone in danger without thinking, even if there were no direct gain. A psychopath, a person without empathy, has a mental disorder. Although psychopaths seem to make excellent business leaders, the idea of a world full of them is what makes zombie movies so scary.

The concept that people are connected is not a theory. It is not just a part of our humanity, it is our humanity. If you are not sure, imagine a world without empathy.

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