I think that “supplant” is not the right move. I do agree that having a wide circle does not require going around feeling lots of emotional empathy for everyone, but I think that emotional empathy helps with getting the circle to expand. A one-time experience of emotional empathy (e.g., from watching a movie about an Iranian family) can lead to a permanent expansion in the circle of concern (e.g., thinking of the Tajiks as people who count, even if you don’t actively feel emotional empathy for them in the moment).
A hypothesis: counterfactual emotional empathy is important for where you place your circle of concern. If I know that I would feel emotional empathy for someone if I took the time to understand their story from their perspective, then I will treat them as being inside the circle even if I don’t actually go through the effort to get their point of view and don’t have the experience of feeling emotional empathy for them.
I think that “supplant” is not the right move. I do agree that having a wide circle does not require going around feeling lots of emotional empathy for everyone, but I think that emotional empathy helps with getting the circle to expand. A one-time experience of emotional empathy (e.g., from watching a movie about an Iranian family) can lead to a permanent expansion in the circle of concern (e.g., thinking of the Tajiks as people who count, even if you don’t actively feel emotional empathy for them in the moment).
A hypothesis: counterfactual emotional empathy is important for where you place your circle of concern. If I know that I would feel emotional empathy for someone if I took the time to understand their story from their perspective, then I will treat them as being inside the circle even if I don’t actually go through the effort to get their point of view and don’t have the experience of feeling emotional empathy for them.