As a species, we like to think of ourselves as empathetic beings. We protest injustices, we take care of wounded animals, and we donate money to charities. Overall, we see ourselves as the saviors of the needy and the unfortunate. However, this really isn’t empathy that causes us to reach out a helping hand, not completely at least. In fact, we humans have a flawed sense of empathy; we condemn terrorism while we drop bombs on innocent villages, we are disgusted by world hunger and homelessness but we refuse to glance at the stranger on the street begging for money. Most of us only express empathy towards the people we think are deserving of it. The less fortunate have to relate to us on some basic level, but they can’t be completely unlike us. This flawed reasoning can be expressed through the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick. Although the world they live in is more dystopian, it is not unlike ours. By using this novel, the true form of empathy will be realized—understanding other’s plights and choices no matter how different they are from any of us.
In Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick, humanity is divided. Most humans emigrated to Mars due to a catastrophic nuclear war that ruined the Earth, while everyone else stayed behind. The most important plot point in the book is that when a person would emigrate to Mars, they were rewarded with an android to be their slave. The only way for an android to escape and live their own lives was to kill their master and run away to Earth to hide. In this world, androids are modeled just like humans and have all of their characteristics, except for one: empathy. Androids are the villains feared by all the humans; they’re stronger, faster, and in some cases, smarter. In order for humans to feel human and to show to others that they are not actually escaped androids, they buy an animal. This is their ultimate form of empathy. They dedicate their lives to taking care of their animal and, if their animal is an android, they strive for the moment they can actually afford a real one. It is an unspoken rule to not discuss whether they own a real animal or not. In fact, Dick states that to ask if an animal is fake is “a worse breach of manners than to inquire whether a citizen’s teeth, hair, or internal organs would test out authentic” (8). In other words, asking if an animal is fake is the same as implying someone is an android. The two go hand in hand.
The protagonist of the story, Rick Deckard, struggles with the concept of empathy throughout the entire novel. He himself owns an electric sheep and he struggles with that reality. He actually only cares for it of out habit and has no feelings of affection towards it. He hated the thought of owing a false animal but “from a social standpoint it had to be done, given the absence of the real article” (Dick 9). Deckard had no choice to care of his electric sheep or else people would think he was an android. The empathy that is sought out by the citizens is actually completely lost based on this aspect. They aren’t caring for their animals because they have empathy, they care for them for social status. They can’t stand the thought of being scrutinized for possibly being an android.
This is similar to how we sometimes interact as humans on an everyday basis. People all around the world post pictures and videos of themselves doing good deeds for others. Now this necessarily doesn’t mean that none of those people actually care; however, the fact that it has to be gratified and shown to the world shows that there is more than empathy driving them. True empathizers would carry out their good deed anonymously because that isn’t the point. The point is to just help. If Deckard and the rest of the citizens truly empathized with the animals, there wouldn’t be a competition. There wouldn’t be android animals to begin with. The citizens would just take care of the real ones that were left and try to repopulate the Earth with those surviving creatures.
As the readers continue to follow Deckard’s journey as a bounty hunter “retiring” escaped androids for the police department, they begin to see Deckard empathizing with androids more and more. The first instance of this is when his temporary partner Resch thinks he might be an android with false memories. Deckard struggles with the thought of telling Resch. In the novel he thinks, “I’ve got to tell him… It’s unethical and cruel not to. Mr. Resch, you’re an android… You got me out of this place and here’s your reward: you’re everything we jointly abominate” (Dick 126-127). He felt bad for him regardless if Resch turned out to be an android. In fact, at this point in the story, Deckard really thinks that Resch is an android. However, he still struggles with the thought of telling him because he knows what has to happen if he really is one.
Deckard again shows empathy for the next android he “retires,” an android named Luba Luft. Luba Luft lived out her days as a beautifully talented opera singer. And Deckard felt genuinely upset that he had to end her existence. He wonders what the world truly gains from losing her. After Deckard and Resch deal with her, Deckard asks Resch, “Do you think androids have souls?” (Dick 135). This question completely puzzles Resch; however, it weighs heavily on Deckard’s mind. This is because unlike Resch, Deckard actually starts to question whether or not what he’s doing is right. Now this instance of empathizing with Luft may be tied to his sexual attraction toward her; however, this is just a stop on Deckard’s journey to fully being able to empathize.
When the novels gets closer to its end, Deckard invites Rachael over to a hotel room. Rachael is an android that showed an interest in helping him “retire” the rest of the androids. Deckard makes a proposition to Rachel that if they “do something else,” he’ll forget about the other remaining androids (Dick, 182). Deckard requests this of Rachel partly because he doesn’t want to find the other androids and partly because he wants to sleep with her. He doesn’t like his job anymore and he just wants something to distract him from his reality. After Rachael and Deckard sleep together, Deckard learns that it was in Rachael’s plans all along. She wanted to sleep with him to get him to stop hunting the androids, and he wasn’t the first. Deckard doubts that her charms worked on him; however Rachael seems to know otherwise. She says, “I already know… When I saw that expression on your face, that grief” (Dick 198). Deckard eventually flies into a blind rage, threatening to kill Rachael, but he can’t go through with it. Just as Rachael had predicted, it did get to him. He didn’t want to kill androids anymore, and he certainly didn’t want to kill her.
At the end of the novel, Deckard is completely broken. He finished off the last three androids he was after and Rachael, the one android he let get away, killed his goat. The goat he saved up for just so he didn’t have to take care of an electric sheep anymore. He’s delusional and almost seems like he has a death wish. Until he finds a toad. In this novel, a toad is a holy symbol of sorts and Deckard sees finding it as a sign from Mercer, the novel’s Jesus-like symbol. When Deckard returns home, he is delighted to show his wife Iran that he found a real, live toad. To his dismay, Deckard discovers that the toad is actually artificial; however, he has a much different reaction to it than the old Deckard would have. “I’ll be okay,” he says “But it doesn’t matter. The electric things have their lives too” (Dick 241). At this point, Deckard doesn’t care anymore about what’s real and what’s artificial. He will take care of the toad and it shows by him acknowledging that electric beings have their own lives. This is something that the old Rick Deckard would never dare to think. He hated his electric sheep. He despised it so much, he spent all his bounty hunting money on a goat for it to only die. And now that he has this electric toad, he’s gone full circle back to a false animal, but this time he’ll actually take care of it fully because he doesn’t care anymore if it’s real or fake.
The entirety of Deckard’s experiences and journey relate to how we, in this world, can truly learn to emphasize. As stated before, we only empathize when we find we have something in common with someone less fortunate. Deckard was the same way. He didn’t emphasize with his sheep because he looked upon it as wrong, he emphasized with Resch because Resch was just like him, and he emphasized with Luba and Rachael because he was sexually attracted to both of them and thought of them as vulnerable. At the end; however, Deckard was revealed to truly show empathy when he encountered the toad. The fact that he didn’t care whether the toad was real or no showed he didn’t care whether people were human or android.
That revelation is the most important because it was the hardest to achieve. In fact, in an article posted to Cyborgology, it was stated by philosopher Jesse Prinz that “empathy is impartial; we feel greater for those who are similar to ourselves” (Recuber). Recuber goes on to state that many experiments back up that claim, especially when it relates to race. There is an empathy gap in our society that is making it harder and harder for people to truly emphasize with one another because we can’t see past our differences (Recuber). This is exactly what Deckard did in the novel by going through all the problems that found him. He found a way to emphasize with androids even though they were nothing like him. So how can we as a society in the real world do it? How can we close this gap and find a way to truly emphasize with one another no matter the differences?
This answer goes back to our flawed system of empathy itself. We need to stop seeing empathy as partial. We shouldn’t put up posts about saving Syrian refugees while we bash the countries who choose not to. We can’t decide who’s right and who’s wrong. That is not how empathy works. With true empathy, there is no good guy or bad guy, whether or not you agree with the choices made. There has to be a level of understanding. A moment when you truly place yourself in their shoes and try to understand why they chose what they did. And maybe getting to that point begins with books. There has been extensive research into whether or not reading fiction improves ones capability for empathy (Surugue). It is suggested by a researcher named Oately that fiction novels stimulate “a social world which prompts empathy and understanding in the reader” (Surugue). Fiction novels seem to bring the reader into a complicated world and forces them to look through the main protagonist’s eyes, which actually forces them to emphasize with them on a certain level (Surugue). Interestingly enough, Surugue also states “Some studies have shown that fiction can even make you feel empathy for people who live very different live than you.” And that is our main problem. That is the solution for the gap that Recuber was talking about.
If we have such a problem emphasizing with people who are different from us, then why don’t we force ourselves to learn by reading fiction novels? And what better novel to start that journey on than Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The novel that centers around what empathy truly is surely can hold answers for many struggling to see both sides of any problem. If reading it can cause myself to empathize with beings I don’t see as “good,” then why can’t it do the same with anyone else that decides to delve into it?
Works Cited
Dick, Philip K, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? New York: The Random House Publishing Group, 1968. Print.
Recuber, Tim, “What Becomes of Empathy?” Cyborgology, 20 Jul. 2016, https://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2016/07/20/what-becomes-of-empathy/, Accessed 29 Sept. 2016.
Surugue, Lea, “Reading Books and Watching Films Makes You Kinder in Real Life”International Business Times, 19 Jul. 2016, https://via.hypothes.is/http:/www.ibtimes.co.uk/reading-books-watching-films-makes-you-kinder-real-life-1571434#annotations:_MOsQlpyEeaiesf9ed4wVw Accessed 29 Sept. 2016.
