I learned about these neurons that everyone has- called mirror neurons- that are supposedly the source of empathy in the brain. Here is how they work: if someone else smiles, the neurons in my brain that normally would cause me to smile start firing. In this way, you experience empathy by having the same processes go on in your brain that are going on in the other person’s brain. This is a really interesting concept to me because it means that you cannot truly understand how another person is feeling without experiencing it yourself (literally). This operates even on the most basic level (such as a smile as I mentioned before).
