Abstract

Giacomo Rizzolatti and his colleagues from the University of Parma identified, through brain imaging studies, the existence of mirror neurons in the human brain. The fundamental implication is the direct relationship between action and perception, which allows us to understand, for example, the phenomenon of empathy. Now, can we argue that empathy is only an epiphenomenon of the functioning of mirror neurons? This article confronts scientific discoveries on empathy with the philosophical thought of Theodor Lipps and Edith Stein, as well as with the contributions, that border between neuroscience and philosophy, of Vittorio Gallese. The article defends that, although empathy has an imitative basis that can be understood by the action of mirror neurons, it is not sensible to identify them absolutely: empathy, even if its biological basis is accepted, is a broader phenomenon not reducible to neuronal activity.