The proofs for the actual physical existence of the seven values in specific genes is under investigation in numerous genome research laboratories around the world, including the U.K., France, and the U.S. The following is an example.
“Finding that even a fraction of why we differ in empathy is due to genetic factors helps us understand people, such as those with autism, who struggle to imagine another person’s thoughts and feelings,” comments Simon Baron-Cohen, Ph.D., director of the Autism Research Centre at the University of Cambridge in the U.K., who is co-corresponding author of the team’s paper published today in Translational Psychiatry (“Genome-Wide Analyses of Self-Reported Empathy: Correlations with Autism, Schizophrenia, and Anorexia Nervosa”).
“Empathy is the ability to recognize and respond to the emotional states of other individuals,” the authors write. “It is an important psychological process that facilitates navigating social interactions and maintaining relationships, which are important for well-being.” There are two different aspects to empathy. Cognitive empathy refers to the ability to recognize another person’s thoughts and feelings, while affective empathy is the ability to respond with an appropriate emotion.” [Emphasis added.]
The phrase, “affective empathy is the ability to respond with an appropriate emotion,” is identified by the author as Compassion, the extension of one’s self in action to come to the aid of another. In this case, empathy is the innate urging value with compassion as a volitional choice — to act on the urging of empathy or not to act. Depending upon the situation that initiated empathy to come into play, the decision to act or not becomes a conscious moral decision.
The second method of proof for empathy is reflected in the work of empathy researchers who used self-reporting for evidence of feelings of empathy by over 65,000 individuals. The process of proof the author used was far less rigorous, but sufficient to suggest that the seven values produced behaviors that reflected their use for decision-making by all members of our species. The consistent preponderance of evidence strongly suggests that, yes, these values are innate to the Homo sapiens species, past and present.