Thank you for the follow-up post. The distinction between empathy and the attribution of "moral agency" is a very helpful update and greatly clarifies the crux of your original argument.
That said, your conflict doesn't seem to stem from simply attributing moral agency, but from an implicit assumption about the *utility function* that all moral agents *should* be optimizing.
If we model humans as self-optimizing agents, we can distinguish between:
1. Terminal Goals: The final, intrinsic objective. I would argue that for most humans, this approximates so...
What you're describing doesn't seem to be empathy in its fullest sense; it seems more like a projection of your own biases and anxieties onto others, disguised as empathy. Real empathy generally involves trying to understand what it's like to be the other person—including their fears, their desires, their biochemistry, their traumas, and their particular worldview—not simply imagining yourself in their place by applying your own frame of reference and then looking down on them for not sharing it.
I believe Iran is definitely going to trie develop nuclear weapons as soon as they regain the capability to do so; I think it's inevitable. Iran was already in a relatively stable equilibrium with Israel and the US by remaining at the threshold of nuclear weapons development, without actually possessing them (because that would provoke an all-out war), but with enough fissile material to build them in months or weeks if necessary (which is why Netanyahu has been claiming for over a decade that they are "weeks" away from having a bomb).
With this war, there ... (read more)