Is there such a word as "empathetic"? I say the actual word is "empathic"?

Question

People always say "empathetic", but I do not see it in my American Heritage Dictionary. I do see "empathic" as the adjective for "empathy". This is a pet peeve of mine! Now, you might say "well, sympathy/sympathetic and empathy/empathetic sounds about right", but I really think it is a mistake. I do not believe "empathetic" is a real word, but is used so much that it is becoming slang.

Answer 1

Maybe you need to look again huney! There is such a word.

Answer 2

language is mutable, and if people use a word, it's a word. Even if originally, it started as a mispronounciation.

If you look at the origins of various words, a lot of the the more interesting ones are degenerative versions of earlier words.

We have a tendency to put the written word and its conventions above the spoken word, as since the west has adopted near-universal literacy, the oral culture is not valued as much. And I think this is an example where people's desire to pronounce a word a certain way is affecting the spelling of it... maybe a few decades from now, the dictionary will read "empathetic" where it used to say "empathic".

That said, I empathise (or is that empathize?) with your irritation, a little bit. I hate it when people say "at this point in time" which is redundant - say "at this point" OR "at this time" ....!

Answer 3

Empathetic is the correct word to use.

An empathic being can intimately sense the emotions of others, but not individual thought patterns.

Answer 4

You are wrong...look at the word just above empathic.

Answer 5

There is such a word

Answer 6

You are correct!

Answer 7

It's in my copy!

It's also here: