Based on his interactions with foreign cultures, Darwin came to define empathy as a desire to end someone's suffering to assuage one's own discomfort.

Charles Darwin probably didn't know it, but he held views on human empathy that mirror Buddhist beliefs, says a pioneer in decoding facial expressions.

Based on his interactions with foreign cultures, Darwin came to define empathy as a desire to end someone's suffering to assuage one's own discomfort.

Buddhist teachings also see empathy as a somewhat selfish motivation, but one that the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet, calls the "seed of compassion."

"It's an amazing coincidence that [Darwin's] views on compassion and morality are identical to the Tibetan Buddhist view," said Paul Ekman, a psychologist whose work decoding