There have been many criticisms of the concept of altruism. One often hears the criticism that there is no such thing as a self-less act. People suggest that all actions are motivated by self-interest. Critics of altruism point out that the altruist, at the minimum gets an emotional benefit from their altruistic actions. This fact gets presented as if it invalidated altruistic action.
I agree that altruistic actions do have an element of self-interest. We can correctly label actions done with an altruistic motivation as selfish action. The person doing the altruistic actions does benefit from those actions and usually has an awareness and anticipation of their own personal benefit. The motivation to achieve this kind of benefit qualifies as a kind of selfishness however; it is a superior kind of selfishness.
Altruism is a form of selfishness. Altruism is the best form of selfishness. It stands far above all other forms of selfishness. The motivation to experience the pleasure of helping others shines as one of the best forms of selfishness.
We cannot eliminate selfishness but we can refine selfishness to the point of altruistic selfishness. This can come from a recognition of the interconnected system in which we all function. All actions have unpredictable impact because of the interconnected system. A kind act done to one person can benefit many people. Likewise a cruel act done to one person can harm many.
The negative feedback cycle of revenge never ends because of unpredictable harm in the interconnected system. For all those whom you kill in revenge, there is someone who was connected to that person that will want to kill you or someone connected to you in revenge. Any harmful act can have the same unpredictable harm.
this brings back memories, all 27 of them…
altruism is not selfishness. this is the actual definition from dictionary.com
to say that altruism is selfishness is to completely ignore what it’s definition is. altruism, at it’s core, is selflessness. if you perform an altruistic act, you perform it purely for the benefit of others and no benefit for you whatsoever. this includes the motivation of pleasure because it is a benefit and altruism cannot have benefits.
i feel silly for not saying this myself a long time ago. people say “everything is selfish therefore there is no such thing as evil”. thats because they are irrationally clinging onto something they shouldnt want. if there are actions that cause happiness and actions that cause sadness, on purpose, then clearly one is better than the other. “gooder” as in “good” as in opposite of “evil”.
its so simple xander isnt it? apparently not as simple as we think. i believe the key to teaching people that altruism is a good thing is to go back in time and undo the trauma they experienced that is causing their psychological malfunction. i cant see any other possible origin for their stance on the matter.
vlad- some people argue that such altruism doesnt exist, all actions are selfish and therefore they are justified being selfish all they want, and anybody who wastes time fooling themselves into thinking that they are less selfish is an idiot.
I want to turn things on their head, but not really. I want to expose what is already there.
There is no such thing as a selfless act. All intention actions have an element of self-interest. Even if you want to do good merely so that you feel good, there is still a personal element to your motivation.
The other day I saw somebody, a woman it turned out, driving down the road with a pile of wood sheets stacked in the back of her truck. As she turned a corner, some of these sheets of wood fell out of her truck. I stopped my car and jumped out to help her load them back. After I had helped her I felt a warm contented glow. I was not concentrating on achieving that personal benefit when I stopped to help her, but I got it anyway. It may not have been on the forefront
If I felt absolutely no emotion after I had helped her, then want could possibly motivate me to aid another? Why would I bother to even help? Why, for that matter would anyone bother to do actions that benefited others, if they got absolutely zero benefit for themselves? There is always a benefit for you when you do actions that benefit others. It may be small, but it is there.
Oh, no. There is very little that is simple. Rarely is anything as simple as we think.
Time travel certainly isn’t easy to do. It looks mostly impossible.
Trauma is an inevitable element of being alive. How well we deal with our trauma has a profound influence upon our perspective. After we have been betrayed, how can we learn to ever trust again? Those who refuse to trust again cut themselves off from many different life experiences. Some of the greatest experiences in life are dependant on how much we can trust another person.
Well if you are using the term egoism as in an inflated sense of self-importance, then I would call egoism as the lowest quality type of selfishness. It is unrefined, crude selfishness. As opposed to altruism, which I consider high grade, refined, mature selfishness.
If Fred gets any benefit from helping Barney then his action qualifies as somewhat selfish. Fred cannot do any action that is completely selfless. All of Fred’s actions qualify as selfish. Everything Fred does will benefit Fred in some way.
The selfless action exists only in the imagination. There are no saints.
altruism is the equivalent of a state planned economy. it will fail, it will fail miserably, you will starve.
if you wont belive me, you are more than welcome to try. you can start by selling your house and donating the proceedings to ilp. if you dont, kindly shut up about it.
So people can’t argue for laws prohibiting homicide even if they will never kill another person, or prosecute a murderer for that matter.
I tried the altruism argument a while back Xander. Unfortunately Beena got ahold of it… and it never quite recovered
I first encountered it while reading about Evolutionary Psychology. Supposedly, Self Interest accords with evolution (that inescapable monolith) and ergo, all actions ultimately serve some selfish purpose.
Ok, now following the same line of reasoning I present the counter-argument.
If Barney gets any benefit from Fred’s action then his action qualifies as somewhat selfless. Fred cannot do any action that is completely selfish. All of Fred’s actions qualify as selfless. Everything Fred does will benefit someone in some way.
If no completely selfless act exists, then neither does any completely selfish act.
I never argued that there are such things as selfless acts. Though that doesn’t mean all actions are selfish.
You have to remain consistant however. So, if you consider an act selfish just because there is a hint of selfishness in that act then I could consider an act selfless just because there is a hint of selflessness in it.
The term selflessness denotes a lack of a selfish motive. If any selfish motive exists, the act cannot be selfless.
If white is the absence of any and all colors and a smudge of, say, red is apparent then the sample is not entirely white. For an act to be truly selfless requires that said act be devoid of any selfishness.
On the other hand, the term selfish denotes at least one particle of motivation in regards to the self. If an act is 99.9999999% selfless but still consists of just a tiny bit of selfishness it certainly isn’t selfess. It may not be entirely selfish, but it isn’t selfless.
Ironically true. We do all things because we gain something from doing so. If we do the most selfless act possible, at the very least, we still do it because it gives us satisfaction in knowing that what we’ve just done was “selfless”.
but if you stopped and helped her without any thought of yourself, then AFTER you were done you felt warm and fuzzy inside, why did you stop to help her in the first place? you thought only of the fact that she needed help and you helped her without any thought beforehand that you WOULD feel that way. THAT’S selflessness (aka altruism). Selfishness can only defined, therefore, as doing something to get that feeling, not having the feeling as a side effect.
you WOULD be completely right except that you kind of forgot time exists.
and, besides, even if he did not stop to help the women for personal satisfaction, he was at the very least, doing it to keep away a guilty conscience.
I’ve honestly never found any would could honestly admitt they love being selfless all of the time as a “full-time hobby”, if you catch my drift.
Well, I’ve read through all the threads in this thread, and think that both “sides” have excellent arguments, but I still feel that 100% selfless-ness can only be completely true in the form of a concept----not an action or deed.
We subconsciencely pick out the cloths we wear each day according to how we think it will make us look (with the exception of those rare days when we are not paying attention and pick out cloths whose colors don’t match).
We help others for these reasons:
We get direct satisfaction from it
We get “subconscience” or indirect satisfact by doing it–even if out of subconscience fellings of duty.
We do it to directs keep from having a guilt conscience. Either way it all points back to us.
This was certainly NOT the first time I had ever done an altruistic deed in my entire life. I had done deeds like this before.
I would claim, although I cannot distinctly remember, that my parents taught me this association when I was learning cause and effect. Do a deed that benefits another get a warm fuzzy.
I can remember later on when I was still quite young helping my mother clean house and feeling the emotional pleasure after doing it. This experience re-enforced the original learning.
I was originally taught about the benefits of doing good, but if I lacked the capacity to experience these feelings then the lesson would have failed. Without the self serving motivation of emotional pleasure then I would have no motivation to continue doing altruistic deeds.