Altruism - Is it a lie?

[Revan]

I'd rather have a negative view point though. It prepares us more for this world.

This I must agree with in a way. If you plan for the worst, all your surprises will be pleasant ones.

Take it Easy
--Avatar

Yeah, and if you plan for the best, and then something bad happens; it hurts you more.

[sindatur]

Darth, no I don't think being cynical is a bad thing, I think it can be blinding to the good in the world, though. The world is a really frelled up place, but, there are good people.

I have been is a similar situation, and followed through on my beliefs, and fortunately was rewarded with not dying, so, I am sure I would jump in front of the bullet.

And yes, I have known someone who every school year gives up the money they would be partying with, in order to be able to afford "back to school" for their child. Sorry your mother didn't.

And numerous women who have given up smoking and drinking during their pregnancy, so their child would have a greater possibility of being born without health defects.

I don't think you have to be a cold cynical person in order to get by in the world, yes you have to accept people will often do the worng thing or do the right thing for selfish reasons, but, I prefer not to automatically assume they will do the wrong thing, just don't live in such a rosy world where eyou believe veryone always does the right thing.

[Revan]

You mention that mothers stop drinking and smoking while they're pregnant... if you read back in this thread, I do say that Mothers (some, certainly not mine) can be selfless when it comes to their children. So I'll agree with you on that point.

I just you're right on some points... I won't deny that people can do good... I mean look at Furls. Took in three kids with illnesses in her home. That's what you call human goodness. I admit, It touches me when I see a mother who loves their child selflessly. i DO see beauty as well as foulness in the human souls... I mean love is an example of that... Love is the most wonderful thing a person can experience... well, that's my believe.

[wayfriend]

because people here seem to be blind to the fact that humans are selfish...

Speaking for myself, I can say that I am not blind to this fact.

What I deny is that it is impossible to act unselfishly because selfishness exists.

I really need to quote from Silverlock here. Alas, the text is home, I am working. I will paraphrase:

If you believe if there is good, there must be evil also, how can you believe that, if there is evil, there must not be also good?

So I ask you, Darth, where is it written that an unselfish act cannot have a selfish component? That unselfishness must be pure or else it cannot be?

[variol son]

Perhaps we are looking at two different dictionaries.

I would jump in front of a bullet and sacrifice myself to save my soulmate's life. Not because I believe myself to be lower, but because of love, unselfish love.

hmmm... Would you really? I would like to think I would to... but you would probably just freeze up. Being too scared to even move. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure you wouldn't let any harm come to your soulmate on purpose... But the truth is, you honestly don't know if you'd jump to take a bullet. Unless you've been in that situation before.

I love you Darth, but you assume an aweful lot about what others would and would not do in certain situations. When it comes to jumping in front of a bullet, I know what I would do, but I can't even say what my best friends would do, let alone other Watchers.

You mention that mothers stop drinking and smoking while they're pregnant... if you read back in this thread, I do say that Mothers (some, certainly not mine) can be selfless when it comes to their children. So I'll agree with you on that point.

But if you agree with that Darth, you are saying that altruism isn't a lie, but that it is VERY RARE in human beings, and usually only present in certain circumstances, which is something I totally agree with.

Sum sui generis
Vs

[Revan]

I'm saying there is no such thing as an altruistic person. A completely non-selfish person, in every aspect of their life Variol. Stopping smoking and drinking while your pregnant does not make you a completely altruistic human.

[sindatur]

I'm saying there is no such thing as an altruistic person. A completely non-selfish person, in every aspect of their life Variol. Stopping smoking and drinking while your pregnant does not make you a completely altruistic human.

Cool. Then it seems you now can see Altruism does indeed exist in individual acts, and your disagreement is now with the idea of a completely altruistic person. Which I think most can agree with.

[wayfriend]

I'm saying there is no such thing as an altruistic person. A completely non-selfish person, in every aspect of their life Variol. Stopping smoking and drinking while your pregnant does not make you a completely altruistic human.

Well, duh.

But that's not what we're here to talk about. We're here to talk about the draft. No, we're here to talk about "atruism is a lie".

There is no such thing as a person who is completly unselfish in every respect of their life.

But can one person somewhere can perform one act sometime that is not selfish.

Therefore, altruism is.

[variol son]

I'm saying there is no such thing as an altruistic person. A completely non-selfish person, in every aspect of their life Variol. Stopping smoking and drinking while your pregnant does not make you a completely altruistic human.

So altruism isn't a lie. It's just that no person can be COMPLETELY altruistic. Kewl.

Sum sui generis
Vs

[Revan]

I'm saying there is no such thing as an altruistic person. A completely non-selfish person, in every aspect of their life Variol. Stopping smoking and drinking while your pregnant does not make you a completely altruistic human.

So altruism isn't a lie. It's just that no person can be COMPLETELY altruistic. Kewl.

Sum sui generis
Vs

Alright, topic concluded. But it's rare that a person can be altruistic in any aspect of their life at all. But I think it can happen with Mothers... even if it didn't happen with mine...

[CovenantJr]

I love you Darth, but you assume an aweful lot about what others would and would not do in certain situations.

Indeed. One of the most important things I've learned in recent years is that it's folly to assume other people are like you.

[Revan]

I love you Darth, but you assume an aweful lot about what others would and would not do in certain situations.

Indeed. One of the most important things I've learned in recent years is that it's folly to assume other people are like you.

I didn't say that people would act like me... I just said people would probably freeze up... not meaning that I'd freeze up... because I honestly don't know how I would react... because I've never been in that situatuon.

[Nathan]

Ah, I wish I'd seen this topic before, don't know how I missed it.

This discussion is one I often have with my friends/family. I agree absolutely with the statement "altruism is a lie", or at least "Pure altruism is a lie". I'd prefer it to say "Every action is self-gratifying" though. It means basically the same thing but seems more clarified.

I don't think any action anyone has ever performed has been anything other than self-gratifying. No motive outweighs the comfort of the person performing the action.

I would jump in front of a bullet and sacrifice myself to save my soulmate's life. Not because I believe myself to be lower, but because of love, unselfish love.

I don't mean any disrespect by this but I don't believe there's such thing as unselfish love. Why do you love your soul mate? Because you enjoy spending time with them, talking to them, being with them. These are selfish motives, you would not be comfortable in a life without your soulmate, you'd rather be dead than live without them. You save their life because it's preferable FOR YOU to not live without them (The guilt of letting them die would also be another selfish motivator for sacrificing yourself for their benefit. Even if there was nothing you could do to prevent their death). Again, I don't mean to disrespect you. Such love is admirable, it says something about you as a person, just because an action is selfish doesn't make it worthless.

Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, worth is subjective. No act selfish or unselfish can have a value other than the one each individual places upon it.

There's also the argument that everything everyone does it purely a "reflex" based on experience, every "choice" everyone makes is the only choice they can make given that their experiences through life have shaped every aspect of their character. This is another one I happen to believe in, and although it's not directly relevant here it does have interesting areas of overlap.

[Revan]

Ah, I wish I'd seen this topic before, don't know how I missed it.

This discussion is one I often have with my friends/family. I agree absolutely with the statement "altruism is a lie", or at least "Pure altruism is a lie". I'd prefer it to say "Every action is self-gratifying" though. It means basically the same thing but seems more clarified.

I don't think any action anyone has ever performed has been anything other than self-gratifying. No motive outweighs the comfort of the person performing the action.

I would jump in front of a bullet and sacrifice myself to save my soulmate's life. Not because I believe myself to be lower, but because of love, unselfish love.

I don't mean any disrespect by this but I don't believe there's such thing as unselfish love. Why do you love your soul mate? Because you enjoy spending time with them, talking to them, being with them. These are selfish motives, you would not be comfortable in a life without your soulmate, you'd rather be dead than live without them. You save their life because it's preferable FOR YOU to not live without them (The guilt of letting them die would also be another selfish motivator for sacrificing yourself for their benefit. Even if there was nothing you could do to prevent their death). Again, I don't mean to disrespect you. Such love is admirable, it says something about you as a person, just because an action is selfish doesn't make it worthless.

Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, worth is subjective. No act selfish or unselfish can have a value other than the one each individual places upon it.

There's also the argument that everything everyone does it purely a "reflex" based on experience, every "choice" everyone makes is the only choice they can make given that their experiences through life have shaped every aspect of their character. This is another one I happen to believe in, and although it's not directly relevant here it does have interesting areas of overlap.

What an excellent post

thankyou Nathan! I thought the same about the jump in front of a bullet thing. But didn't quite know how to put it... You put it excellently. And without offence. Which is more than I could have done.

[Avatar]

I agree that it is an excellent post. However, you neglect to address the question of whether these motivations are conscious ones or not.

I contend that if they are not conscious, then it doesn't negate the altruism of any act. It is only a selfish act in the way that we are discussing if the motive is deliberately considered. i.e. "I will jump in front of that bullet because I don't want to have the pain of living without that person."

In other words, it is non-altruistic if the "actor" percieves that he will gain from it, but not if the question of gain doesn't enter into his descision making process. I think that there is a big difference between deliberate selfishness and unconscious selfishness in so far as it negates altruism.

Although we could stretch a point and claim that the fact that any gain can be accrued makes an act selfish, I'm not sure that it counts toward demeaning the "actor" if he has no conscious expectation of such gain.

--Avatar

[Nathan]

I contend that if they are not conscious, then it doesn't negate the altruism of any act. It is only a selfish act in the way that we are discussing if the motive is deliberately considered. i.e. "I will jump in front of that bullet because I don't want to have the pain of living without that person."

Every action is either conscious or instinct/habit. Habit forms from conscious actions repeated, and since all conscious actions are necessarily self-serving (because humans can do nothing else except pick the path of perceived least discomfort) habits are self-serving also. Instinct is not a conscious choice, since it is not a conscious choice it cannot be called either altruistic or selfish/unselfish because the action isn't a conscious one. I haven't explained that very well, I hope you understand what i mean.

Although we could stretch a point and claim that the fact that any gain can be accrued makes an act selfish, I'm not sure that it counts toward demeaning the "actor" if he has no conscious expectation of such gain.

Agreed, a selfish action can have worth, and an action of worth causes the actor to have worth also.

[I'm Murrin]

Moral conditioning causes seemingly selfless acts to become self-gratifying. In the same way that we feel good when we get money because we have been raised to think of having money as a good thing, if we have been taught that doing selfless things is good, then we will do these acts because we feel good to know that we have done something we were taught is good to do.
However, Avatar is right - it is usually unconscious.

[Avatar]

I know what you mean there, but I have to disagree with the following:

...(because humans can do nothing else except pick the path of perceived least discomfort)

The world is full of examples of people choosing the path of least comfort. Admittedly that path may lead to greater comfort later on, but what must be endured in order to reach something percieved as more "comfortable" can sometimes be so awful that we wonder why they bother.

If peole did nothing but choose the easiest path, nobody would ever kick a heroin habit, or even a tobacco one. (just the first example I could think of).

I agree with Murrin on the conditioning, but my question remains do we do these acts so that we can feel good? Or is the "feel-good" factor a beneficial side-efect?

--Avatar

[Nathan]

If peole did nothing but choose the easiest path, nobody would ever kick a heroin habit, or even a tobacco one. (just the first example I could think of).

Not the easiest path, the most comfortable. Heroin addicts are often short on money, having spent most of it on their expensive heroin. Having more money and less addiction would certainly be more comfortable. There is also the chance that they will be caught stealing to fund their addiction, or be imprisoned for possession. Some people perceive the more comfortable life afterward to be worth the pain of quitting.

[Nathan]

I agree with Murrin on the conditioning, but my question remains do we do these acts so that we can feel good? Or is the "feel-good" factor a beneficial side-efect?

We do them so we can feel good. Darth mentioned earlier that you'd only give as much to a beggar as you can safely spare. If you didn't care about feeling good you'd give him as much as you could until he had equal possessions as yourself (or more, if you were feeling REALLY altruistic). But who does this? Even if they did they'd be doing it because it was the path of least discomfort. Maybe they feel uncontrollable guilt that they are better off than others. Maybe they feel uncomfortable walking past a beggar with coins jangling in their pockets and not giving him anything. I don't know, but I do know this: Every action I've ever performed has been purely self-serving. I care what happens to other people only in the way that what happens to them will affect me.

I care what happens to my parents because I love them, and if something bad happened to them it would make me feel bad. This is selfish. To be unselfish would be to care what happened to someone PURELY because you cared, not because their happiness makes you happy, not because their unhappiness makes you feel guilty.

It is impossible for a human to be both altruistic and selfish at the same time, but it is also impossible for someone to be altruistic and completely unselfish because altruism is an act of kindness, and performing kind acts gives happiness to the actor indirectly through the happiness of the receiver.

I seem to be going in circles and making a real hash of this, so I'll end it here. If I haven't explained it properly by now I am probably unable to.