Capitol Hill Blue Forums Life and Moral Issues Morality & Society Altruism -- a load of piffle?

Oxford English Dictionary notes that while the specific word as a matter of philosophy originated with Monsieur Comte, the concept existed prior:
Sorry, can't provide a link; to the best of my knowledge one cannot link to OED without a paid subscription. The above citation is from my CD copy of the Shorter edition. (The printed version is great for Scrabble!)

Any good Latin students who can elucidate the matter further in a linguistic sense, how the concept functioned within the language before Monsieur Comte decided to transform it from an every day occurrence into a school of philosophy?

Your remarks do seem rooted in a fixation on "selflessness" being an inseparable part of "altruism", isso. I don't attach that requirement to the term. Just because one derives benefit from something does not automatically mean one is being "selfish". In between "selfish" and "selfless" there is a wide range of mutually beneficial action that describes a great deal of perfectly normal human behavior.

Altruism is a completely synthetic concept... by which I mean that it does not have the solid existence of... for instance... the Grand Canyon. It is a term that has different meanings to different people; it is a term whose meaning is not perpetually fixed by the conception of first person who used the term.

Because of the above, we could indefinitely continue discussions about the "real" meaning of the term. I conjecture that Iss does not care for the concept or the ideas associated with it and therefore will seek to define it in a way that makes it easy to show the term to be "piffle."

One can observe that even ants will sacrifice their lives for their social group. It is unlikely that their sacrifice comes after moral philosophical reflection. On the other hand it also seems likely that animals who live in social groups have developed mechanisms by which members of that group "sacrifice" their interests for the greater good of the group. Perhaps the major difference here is that the human animal has developed some conscious thought process about the subject.... and attached the word "altruism" to some of those behaviours that the group wishes to encourage in order to better flourish.

I found this in the Ayn Rand lexicon (www.aynrandlexicon.com):


I found this here:


The latter quote is how I perceive the concept of altruism.

EmmaG

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Issodhos has initiated a very interesting discussion. Some people might accuse him of having a perverse sense of humor, since he has placed restrictions on the meaning of "altruism" so that it would be impossible for any action not to be motivated by self-gratification. I would not dare to make such a criticism, of course, since many people might find my own sense of humor to be somewhat perverse. "People who live in glass houses should not throw stones."

Among all the people of the world, Westerners seem to be the most absorbed in their egos, and among Westerners, Americans seem to be those who are generally most absorbed in seeing life as a series of transactions engaged in for profit. I must admit that I find such an attitude to be very low and debased, and not one worthy to be a part of a true human life. I think it is fit only for the pig-sty.

I think Stereoman made a very important point:


Such a lot depends on one's point of view. Life is often like one of those ambiguous pictures that looks one way if one's brain processes the image in a certain fashion, and looks like a completely different thing if perceived under a different mode of processing the image.

If one is not overly concerned with one's ego, so many of these moral "problems" just disappear from the picture. I have often done things of benefit for other people, in ways that more self-absorbed people thought were reckless and damaging to myself. I find it amazing how often such actions have worked to my benefit, often in quite surprising ways. I am quite sure that calculations of self-benefit were quite absent from my motivations, nor, in many cases, could they have been foreseen. What I did seemed as natural as breathing --- feeling my way to a little more harmony and beauty in my environment.

I opine that the more that one perceives harmony and beauty and truth, the more does self-gratification vanish from one's relations with the universe --- it becomes trivial and unimportant.

Though I find their views repugnant and harmful, I am also amused at the attitudes of those who 'think' that "the guy who accumulates the most toys, wins." A moment's clear reflection tells you that when you die, that is the end of personal existence. What is the significance of accumulating toys, conquests, and personal gratification? The moment you have breathed your last breath, they are all as if they had never been.

As the Buddhists say, all things are "as illusions in the sky, a fault of vision, as a lamp, a mock show, dew drops, or a bubble, a dream, a lightning flash, or cloud...." All these things have their place in the pageant of existence, but to imagine that there is anything enduring about them is ridiculous.

I do not know what is the ultimate nature of existence, but I sense that there is something wonderful, harmonious and beautiful in the enduring mystery of Truth. I certainly cannot prove this to the satisfaction of a logician; one cannot hold the sun or moon in one's hand; the best one can do is to lift one's hand and point to them shining in the sky.

I received a lasting impression when I visited the city museum of Taibei, Taiwan. There were a number of ancient ceramic plaques with images impressed upon them, scenes of Buddhist mythology and symbolism, expressive of Buddhist doctrine and philosophy. These plaques were very ancient, dating from the Tang Dynasty, more than a thousand years old. Originally, they were plastered on the outer façade of Buddhist temples. What was interesting about them was that they contained human ashes mixed in with the clay out of which they were made. When devout Buddhists died, they had their bodies cremated, and the remaining ashes were incorporated in these plaques, so that even in death they could continue to proclaim the essential, eternal truth of Buddhism: the transcience of all things. There is a wonderful, paradoxical, Chinese quality to what they did. Eternal truth proclaimed by the dead ashes of vanished men? What is in fact enduring, and what must pass and fade? Very few of these plaques remain, a mere handful in a glass case in a museum. At some point in time, not one of them will remain. Yet the strange, paradoxical, eternal truth that all things pass away will remain, ready to pop up out of non-existence whenever there is a mind able to perceive it.

Also, what they did took more courage than might appear. In traditional China, it was considered vital to bury family members with proper rites and in propitious locations. The future happiness of an entire family was considered to depend on this. The people who mixed their ashes into plaques did something that was roughly equivalent to us throwing the bodies of our dead parents by the side of the road for dogs to eat. They apparently thought proclaiming Truth to be more important than following social convention.

Was what they did altruistic, or not? I think the question blushes to annihilation in a world view in which Truth is real, and ego an illusion.

Numan,

The first time and many other times I struggled not so much to selflessly help someone, but to do it without desire of any discernable recognition. I still struggle with it.


I can say that most times now I don't do it because I expect any reward, but the results have changed somewhat. Avoiding any recognition at all for altruistic acts can give you a sense of power. That's not good either. It's all wrapped up in ego. As Numan says, ego is an illusion. How can all this is possibly be rewarded by all that is for being kind to all that is?

The more thought given to an action, the less likely it is altruism, given that the very purpose of thinking is to preserve the ego-self

That is why I have come up with the following apothegm --- with which I am sure many people who read my postings will heartily agree:

When I know not what I say,
No selfish thought I do betray.

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I agree that there is a distinction made between a more formal and a less formal usage of the word. The more formal usage is seen in such things as public service, charitable activities, political activities and even the idea that society must be redesigned to be based on altruism. I think the work becomes even less meaningful when applied to these categories of action.

Whether it be Mother Theresa, Save the Children, community organizers, Habitat for Humanity, etc., they are motivated to satisfy their own needs, desires, and expectations. This does not mean that what they do might not be a good thing, but the idea that a thing named "altruism" is involved seems to me to be ludicruous. How does one voluntarilly do what one chooses to do and then try to claim it is not motivated by a satisfaction to self?
Yours,
Issodhos