Why egoism is wrong

For its most recent presentation, see Rachels and Rachels For an introduction to these questions, see Im partiality by Shane Gronholz. Baier, Kurt. Rand, Ayn. New York: New American Library, Rachels, James and Rachels, Stuart. The Elements of Moral Philosophy , 9th Edition , 1st edition. Boston: McGraw-Hill, Zalta ed. Deontology: Kantian Ethics by Andrew Chapman. Consequentialism by Shane Gronholz. Im partiality by Shane Gronholz. Happiness by Kiki Berk. Speciesism by Dan Lowe.

Evolution and Ethics by Michael Klenk. Social Contract Theory by David Antonini. In order to see why there cannot be any psychological egoists, we must first come to a clear or clearer understanding of what psychological egoism involves, and that will be the task that occupies us initially in what follows. Someone who thinks it is his duty to help others and who accordingly does just that acts conscientiously, and since their conscience is directing them to help others, they lack any egoistic or ulterior motive for what they do on behalf of other people.

In some sense one can call such behavior and such motivation altruistic, but there is a narrower and, I think, more accurate sense of the term in which it is not. Of course, some philosophers, in fact many philosophers, have questioned whether there can be or actually is such a thing as altruistic human motivation in the above sense. Many of us have thought that Bishop Butler in his sermons settled that issue over three centuries ago, but in recent decades there has been a flurry of interest in the question of whether human altruism exists and many have thought they could show that it likely never does exist.

I am not going to go through the entire philosophical thicket of such arguments here. Rather, I shall try to review what I take to be the philosophical import of those discussions by homing in on the highlights of what I just described as a philosophical thicket. But then it turns out that Butler himself conceived things more narrowly than I think we have reason to, and what I have to say on these topics will then lead us toward an explanation of why altruism is impossible.

Let us proceed step by step. I want first to consider a new way of arguing for psychological egoism that has been offered in recent decades specific references can be found in the two books mentioned above. But such motivation, it is argued, is egoistic, and, it is further argued, it is very difficult to show that we ever help others without such background motives. This then, according to the argument, places the psychological possibility of altruism in serious doubt. In my estimation, this sort of thinking goes wrong not only in the way it moves toward denying the possibility or likelihood of human altruism, but also and most importantly for our immediate purposes in the way it conceives psychological egoism.

It treats the desire for the good opinion of others as an egoistic motive and that is in my opinion a deep mistake. I agree that it is possible to view the desire for the esteem or approval of others as a widespread human motive, even as a basic motive in human psychology.

That is precisely A. Rather, it looks for what it can get from others, not for what it can do for others; and those who have argued that the desire to help others can be based solely in the desire for their approval or non-disapproval and that it in such cases is not altruistic are certainly right to that extent. But it is a mistake to suppose that this way of looking at or thinking about human attempts to help others tends to support psychological egoism.

But, as Maslow amply indicated and commonsense also suggests, the desire for the esteem of others is very often perhaps in the majority of cases not like this. This is what Maslow meant by saying we have a basic desire to be esteemed or approved or liked by others. Wanting more money is in most cases egoistic, and when the desire for others to like or approve of one is grounded solely in that motive, it is certainly operating under the aegis of egoism and is not merely non-altruistic.

But an intrinsic desire to be liked will not count as egoistic in this way, and in fact there is nothing egoistic at all about it. Now a natural counterargument can be given at this point. It can be said that in the case of the so-called intrinsic or basic desire for others to like or esteem one, one will be pleased if one gains their esteem and at least somewhat unhappy if one does not.

Certainly not. As Butler essentially taught us, one only gets the pleasure in such cases if one independently wants to see others happy or happier. But the same considerations transpose to the case of wanting others to like or esteem one. The pleasure someone feels when they know or believe they are liked or esteemed arguably only shows how much independent importance they place on being liked or esteemed. It does nothing to show that such a motive is egoistic. The arguments just given tend toward the conclusion, then, that the desire to be liked or esteemed or approved or, for that matter, loved is neither altruistic nor egoistic.

Butler most famously argued that malice and revenge are not egoistic obviously they are not altruistic , and in order to do so he mentioned some of the considerations or arguments I have brought out above.

But malice and revenge are in an important sense negative—they seek the suffering or death of others, and the fact of this negativity may have been part of what prevented him from calling such motives neutral. Still, his point that people acting from the motive of revenge will seek the suffering or destruction of others even at a considerable cost to themselves cutting off their nose to spite their face played an important part in his attempt to persuade people that malice and revenge are not egoistic.

He then compared the motivational structure of compassion and benevolence with that of malice and revenge in order to show that the former too are not egoistic and can be considered altruistic in a way the latter obviously are not.

Understanding curiosity or inquisitiveness better will help us see how widely and deeply and variously neutral motivation occurs in human lives. Curiosity can serve the purpose or purposes of human or animal survival.

But there have been studies showing that animals can be curious independently of their desire for food or survival. A child can be curious about the moon or about ancient Egypt having seen pictures of the pyramids, and adults can be similarly curious, but none of this has to be in the service of other more basic needs or desires.

As Aristotle tells us in the Metaphysics , man sic by nature desires to know. This much is common sense. But think what it implies. If I want to learn about my surroundings because I think I need to do so in order to survive, then my desire to know is egoistic.

But if I want to know about things out of sheer or basic curiosity, ulterior motives are out of the picture and, as Butler saw, there is no reason to characterize the motivation involved as egoistic. When I want to know about ancient Egypt or the moon for its own sake, I place a certain importance on finding out about Egypt or the moon. We can even say that I thereby place a certain intrinsic importance on, say, the moon. It becomes important to me independently of whether it can provide me with good things other than the sheer knowing more about it.

I would say that this fact of attributed importance is basic and essential to the non-egoistic character of the curiosity about the moon or of curiosity more generally. To be curious for survival purposes places curiosity in the service of the self and places no intrinsic or independent of oneself importance on learning what one seeks to learn.

But ordinary curiosity is not instrumental like that and counts as non-egoistic on that basis. The same considerations apply to revenge. Although the vengeful person might not like and would be surprised perhaps to hear this, their desire for revenge ascribes a certain intrinsic importance in their life to the person they want to take revenge against.

Yet this latter is part of the psychology of revenge and that shows the non-egoistic character of ordinary revenge.

One hypothesis is altrustic: empathy causes a non-instrumental desire to help. There are many competing egoistic hypotheses. Empathy might cause an unpleasant experience that subjects believe they can stop by helping; or subjects might think failing to help in cases of high empathy is more likely to lead to punishment by others, or that helping here is more likely to be rewarded by others; or subjects might think this about self-administered punishment or reward.

In an ingenious series of experiments, Batson compared the egoistic hypotheses, one by one, against the altruistic hypothesis. He found that the altruistic hypothesis always made superior predictions. Against the unpleasant experience hypothesis, Batson found that giving high-empathy subjects easy ways of stopping the experience other than by helping did not reduce helping.

Against the punishment by others hypothesis, Batson found that letting high-empathy subjects believe that their behaviour would be secret did not reduce helping. Against the self-administered reward hypothesis, Batson found that the mood of high-empathy subjects depended on whether they believed that help was needed, whether or not they could do the helping, rather than on whether they helped and so could self-reward.

Against the self-administered punishment hypothesis, Batson found that making high-empathy subjects believe they would feel less guilt from not helping by letting them believe that few others had volunteered to help did not reduce helping. One might quibble with some of the details. Perhaps subjects did not believe that the easy ways of stopping the painful experience Batson provided, such as leaving the viewing room, would stop it.

For an account of an experiment done in reply, favouring Batson, see Stich, Doris and Roedder , as well as Batson — Perhaps a Batson-proof egoistic hypothesis could be offered: say that subjects believe that the only way of stopping the pain or avoiding self-punishment is by helping though whether subjects have this belief might be tested for on its own.

For further discussion of Batson, see May a and Slote Second, Elliot Sober and David Wilson argue that evolutionary theory supports altruism. Parental care might also be explained on altruistic grounds: the parent has a non-instrumental desire that the child do well. Lastly, parental care might be explained by a combination of these mechanisms. Sober and Wilson argue that more reliable care would be provided by the altruistic or combination mechanisms.

Given the importance of parental care, this is a reason for thinking that natural selection would have favoured one of these mechanisms. This argument has drawbacks.

Natural selection does not always provide back-up mechanisms I have but one liver. Natural selection sometimes has my desires caused by affect that is produced by a belief rather than directly by the belief my desire to run away from danger is often caused by my fear, rather than by the mere belief that there is danger. And in these cases, as in the case of the imperfectly correlated pain and bodily injury, there seems usually to be enough affect.

The altruistic hypothesis also has some of the same problems: for example, just as there might not be enough pain, the non-instrumental desire that the child do well might not be strong enough to defeat other desires. Indeed, without an estimate of how strong this desire is, there is no reason to think the egoistic hypothesis is less reliable. It may have more points at which it can go wrong, but produce more care than a direct but weak altruistic mechanism.

For many of these worries, and others, see Stich, Doris and Roedder Even if evolutionary arguments can be met, however, psychological egoism faces the problems noted earlier. Predominant egoism is not troubled by the soldier counter-example, since it allows exceptions; it is not trivial; and it seems empirically plausible.

For other weakened positions, see LaFollette and Mercer Ethical egoism claims that I morally ought to perform some action if and only if, and because, performing that action maximizes my self-interest. There are possibilities other than maximization. One might, for example, claim that one ought to achieve a certain level of welfare, but that there is no requirement to achieve more. Ethical egoism might also apply to things other than acts, such as rules or character traits.

Since these variants are uncommon, and the arguments for and against them are largely the same as those concerning the standard version, I set them aside. One issue concerns how much ethical egoism differs in content from standard moral theories. It might appear that it differs a great deal. After all, moral theories such as Kantianism, utilitarianism, and common-sense morality require that an agent give weight to the interests of others.

They sometimes require uncompensated sacrifices, particularly when the loss to the agent is small and the gain to others is large. Say the cost to me of saving a drowning person is getting my shirtsleeve wet. Ethical egoists can reply, however, that egoism generates many of the same duties to others. The argument runs as follows. Each person needs the cooperation of others to obtain goods such as defense or friendship. If I act as if I give no weight to others, others will not cooperate with me.

If, say, I break my promises whenever it is in my direct self-interest to do so, others will not accept my promises, and may even attack me. I do best, then, by acting as if others have weight provided they act as if I have weight in return. It is unlikely that this argument proves that ethical egoism generates all of the standard duties to others. For the argument depends on the ability of others to cooperate with me or attack me should I fail to cooperate.

In dealings with others who lack these abilities, the egoist has no reason to cooperate. The duties to others found in standard moral theories are not conditional in this way.

I do not, for example, escape a duty to save a drowning person, when I can easily do so, just because the drowning person or anyone watching happens never to be able to offer fruitful cooperation or retaliation. First, the ethical egoist will rank as most important duties that bring her the highest payoff.

Standard moral theories determine importance at least in part by considering the payoff to those helped. What brings the highest payoff to me is not necessarily what brings the highest payoff to those helped. I might, for example, profit more from helping the local Opera society refurbish its hall than I would from giving to famine relief in Africa, but standard moral theories would rank famine relief as more important than Opera hall improvements.

Second, the cooperation argument cannot be extended to justify extremely large sacrifices, such as the soldier falling on the grenade, that standard moral theories rank either as most important or supererogatory. The cooperation argument depends on a short-term loss such as keeping a promise that it is inconvenient to keep being recompensed by a long-term gain such as being trusted in future promises.

An ethical egoist might reply by taking the cooperation argument further. Perhaps I cannot get the benefits of cooperation without converting to some non-egoist moral theory. That is, it is not enough that I act as if others have weight; I must really give them weight.

I could still count as an egoist, in the sense that I have adopted the non-egoist theory on egoist grounds. One problem is that it seems unlikely that I can get the benefits of cooperation only by conversion. Provided I act as if others have weight for long enough, others will take me as giving them weight, and so cooperate, whether I really give them weight or not. In many situations, others will neither have the ability to see my true motivation nor care about it. Another problem is that conversion can be costly.

I might be required by my non-egoist morality to make a sacrifice for which I cannot be compensated or pass up a gain so large that passing it up will not be compensated for. Since I have converted from egoism, I can no longer reject making the sacrifice or passing up the gain on the ground that it will not pay. It is safer, and seemingly feasible, to remain an egoist while cooperating in most cases.

If so, ethical egoism and standard moralities will diverge in some cases. For discussion of the cooperation argument, see Frank ; Gauthier ch. There is another way to try to show that ethical egoism and standard moral theories do not differ much. One might hold one particular objective theory of self-interest, according to which my welfare lies in possessing the virtues required by standard moral theories.

This requires an argument to show that this particular objective theory gives the right account of self-interest. It also faces a worry for any objective theory: objective theories seem implausible as accounts of welfare. I may have a duty to help others, and the world might be better if I helped others, but it does not follow that I am better off by helping others. For a more optimistic verdict on this strategy, noting its roots in Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and the British Idealists, see Brink and Of course the divergence between ethical egoism and standard moral theories need not bother an ethical egoist.

An ethical egoist sees egoism as superior to other moral theories. Whether it is superior depends on the strength of the arguments for it. Two arguments are popular. First, one might argue for a moral theory, as one argues for a scientific theory, by showing that it best fits the evidence.

In the case of moral theories, the evidence is usually taken to be our most confident common-sense moral judgments. Egoism fits many of these, such as the requirements of cooperation in ordinary cases. It fits some judgments better than utilitarianism does. For example, it allows one to keep some good, such as a job, for oneself, even if giving the good to someone else would help him slightly more, and it captures the intuition that I need not let others exploit me. The problem is that, as the discussion of the cooperation argument shows, it also fails to fit some of the confident moral judgments we make.

Second, one might argue for a moral theory by showing that it is dictated by non-moral considerations -- in particular, by facts about motivation. It is commonly held that moral judgments must be practical, or capable of motivating those who make them. If psychological egoism were true, this would restrict moral judgments to those made by egoism.

Other moral judgments would be excluded since it would be impossible to motivate anyone to follow them.

One problem with this argument is that psychological egoism seems false. Replacing psychological with predominant egoism loses the key claim that it is impossible to motivate anyone to make an uncompensated sacrifice. The ethical egoist might reply that, if predominant egoism is true, ethical egoism may require less deviation from our ordinary actions than any standard moral theory. But fit with motivation is hardly decisive; any normative theory, including ethical egoism, is intended to guide and criticize our choices, rather than simply endorse whatever we do.

When I make an imprudent choice, this does not count against ethical egoism, and in favor of a theory recommending imprudence. The argument has other problems. One could deny that morality must be practical in the required sense. Perhaps morality need not be practical at all: we do not always withdraw moral judgments when we learn that the agent could not be motivated to follow them. Or perhaps moral judgments must be capable of motivating not just anyone, but only idealized versions of ourselves, free from say irrationality.

In this case, it is insufficient to describe how we are motivated; what is relevant is a description of how we would be motivated were we rational.

Finally, if I do not believe that some action is ultimately in my self-interest, it follows from psychological egoism that I cannot aim to do it. But say I am wrong: the action is in my self-interest. Moral requirements based on agreement thus still lack sufficient force to ensure that everyone in fact does comply. Why should we follow norms that restrict our choices in certain cases?

In the previous chapters, we have seen that the authority of cultural norms, religious rules, and appeals to nature do not conclusively show why it is that we should follow the rules. In this chapter, we have seen that appealing to self-interest is also not sufficient to account for such rules.

Instead, we need to derive more objective ethical principles from reason. The following chapters explore other philosophers who base such principles upon reason. Gauthier, David. Morals by Agreement. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hampton, Jean. Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan , ed. Richard Tuck. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kant, Immanuel. Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals , ed. Allen Wood. Rand, Ayn. The Virtue of Selfishness. New York: Signet. Rawls, John. A Theory of Justice , reissue ed. Smith, Adam. The Theory of Moral Sentiments , eds. Raphael and A. Stirner, Max. The Ego and Its Own , ed. David Leopold. Vallentyne, Peter, ed.

Contractarianism and Rational Choice. Skip to content An egoist is known for their big ego. Psychological Egoism Psychological egoists argue that everything we do is self-serving even if we might think it is not.

He bases his analysis of social institutions and behavior upon principles of human action, the starting point of which is a form of ethical egoism: Every man is, no doubt, by nature, first and principally recommended to his own care; and as he is fitter to take care of himself than of any other person, it is fit and right that it should be so.

Altruism is also responsible for making totalitarian regimes such as Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia possible, given that altruism holds death as its ultimate goal and standard of value—and it is logical that renunciation, resignation, self-denial, and every other form of suffering, including self-destruction, are the virtues it advocates.