And as for any impact upon morality...

Well, I think it's well-known by this point I consider any idea of an objective morality based on anything we might normally term "moral standards" or so absurd...about the closest I come to any sort of "morality" is a agreeing to a reasonable degree with Aristotle that any such evaluation should be based upon Merit and Action, hence the reason why I champion greatness over the ordinary...

But as that really doesn't pertain here, I think, at least not directly...

No, Obiwanobiwan does not subsccribe to the theory that there is an objective morality and thus an objective Evil EXCEPT in the rare instance where the sheer magnitidue of the action commited is such a crime against not only greatness but human potential and humanity in genral that it may be found universally--or as close to "universally" as is possible for huamnity--reprehensible...examples being mass genocide or a 1984-esque regime or slavery (though the last one must be viewed within historical context, that is, it's certainly reprehensible, but to call George Washington an evil man for owning slaves seems unfair, as it was a common practice at the time, and we can thus see that perhaps it was instilled in Washington so young that this was acceptable that he may be given a certain pass here, especially since he freed his slaves in his will, whereas if it turned out a politician TODAY held slaves, it'd be the firestorm of the century...)

So to rephrase your argument:
1) People only do things if they want to do them.
2) If we define "wanting to do something" as "self-interest," then all actions are self-interested.

I'm not sure this is philosophically meaningful. Even if we define away altruism, it leaves the question of why someone would see it in their "self-interest" to sacrifice for others' benefit. Nor does it really change the basic ethical question of whether there is a some sort of obligation to help others, and under what circumstances.

I would say it does affect that qustion, as if they are all self-intersted acts, if we accept that, I would say that defeats the notion of a "good" act in a very common sense, as we so often in the West liken goodness to selfless actions, and if that latter is an impossiblity, does goodness in that sense cease to become a possibility as well?

I would say yes.

And, again, if we are to be SELF-motivated...

Why should we care about what a GOD, say, or a GOVERNMENT, and so on, why should we care about an external impetus at all if it gives no pleasure? And if it DOES give pleasure, say, to follow God's word, then again, going back to that idea of distinguishing between moral and pleasurable actions, as some would have us do, how can a "love of God" be a moral thing if we only follow said God and believe in a Heaven because it's pleasurable rather than "true"--if you wanted to go the atheist's route--or otherwise intrinsically moral in it's own right?

(Hopefully that made a bit sense and wasn't all incessant rambling, it's late, er, well, actually early morning where I am...)

While I don't think many systems of moral philosophy would concede defeat to your argument, you're on an interesting track. If we use selflessness as a standard for morality, then "goodness" calls for effacement of the self, replacement of one's one will with that of a deity, etc. Nietzsche argued against this as perverse; Ayn Rand came along and restated the case for people too dumb to read Nietzsche.

But so what if everyone becomes a sociopath when they put on the Ring of Gyges? That just seems to me like a really good argument for casting the ring back in to fires of Mordor.

Obi

I'm agreeing with a number of your statements.

The selfish motivation behind much (restate that, all?) of human action is pretty much undeniable when you get down to the core of the action.

I'll take up the religious side of your statements against altruism..

Jesus could be in a sense viewed as acting selfishly as you claim, in the sense that he acted in God's best interests. His life/death were 100% for God's glory. God, if He is the object of ultimate worth as we Christians claim, would be selling Himself short if He placed ultimate value on "loving" mankind or "saving" them from sin, etc. He should be the most self-absorbed being in the Universe and rightfully so if He is the object of ultimate worth.

Semantically, I disagree that Jesus actions were selfish, however, and here I resort to the Trinitarian view of God. Jesus actions were all to the glory of His Father at the expense of Himself, but this is consistent with my view of God being of ultimate worth, and He would be the only Human to behave in Someone Else's best interests. (Note that I argue it's not in our best interest but in God's).

If a God of Ultimate worth exists, then the definition of morality is easy.

A couple clarification questions about your arguments obi:

Is this a fair characterization of your view?

Humanity is motivated by self-interest at best and selfishness in most cases, thus morality is at best defined by majority self-interest.

Where is a good reference for your "Hobbesian" viewpoint? I'm more familiar with Nietzsche and Rand.
Are you a subscriber to the philosophy of objectivism? That everyone acting in their own self-interest makes the world a better place?

What do you make of the philosophy of Hedonism?

Without reading any of the posts, I guess I can just say that the root of our actions is human nature.

It is our instincts, like any other species on the planet, that control our actions.

"The most common defense I get is what might be called--and here's where you can choose to either take another ride on the Religious Debate Express or cheerfully pass and deal with this in a merely secular way--The Jesus Example of Self-Sacrifice."
Well, I guess as a secular person and a philosopher I fail to see why Jesus was self-sacrificial. Humans aren't just greedy about their lives, they want whats best for their loved ones, and some would rather be famous in death, then a nobody in life. That is the kind of person Jesus was. Without his self-sacrifice, his religion would have never taken off, and the world would be without Christianity today. His self-sacrifice brought him fame, and hes not the only one to do this. Look at any famous self-sacrifice in a war story, they all sacrificed them selves to say the day, and they did exactly what Christ did.

From the religious perspective you could argue that christ was the son of god, not human.

(all though I believe you covered both those arguments in your posts)

This is the first time that I agree with everything you say.
Well thats boring...

Life always acts in its self interest, or it would have died out long ago. The reason that self interest manifests itself in different forms is that people live in wildly differing percieved realities and have a huge variation of perspectives. Jesus, so we are told, percieved a reality in which He was the son of a rather hands-on God and would have had a very long term persepective, making His resulting actions rather special.

I agree with Hegelmon. Obi defines "self-interest' and "selfishness" so broadly as to be philosophically meaningless. You can define any concept so broadly and the opposite concept so narrowly and thereby eliminate the 'problematic' concept, but I don't believe it's an honest assessment of what's going on. Usually the people who do that in the self-interest case have an ideological axe to grind to prove that an economic system based on everyone exploiting each other is the only way we can live. So even the most obviously altruistic acts are defined away as "selfish".

But this whole view cannot explain why human beings are the only species capable of empathy on any substantial scale, and why human beings have gone out of their way to save other species from destruction, and why human beings think about the consequences of their actions for future generations. It does not explain why we have tombs of the unknown soldier in every country, and why nameless men sacrifice their lives for their country. They aren't remembered, they don't get any glory, so to call it a selfishness act takes a great deal of cynicism and a large amount of stretching the truth to fit your preconceived argument.

It's also hard to imagine how the institution of the family became one of the most enduring and pervasive institutions humans ever developed, considering the amount of sacrifice for zero gain that is involved in raising one. There are many cases of people doing whatever it takes to help their families even though it causes them nothing but misery, not happiness. "Self-interest" cannot explain the seemingly irrational ties of blood in an era where basic survival is most often not threatened.

Self-interest can't explain why all major religions command their followers to help the poor and less fortunate. It is odd that this would be a culturally transcending value if humans were nothing but selfish. It cannot explain why, until only recently, there was no such thing as economic 'growth'. People didn't do whatever it took to make themselves 'happy' or 'rich'. Instead most believed their own happiness was sinful and what mattered was pleasing the deity. Self-interest cannot explain why many people follow even the most rudimentary rules when it's not convenient and when the possibility of being 'punished' is non-existent.

In short, when exploring this issue one is started by how little 'self-interest' actually explains. Humans are a remarkably other-interested species.

And Hegelmon is again 100% correct when he points out the inconsistency of the Randroids claiming that all acts are selfish while railing against altruistic behavior. Surely there are many types of action that don't fully fit with the 'selfish' meme and that the pro-selfishness types would say are self-destructive.

@Leif:

"If a God of Ultimate worth exists, then the definition of morality is easy.

A couple clarification questions about your arguments obi:

Is this a fair characterization of your view?

Humanity is motivated by self-interest at best and selfishness in most cases, thus morality is at best defined by majority self-interest.

Where is a good reference for your "Hobbesian" viewpoint? I'm more familiar with Nietzsche and Rand.
Are you a subscriber to the philosophy of objectivism? That everyone acting in their own self-interest makes the world a better place?

What do you make of the philosophy of Hedonism?"

-If a "God Utlitmate Worth" exists, I would say that it would strengthen the case for morality dramatically, but not necessarily, for as so many thinkers and speakers, from the most devout of beleivers to the staunchest atheists, have said, it is altogether possible that I might believe in a different "God" than you, and so even if we were somehow able to "prove," say, the Judeo-Christian God to be true logically, as faith has a root outside of logic, there will still be those that would hold to other ideals, and what's more, any idea of an Ultimate Worth of God seems to hinge upon said God being BENEVOLENT if we're to talk of morality--and the benevolence, and certainly the DEGREE of benevolence versus malevolence, is and would likely be in great dispute.

-An important distinction here--*I* would say that because "morality" seems to suggests an objective, free-standing system of rights and wrongs outside personal adn particular people and cases and actions, my view, that of selfishness and self-interest being the roots of human action, are AT ODDS WITH the idea of such morality, and as such, I wouldn't call Action from Self-Interest "moral" or a "moral system," but rather a refutation of the idea of such a system; since self-interest depends heavily upon the individual "selves" in question, this is subjective ethics to a great extent, great enough to stray from the idea of of a uniform, systematized approach to morality. Where we SHARE ethical views, where different human beings hold the same values, and, indeed, msot of the race holds at least similar values, can be attributed in most cases to either something universal in the race--ie, the idea that while we have the freedom to do whatever we please, doing so to the extreme of harming others will attract attention and likely harm to ourselves, and so "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" becomes a universal maxim of behavior out of logical necessity and human nature, one BORN from the idea that without such a constructed maxim--which feeds a universal interest of man--ie, peace via compromise is in the self-interests of nearly all, and so we form laws and states and don't war at every slight offense--OR is the product of such a compromise and social custom.

-A reference to my Hobbesian viewpoint would be his statement which I believe to be very true--that human beings are nothing more or less than "desire-pursuing machines," and while I think we CAN be more, to become more would still be in our best interests AND, at present, I think modern man is as Hobbes more or less describes here--as well as the idea, stated above, of custom and law being accepted out of a mutual self-interest for peace rather than--to cite a common opposing viewpoint--a "natural" or "God-given" law, which is naturally-good or divinely-good and is a law given by Nature or God by which to live, rather than our creating such laws artificially because they suit our own interests long-term; even if we CAN act violently against a man ehre or there and ahve sufficient provocation to do so, if we do so we might very well incure more violence, which could harm either ourselves directly or those we would care about, and so we isntead defer to a constructed LAW and LEGAL SYSTEM of RULES to levy the penalty, which is enforced because the majorty of people would ALSO want what they would call "justice" and yet, for the same reasons, would not take justice into their own hands--and on the occaisions this DOES occur, via vigilante actions and mob scenes, we see how well this works as a whole, and seeing the violence, we tend to stray from that action and accept the law unless IT is unjust.

-As for Rand...I do NOT give here credence.

You are correct, & hedonism is it ;-)"
. . . the rest is mental gibberish . . .

You don't give Rand credence? How odd for someone who loves Nietzsche and claims humans are nothing but selfish :)

Not saying you should read her though, her work is absolute drivel.

"You say money is the root of all evil. Have you ever asked yourself what is the root of all money?"

@Putin:

I like good authorship as well, and while I might not have developed it yet, I can rest assured that at the very least I may, at my most meager plateau, easily surpass Rand in both style and sensibility.

And as you'll notice, I prefer "self-interest" to "selfishness," as the latter is, I think, a more extreme and less-prevalent form of the former.

To sacrifice oneself for one's family is in the self-interest, or the presumed self-interest, of that person, as most would claim that a family offers a form of longevity and a lasting legacy that can be found in very few otehr instances, and thus, protection so the larger, long-term legacy is in the self-interests of the sacrificee more than the short-term interest of their life itself.

"To sacrifice oneself for one's family is in the self-interest, or the presumed self-interest, of that person, as most would claim that a family offers a form of longevity and a lasting legacy that can be found in very few otehr instances, and thus, protection so the larger, long-term legacy is in the self-interests of the sacrificee more than the short-term interest of their life itself."

How many people that you know of have any clue what sacrifices their family made even 3 generations back? Nobody records or remembers their family history, which is why the genealogy industry is such a thriving business. How many people go visit the gravesites of even relatives they *knew* on memorial day or any day of the year for that matter? Few, as memorial day is nothing but a three day week for barbeques these days. The idea that people who sacrifice have any hope of being 'remembered' beyond perhaps one generation is far fetched. The dead are honored less and less. Like the unknown soldiers, usually people who sacrificed everything so that future generations of their family could have a better future aren't remembered at all.

I didn't say it had a happy outcome, these people making the sacrifice--I merely gave my take on why I believe they made it.

'Without reading any of the posts, I guess I can just say that the root of our actions is human nature.

It is our instincts, like any other species on the planet, that control our actions.'

Humans conquered nature, including their own. How many transformations and mutations must humans undergo before we bury this old claim? Humans have no 'nature', because humans are purposeful actors who can transcend their genetic hardwiring.

'I didn't say it had a happy outcome, these people making the sacrifice--I merely gave my take on why I believe they made it.'

The 'self-interest' narrative depends on conditions of near total imperfect information in order to work. In other words, in the self-interest narrative, people only make sacrifices because they have implausibly rosy pictures of how the future will turn out. But humans learn, so eventually they should figure out that this idea that they will be remembered in future generations is not going to happen.

Here's what is more likely. In the modern era, 'sacrifice' is coming to be seen as increasingly foreign and unthinkable. An alien ethic from another time. 4,000 American war dead in Iraq is even too much to handle. Jihadists who blow themselves up for a 'cause' are seen as completely bizarre. So we rewrite history to conform to our present values. Sacrifice is written out of history. We are always rational calculating individualists and egoists who only did things for others if it benefited ourselves.

I think this is a natural consequence of the fact that the old bonds that kept people together - family, church, cultural community, are in many ways withering away. We need a new way to orient ourselves to and cope with these conditions, so individualism is one answer

i confess i haven't read past the first post, so i'm not in tune with the discussion. but, just going off the original question, i think there are two factors: evolutionary and learned behavior.
i know frreud boiled it down to sex and aggression. though i'm not sure how modern scholarship looks on this, it seems to make sense from a darwinian perspective.
i do know that post-freudian psychology has emphasized learned behavior a lot more. normative social standards and childhood influences affect behavior.
in short: sex, aggression and cultural norms.
sorry for dragging psych into a philosophy fight :)
and thanks to obi for inspiring me to go read my psych book for my midterm next week after letting it collect dust all semester.

Oh no!

I've inspired someone to take on psychology!

WHAT HAVE I DONE?!?!?!?! :O *Sreams and faints!*