I barely even remember this thread.

I barely remember you.

That's in your best self-interest.

Whew, I remember why I avoided this thread. Let me see if I can touch on a few points.


Self-interest is the primary motivation of human action but it is not the sole motivation. Other motivations include duty, altruism, anger, and greed.

Selfishness is not the same thing as self-interest. A selfish act is one in which a person acts in his own self-interest without concern for its effect on the self-interest of others. This is very distinct from an act of self-interest only.


As far as intent vs. actions, well first of all this should really be called intent vs. consequences. In any case, I tend to side with the deontological school which, simply put, says intent is what matters. Utilitarianism is one of the more obvious results of a teleological approach in which every action is judged by its consequences. Utilitarianism (and in fact most other teleological philosophies as well) has some significant problems when it comes to personal practical ethical systems.

Oh, I guess I did sort of get involved but I was definitely holding back.

I WAS JUST GOING TO WRITE ABOUT TELEOLOGICAL PHILOSOPHY!

I was going to put a LOL WUT pear but I thought that was too easy. Good choice, however.

someone post here

If an accident occurs....the outcome goes against the original intention. Correct? Yes. We can all understand this. But this doesn't address the issue that, as some people say, all intents are a result of self-interest. Now take the example of the 'really quick' decision mentioned by ceebs...this was determined to be a biological impulse that ultimately satisfies the body's self-interest. Correct? Yes.

But then take an 'accident' at this level - corrupted electrical wiring in the brain ( )...surely then the original self interest has been affected..corrupted. Obviously the 'self interest' we talk about comes from our basic instincts - survival. At an extreme level, a self harmer, is going against his basic survival needs. This results from an irregularity in the brain. Surely the realisation that some of these 'accidents', or mutations occur means that we are not perfectly programmed to always act in our own self interest. Rather, there are possibilities, that in that 'very quick moment', whereby a stranger lays unconscious on the railtrack, one of these 'accidents', 'dodgy wiring' has led us to step in and save the stranger at risk of our own lives and without contemplation of self-satisfaction, reduction of guilt.

So to summarise, if we are always self interested - this is how we are pre-programmed. But as we know, our programming has gone awry every now and again..so this must affect the preservation of the self interest....leading an open window for selfless acts.

bump

I'm posting in this thread because I want to stay relevant

Okay, but then doesn't it no longer become "self" interest and expand to "family" interest?

No. Your family is your self-interest. Thodoks articulates this pretty damn good in the thread he just bumped. I used to think the same way you do, and was going to express exactly what you're saying here. But Thodoks cracked my mind just enough for me to hold back from posting in that thread. After a lot of thought about how I view my family, my service in the military, and my extensive volunteerism overseas, I still ultimately conclude that Thodoks is right. I've grown outside of an ego-centric mindset that I had as a small child. I fully understand that my girlfriend and family are extremely important to me. I understand that what I did overseas benefited other people and that I cared about "orphans." But it is still in my self-interest to have this job. It's still in my self-interest to shoulder an immensely disproportionate burden to assist my girlfriend. It's still in my self-interest to help out my family as much as I can. And it everytime I visited the orphanages, or fixed up a dilapidated third world school, it was still in my self interest to do so. I decided that it was better for myself to go out and fix up soccer fields in a hellish urban slum that it was for me to sit in a nice cool air conditioned tent playing X-box. I may have gone to serve "my nation," but it was in my self-interest to do so.

I guess I would just say I'm trying to emphasize the distinction between thought and action/behavior. It's clear to me that thoughts (or interests, or whatever) are NOT always egocentric. But employing means and pursuing those thoughts - that is, action, the sum of which is behavior - is an act of self-interest. This is why I phrase my claim the way I do.

was Mickey acting in self-interest when he made his girlfriend change his flat tire?

Get off my train ride, bub.

i haven't read thru this thread, but i appreciate this distinction, b/c it does make it more clear what you're getting at.

as for the question posed in that other thread, again, i don't know if its in here already and will make an attempt to find it myself, where does giving your life so somebody else can live fall? how does it benefit you, if the only outcome of your "act" is your own death?

"Benefit" is a subjective notion that differs from one person to the next. And it certainly doesn't make the action any less selfish.

In this case, what this tells me is that A values B's life more than he does A's (perhaps A is B's parent). When A is faced with the choice to either save his own life or that of B, he acts in a manner consistent with those preferences. So, yes, A can be said to be altruistic (or at least not be exclusively egocentric). But once A employs means to advance those interests - no matter how altruistic they may be - he is engaging in self-interested behavior, because to do otherwise would not advance A's interests.

It's a subtle distinction, and it certainly takes some hashing out.