Altruistic The Person example essay topic

A weak version of psychological egoism accepts the possibility of altruistic or benevolent behavior, but maintains that whenever a choice is made it is by definition the action that the agent wants to do at that point. A person wants to help the poor, therefore A is acting not necessarily altruistically; if a person ran into a burning building to save a kitten, it must be the case that this person wanted to save the kitten. Rational egoism claims that the promotion of one's own interests is always in accordance to some reason. In the strong version, not only is it rational to pursue one's own interests; it is also irrational not to pursue them. In the weak version, it is rational to pursue one's own interests but there may be occasions when not pursuing them is sometimes irrational. However, altruism does not rely on rationality.

It may be seen as just the behavior that comes not from mind, but primarily from soul. Altruism can be also seen as the relationship between the desire to help someone in some situation in order to bring pleasure to the person in need. Altruistic behavior also is viewed as paying a debt virtually in accordance to the previous experience of a person who is altruistic. This person might have experienced some help in the past and this might served as the reason for acquiring such a type of personality. Nevertheless, altruism is not just about help, it is about the perception of the world. Some people are hostile to others and their single motive in doing something for others is to obtain something that can be valuable for them.

Altruist in contras does not even think about some material value of his actions aimed at providing assistance to others. There many people who are altruistic, however, they do not show this altruism in their everyday life. For example, if to take a situation in which an old woman accidentally dropped the keys from her vehicle and due to poor vision (she might also forget her glasses in the car) cannot find them will be noticed an altruist she might have some assistance. The person probably will help that woman to find her keys and this will make this person happier. Altruism is primarily about happiness in social interactions.

However, it is suggested that human nature is completely and exclusively egoistic. People are entirely selfish and devoid of any genuine feelings of sympathy, benevolence, or sociability. They are always thinking of themselves in everything they do. Each individual is preoccupied exclusively with the gratification of personal desires (felicity or happiness).

Ones success in maintaining a continuous flow of gratification is the means of ones happiness. The object of the voluntary acts of every man is some good to himself. Whenever man renounces his right, this right is considered for some right reciprocally transferred either to him, or for some other good, he hopes for from the outcome. This presents us with the old saying: "Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you". It will be difficult to find an action that the psychological egoist will acknowledge as purely altruistic, however. We usually try to benefit in any action we choose.

For example, if I helped my friend out of trouble, I may feel happy afterwards. Nevertheless, is that happiness the motive for my action or just a result of it? Perhaps the psychological egoist fails to distinguish the beneficial consequences of an action from the self-interested motivation. After all, why would it make me happy to see my friend out of trouble if I did not already have some prior concern for my friend's best interest?

Would not that be altruism? People usually see altruism on a primitive level, such as giving some assistance to somebody, especially if it is not hard. I think that is actually right. If to take for an example a case in which some millionaire would build a school (for example) I do not think that it would be absolutely right to consider this person altruist, because this person might have some benefit out of his action.

This benefit would be popularization of his persona. Altruism holds each man as his brother's keeper; in other words, we are each responsible for the health and well-being of others. Clearly, this is a simple statement of the safety-net' theory. This is incompatible with individualism, yet many people who are individualists uphold altruism as the standard of morality. What is going on? The first confusion is to confound altruism with kindness, generosity, and helping other people.

Altruism demands more than kindness: it demands sacrifice. An altruist may sacrifice a minute of his time or maybe even something really important. It all depends how altruistic the person is. If it would be an example with an old woman that have lost her keys almost everyone would help her, nobody would mind to lose a minute for helping others. However, if a person would risk something really important it would bring that person to a doubt whether to help another person or not.

I think that altruism is a good feature of a character. If everybody would be altruist, the world would become more kind and people would pay more attention to the problems of others. This would eventually make people happier..