Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>
> Isn't altruism a dialectical twin of individualism? The concept of
> "altruism" emerged in the English language in the mid-19th century,
> according to the OED. The word is used in attempts to explain why an
> individual cares (or should care) about anyone besides himself at
> all.
Altruism appears to be an individualistic term because meth.
individualists
use it, but that doesn't necessarily have to be the case. Altruism is a
technical term in biology, psychology and philosophy and
is used diffently in these areas, making it a thorny subject. In
evolutionary biology, an individual is altruisic if it increases the
fitness of others at the expense of its own. In psychology it usually
has to do with the motives for acting with the goal (as an end in
itself) of improving others' welfare. The two uses are seperate and not
necessarily congruent. For example, someone in a group who helps
everyone else but only because it makes him feel good is an evolutioanry
altruist but also a psychological egoist.
An interesting book is *Unto Others.The Evolution and Psychology of
Unselfish Behavior* by Elliot Sober and David Sloan Wilson. The authors,
I think, are kinds of Marxists but the book is written for a general
audience. They argue that altruism requires group selection to evolve
because altruists have a low fitness within groups (they sire less
offspring) but increase the fitness of their group as a whole. So
altruism can only
thrive amongst a group of altruists who ,as a group, will thrive
compared
to other groups because altruists will tend to gravitate towards each
other.
There are a lot of interesting thigns in the book, including solid
refutation of selfish gene theory and discussion of methodological
issues. These guys cover a lot of ground.
Altruism can be, and presumably is, used in rat choice theory because
you just have to enter "concern for others" into a utility function. It
would seem hard to build a comprehensive economic model with altruism
though. I guess you could argue that altruism is a preference, a
preferred outcome that would influence someone's choice.
Jim Devine wrote:
>
> What the "worst outcome" is depends on your perspective. The "I cooperate,
> you defect" outcome is the worst only from an individual's (my)
> perspective, whereas the "you cooperate, I defect" would be the worst from
> the other individual's (your) perspective. From the _social_ perspective,
> the worst would be "both defect."
The point is amplified in discussion of altruism since altruism
decreases individual fitness within groups but increases the fitness of
the group as a whole. Groups of altruists do better than groups of
exploiters (defectors).
Sam Pawlett
