+162 When we fall in love, we want our beloved near us. When we give money to charity, we get tax reductions.When we do community service or try to be green, we get a cleaner conscience. No deed is entirely altruistic, amirite?

by Anonymous 11 years ago

You get tax reductions for giving to charity?

by Anonymous 11 years ago

And no matter what the deed, you always partly do it for the glory of doing good, even if you don't tell anyone else and it's just pride you let yourself feel.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

The consequences of an action do not always reflect its purpose.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

That's why I love it when people donate things anonymously. Like who cares if there's a theater in a college named after some rich guy, I'd rather be the person who feels good after actually helping someone

by Anonymous 11 years ago

And the fact that it makes YOU feel good, already makes it not completely altruistic :)

by Anonymous 11 years ago

To say that there is "no deed entirely altruistic," first you guys must agree on a definition of altruism. What IS altruism to you guys? If you are selflessly giving yourself up to others, it is because you WANT to do that. That is the definition of altruism; if someone else is forcing you to give yourself up to others, it isn't altruistic, you're just doing it because someone else made you. But from what you guys are saying, selflessly giving yourself up to others (the very definition of altruism) is NOT altruistic.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

Friends reference. It's completely altruistic to donate money to a charity run by Joey tribiani anonymously when you hate what the charity stands for and you were planning on buying a hamster instead.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

I've said this before, but no one around me understood. If there's no outside power influencing you to do it and no benefit or personal desire to do it, then you're not going to do it. Just like you said, even the most "selfless" act is done out of the desire for the natural high one gets from doing good. No matter how you look at it, humans, even the kindest most generous ones will do nothing unless there is benefit to them. The way I see it, humans do things for two reasons and two only. The rest are meaningless details and semantics. It's either: 1. They have an internal desire to do it themselves, be it in exchange for the natural high of doing good or it benefits them in some other way 2. They fear the consequences of not doing it, be it by getting fired from a job or the pain of a guilty conscience The third possibility I thought over was habit, but that habit would have been picked up by originally performing the action due to one, the other or both reasons.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

I've always said that it's impossible to consciously perform an action unwillingly. You are always either avoiding a punishment, or seeking a reward. Even that reward is feeling warm and fuzzy inside, and even if the punishment is guilt.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

Heh, you managed to condense my long winded post into three sentences. I imagine my extended posts can get a bit tedious, but dammit I like detail and clarification.

by Anonymous 11 years ago

Maybe I can just follow you around on amirite and be your sparknotes.

by Anonymous 11 years ago