Psychological Egoism

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Egoism and Altruism

• Psychological Egoism
• Joel Feinberg

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Psychological Egoism

• Psychological egoism PE is the view that all
  human actions are done out of self-interest
• PE is a descriptive theory

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• Ethical egoism EE everyone ought to pursue
  their own self-interest 
• a normative or prescriptive theory
• Relativism
• morality is not universal
• it is relative to the individual

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Egoism A Widespread Belief

• Folk psychology
• There is a widespread belief that people are just
  out for themselves
• Social sciences
• Economics, marketing rational agent theory
• Sciences with high degree of behavioral
  predictability that assume people are
  self-interested
• Foreign policy
• Belief that other nations will always act solely
  in terms of self-interest

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• Psychological Egoism PE is not an ethical view
  it describes something about the world
• Suggestion it should be left to psychology, and
  scientific explanation. Why investigate
  philosophically?
• PE has ethical consequences
• It makes ethics look less plausible
• It suggests to some Ethical Egoism
• It suggests that we dont have free will

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The Main Issue

• If PE is true, then there are no altruistic acts
  (i.e., acts done for the sake of others).
• But that seems puzzling. Think of Gandhi,
  soldiers who sacrifice their lives to save
  another, parents acts towards their own children
• Psychological Egoists maintain that altruism is
  an illusion

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Altruism

• Received Medal of Honour Posthumously
• a grenade sailed past McGinnis and into a truck
  where four other soldiers sat. He shouted a
  warning to the others, then jumped on the
  grenade. The grenade, which was lodged near the
  vehicle's radio, blew up and killed him.
  McGinnis easily could have jumped out of the
  truck and saved himself.
• "The instinct is, jump out of the vehicle, but
  his four buddies were in the vehicle with him ...
  and he chose to place himself on top of the
  grenade and absorb the impact, and it saved their
  lives,- a witness

• Army Private First Class Ross McGinnis

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Re-describing Altruism

• PE defenders re-describe altruistic action as
  being self-interested in one way or another
• Charity is enjoyable because it demonstrates our
  superiority over those to whom we are giving
  improvement of reputation
• Pity is ultimately self-interested because it
  reflects our own fears of suffering misfortune
• Kindness/Compassion?
• Prayer?

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Reasons in Support of PE

• Reason for) We often deceive ourselves into
  thinking our motives are altruistic when really
  they are selfish.  So, it is probable that we do
  this all the time that our motives are always
  selfish.
• Objection) This establishes that (apparent)
  altruism might be the result of selfishness, but
  such a sweeping generalization requires
  considerable empirical evidence, and such
  evidence is not presently available.

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Reasons in Support of PE

• Reason For)  Whenever I act, I am always
  pursuing my own ends or trying to satisfy my
  desires so it follows that I am always pursuing
  something for myself
• Objection)  This conflates the genesis or
  origin of an action with its purpose  Just
  because the act is brought about by the agents
  motives does not imply that the purpose must be
  selfish ones

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• Reason for) from the fact that all our successful
  actions are accompanied by pleasure (for us), it
  follows that the objective of these acts is
  pleasure for oneself.
• Objection) William James' example of the sort of
  fallacy here because an ocean liner constantly
  consumes coal on its trans-Atlantic passage,
  therefore the purpose of the voyage is to consume
  coal!

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Response

• Ambiguity of PE
• self-interest can mean two different things
• 1. motivated yes, we are always motivated
• 2. striving towards a purpose/goal
• Goal may be to benefit me personally
  (self-interested goals)
• Goal may be to benefit another person (altruistic
  goals)
• Altruism doesnt deny that we are always
  motivated but that at least some of our goals are
  for the benefit of others

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Moral Nihilism

• Moral nihilism there is no right or wrong
  action everything is permitted
• Reason
• Morals/moral facts are not observable or
  verifiable by scientific investigation.
• Morality is a superstition like other things we
  cannot observe or verify witches, ghosts
• Why is it that most people do not murder?
• Either they do not want to murder, or they do not
  want the consequences of killing someone (i.e.
  possible jail time).
• Most people think they are doing it for some
  moral reason, but this is an illusion or
  pretense.

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Ethics A Summary

• Ethics is unavoidable because the way we act
  shows the kind of values and morals that we hold
• Either you believe in morality or you think there
  is no such thing as morality Moral Nihilism
• If you believe in morality, then either you are a
  relativist or an absolutist universalist about
  morality
• If you are a relativist then either you are
  Cultural Relativist, or an Ethical Egoist
• If these positions are wrong then you have to be
  an a universalist

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• If you are a universalist about morality then
  there are three options Christian Ethics,
  Deontology (e.g. Kantian Ethics) ,
  Consequentialism (e.g. Utilitarianism)
• Deontology
• problems elaborating duties of beneficence
• problems with prohibition never to lie, never to
  kill
• Utilitarianism
• problem estimating the consequences
• trolley problems