In one of his articles entitled Case Against Religion, Ellis writes that a psychotherapist tries to help patients to become minimally anxious and hostile. He said to become minimally hostile and anxious we should promote nine basic personality traits. He briefly outlines these nine base traits that lead to a healthy personality. The first of these traits is “self interest.”
Self interest, as described by Ellis, is a truthfulness to one’s self, without masochistic sacrifice of oneself for others. This would classify those willing to commit altruistic suicide (suicide for the betterment of a group, i.e suicide bombers, cult members, and kamikaze pilots) as having an unhealthy low self interest. These are extreme cases however. Even those that harm themselves short of suicide, for example financially or emotionally, have a low unhealthy low self interest. Over-donating to excess can be seen by an outside observer as a noble practice, while in reality it may be a self destructive and maladaptive behavior stemming from poor personality traits.
Ellis is not condoning outright megalomaniacal, narcissistic selfishness by saying one should have an interest of himself/herself first and foremost. In fact he goes on to say that one's kindness and consideration of others can actually be fueled by the desire to be free from pain and restriction. By considering others, in a manner that is not self sacrificing, an individual can promote an environment where his own needs are met and considered. One may consider the motivation of self comfort to do right by others to be a selfish and undesirable thing. I personally believe that it says a lot about human nature that we have qualms with motivation for good deeds; we often forget that there are easier alternative methods for achieving self comfort that no one normally considers, namely total annihilation of opposition. What I mean by this is that those who would have a problem with a self interest based motivation for altruism are essentially splitting hairs, taking for granted that the altruism is taking place in the first place.
Essentially altruism and good deeds can come from one of two opposing places. Firstly, altruism can have a root in low self interest, and this is a destructive behavior by nature. These deeds can be harmful, because the individual does not have the self interest enough to stop giving before the giving causes irreparable damage. This can lead to overworking oneself to death, or donating assets until economic ruin. The opposite of this is of course giving because one has a high self interest. I agree with Ellis when he says that people may give to promote an atmosphere that ensures that they themselves may feel free from unnecessary pain and restrictions. In fact, famed biologist Richard Dawkins wrote an entire book exploring the biological connections between selfishness and altruism called The Selfish Gene. A video found here gives a brief but interesting bit about Dawkins' ideas regarding selfishness and altruism. Though I do agree with both Ellis and Dawkins about how altruism is strongly connected to self preservation as well as ensuring self comfort, I think that the selfish nature of altruism can have a more immediate, while equally selfish, positive reinforcement. People sometimes talk about the elation they feel when they give to charities or help those less fortunate. This positive feeling can even be somewhat addictive. The positive emotion that comes with giving could very well have evolved over time, in order to encourage us to be altruistic in order to preserve ourselves as a species.
In the end, it is important to have self interest. Even if the social mainstream deems selfishness as a negative quality, selflessness is, in essences, selfish in nature. We can be selfish in a way that helps our fellow man. There are the rare cases where people are selfish to a narcissistic degree, but that is maladaptive behavior that not many consider normal. Most of the world tends to aid one another and view that as a positive thing, selfishly lending a helping hand.
What do you think about self interest? Do you think an underlying selfish motivation diminishes the deed itself? What other positive reinforcements do you think there are for selfish acts of altruism?
8 comments:
I agree that there is an underlying self interest in 99.99% of the things that we do, however, this is not a bad thing until the actions taken to fulfill this self interest start to go against societies' behavioral norms. If I fulfill my self interest to make myself feel happy by making my wife fell happy, I see nothing wrong or diminishing in that. I cannot think of any positive reinforcements that might apply other than say the prospect of going to heaven for being selfless and giving, but even then, you are only being selfless to achieve something for yourself, which is a contradiction and therefore is impossible.
"[T]hose who would have a problem with a self interest based motivation for altruism are essentially splitting hairs, taking for granted that the altruism is taking place in the first place."
I think this is a good point, and one that I myself would do well to remember. For whatever underlying reason, I think people often judge those who do something charitable as simply 'trying to make themselves look good,' and fail to realize such thoughts are typically unnecessary and a waste of time.
Hi there
I found your blog trough your announcement on uncommonforum.com
This article cought my attention the most, and if you care for it, here are my two cents on it. It will be in three parts because of character limit :p
(1/3)
I'm in no position to judge whether Ellis is is a good psychologist. Judging from his articles he seems to have a very good understanding of how the human brain works. However, with all due respect, I think he was in no way fit to write an article on religion, since he is obviously no expert in any religion, let alone all religions. In his case against religion, he appears biased from his judeo-christian background (as a Jew living in christian-dominated America), and he does make sweeping generalisations from that bias. But judging from his article he doesn't appear to know the first thing about Islam to name one. In fact, the way he refers to Muslims as "Muhammadans" kind of proves that point. Most Muslims, including me, would even take offence in that word, because it paints out Islam to be the exact opposite of what its core beliefs hold.
As a second objection, it can be argued that his views of what a psychotherapy should aim for, and how religion interacts or counter-acts that, is biased by his own humanitarian views. Ellis, as a self-proclaimed atheist has his personal views on what characteristics should matter most, what goals in life are most worth striving for and how a healthy psyche should be like. Of course I cannot hold that against him, or anyone else who would do so. But I do on the other hand think it's relevant to understand how these personal viewpoints, of which I might agree with some and disagree with others, ooze trough many of his premises and deductions he makes in "a case against religion".
(2/3)
Self interest.
When you list examples of altruistic suicide, it's interesting to note how you picked only cases which by the general public would be judged as "bad". There are of course much more controversial examples, like for example a parent sacrificing him/her-self for his/her child. If then you take away the certainty of death, sacrifice becomes even more controversial. Take the example of a soldier fighting for the protection of his family. He might have known the probability of death, but went ahead and fought either way. Now don't get me wrong, I'm by no means an advocate of war, far beyond it. I am however a realist, and that means I accept that sometimes the only two choices you have is either to fight with risk of death or to forfeit any chance at an enjoyable life either way. Perhaps you merely mentioned the clear-cut cases because they best illustrated your point, or perhaps because you went from the assumption that self-sacrifice is always the moral low-road. Either way your choice in examples is interesting. Going on to the example of over-donating. again I would have to flag this as controversial, and biased. For one person this might bring disastrous results, for a Tibetan monk on the other hand, this might lead to a happy peaceful and fulfilling life. Regardless of whether their philosophy is right, it can't be denied that this desired effect is achieved by many. Either way, getting back to the main issue here, not all religions prescribe this. If I look at my own religion again, Islam, we see that any form of suicide is forbidden (yes including suicide bombers, but I won't go into that issue here), we see that any form of self-harm is forbidden, and while donating to the poor is mandatory for Muslims, it is only mandatory if one has wealth to spare, and becomes forbidden if one's own health, or the rights of one's family upon him are threatened by it. So although an ill-informed Muslim might go overboard on donating, one that follows the rules would not. And in the case of the former, obviously this cannot be held against his religion. If anything is at the cause, it is the lack of Islamic knowledge that would cause such cases.
(3/3)
Altruism.
I'm very strongly inclined to disagree with his views on altruism. Ellis claims that altruism can only be built on either low self interest or high self-interest. I'd like to ignore the high self-interest and focus on those cases he would judge as "rooted in low self interest". In such a claim lies a hidden assumption that if you philosophical views on right and wrong guide you to do something altruistic, that must inevitably be because you have low self interest. Or at least not high enough according to Ellis. But on what ground can he seriously claim that in any such case the person's judgement is flawed? Obviously this is a clear example of bias by his personal humanitarian believes. I agree that actions can have multiple motives. And an action can be partially selfish and partially altruistic. But I believe that there also exist actions which are altruistic, but in no part selfish. I myself occasionally make choices and do things not because I have any gain from them, but merely because I consider them the right thing to do. And I know what you're probably thinking. You're thinking: "well there you go, you do them because you believe they are right, therefore you do the right thing, and you feel good about being righteous". Well true in some cases, but false in others. Can you actually know what my motives have been in my past decisions? Or would you just be basing that on a psychological school of thought, which by the way is unproven and speculative in nature? I mean it's not like our knowledge of neuro-psychology is anywhere near to excluding the possibility of altruism without selfishness; despite what Richard Dawkins might hope. So getting back at the low self-interest. If we cannot rule out the possibility altruism without selfishness, and at the same time we have no universal laws of morality to judge what level of self-interest should be normal, then the whole case against religion slides down face-forward on it's own slippery slope.
greetings from www.seemyparadigm.webs.com
First thank you for reading and commenting
I was not personally arguing or defending the validity of Ellis' comments on religion, just the bit about personality that happened to be in the text that he wrote. As far as his inflammatory wording in Ellis' work, I mean no offense to you, but he wrote that many years ago when sensitivity was not at an all time high, not that it’s any real excuse. I also do not think people's achievements should be judged by their religious viewpoint, or lack there of. Ellis is a respected pioneer in the field, regardless of his personal beliefs on religion.
As far as your thoughts on altruistic suicide, you are right. I didn't not mention any examples that society considered "good". Though I only used a few examples, I didn't expect that to be offensive in anyway. On airplanes, people are instructed to first place air makes over themselves first, before they consider putting one on their child. By preserving oneself they can better provide for others in the future. No one can argue that protecting a child is moral, but protecting ones own child or family through self sacrifice can be a kind of genetic selfishness, ensuring that their genes continue, and protecting lineage. This is what was talking about, self sacrifice as selfishness for a species, or family. Also, if a monk over donates, it is not damaging, if what he donates is not something that he needs to flourish. It does not damage him, if he does not need it, and he is gaining a positive reinforcement of self satisfaction.
Lastly, I believe that moral limits developed because of the evolution of our kind as a species. Moral morays are a way for us to ensure that we survive as a people. Like a survival method based on respect and giving, but selfish in nature.
Speculation is not always bad. Many theories have been speculative, but we explore, discuss, and try to find something that makes the most sense. When trying the find answers for things that we do not have the technology or methodology to test like an exact science we have to theorize, like the Greeks. If numbers are what matter, REBT, the method of theory developed by Ellis, based on his theories, is widely used for a wide variety of ailments is pretty successful, inexpensive effective and simple when compared to some of the other kinds of therapy.
In your last comment, the last thing you said, "the case against religion slides down ect ect . . ." gives away a lot about the ideas you had to share. It seems that the religious aspect of what Ellis had to say had more to do with your comment than my ideas on the subject. Remember, my post had NOTHING to do with religion, or the case against it. Ellis article did. My ideas mentioned little to nothing about religion specifically, aside from cult suicide. I took something from an article. An idea that I thought had some merit, and explored it further. I was able to segment what I thought was an interesting concept out of the anti-religious content context in which it was written and was exploring as a stand alone idea.
Regardless, thank you for your ideas. You gave me some things to think about. Like I said, I am a student and I welcome all ideas. I hope you come back to discuss more in the future.
-Alex
I feel much altruism to be tangled irrevocably with guilt, which means it acts as the psychological novocaine and additionally represents low self interest. Two birds, one trip to Goodwill.
Dear MTM-
That is an interesting, if not pessimistic thought. I am sure that some altruism in some cases can stem from a form of guilt, but I doubt that most altruism is. Though the relief of the guilt would support the idea of a selfish base for altruism, I believe that this counts for only a small portion of good deeds.
There are many things that people do for one another every day, above and beyond a lip service half-hearted donation to a goodwill. From small gestures as traffic curtsy, paying for a friends meal, and holding the door open for the disabled, to larger donations such as volunteering in building projects, or entering a professional field centered on helping other people, people tend to want to better the place they live. They desire others to treat them well, and so others will treat them well. Perpetuating kindness into a community can help ensure kindness comes back around. Helping others helps everyone including ones self.
The idea that there is a wrenching guilt in everyone driving most good deeds is at its base, cynical viewpoint. I don't know much about you personally, but I would venture that this negative worldview could be some sort of projection on your part. The cynicism that you may be feeling in regard to the emotional and mental state of other people could stem from some other issue. Like I said, I don't know you, but I would reevaluate why it is that you feel so pessimistic about human nature.
Thanks for reading, and commenting. I hope you return.
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