Altruism

Altruism and Moral Philosophy

From a philosophic point of view, altruistic behavior is deliberate with the underlying intent to help others. Ancient accounts on ethics explored the virtue of being helpful to others. To understand human nature, Plato and Aristotle devised a naturalistic ethics that focused on how moral virtues were linked with a person's happiness. A moral way of life involves behaviors that generate intrinsic happiness within individuals. It is part of human nature that individuals would seek such pleasure. Principles of justice were considered an altruistic quality by Plato but were closely tied to the psychological motivation to produce intrinsic happiness. The Socratic position differed slightly in that [Page 70]virtuous behavior was viewed to be derived from moral wisdom and that justice toward others is a good in itself for the greater benefit it generates. Altruism developed as a refutation of ethical egoism—that it is unethical and irrational for individuals to engage in behavior that compromises their own self-interest.

From this groundwork laid down by moral philosophers in response to the idea of ethical egoism, Auguste Comte originated the actual term altruism in the mid-19th century. However, the creator of the term believed that emotion did indeed play a role in the motivation to care for others over self. Comte posited that human beings were motivated by both selfinterested feelings and socially benevolent emotions. His ethical theory stated that morality is the subjugation of self-interested tendencies in favor of otherregarding drives to promote societal welfare. True happiness could be found in a life that serves others' needs and interests. This understanding of altruism has religious overtones as well. Christian dogma professes that decent followers should love their neighbors as they would love themselves. By serving the needs of the greater humanity, an individual is serving God.

In contrast to Comte's view of altruism, English social evolutionist Herbert Spencer took a more psychological approach to understanding the motivation to be altruistically inclined toward others. Having coined the phrase “survival of the fittest,” Spencer—a contemporary of Charles Darwin—believed that feelings of pleasure or happiness became biologically inherited in the later stages of evolution, when social relationships were important for survival. Intrinsic egoistic feelings of happiness transformed into pleasurable feelings associated with helping others. Spencer claimed that humans were capable of making psychological associations between certain actions and the pleasure generated by those actions. Behaviors that sustained and promoted the greater good of society—a utilitarian notion—induced emotional and psychological pleasure for those individuals engaging in those prosocial acts. The ethical standard of altruism resulted when these associations of personal happiness and greater societal utility were passed down to later generations. Societies prosper when the greater utility of the community is served by individual acts.

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