Well, let's think about it for a moment...
True altruism would involve doing something that is in NO WAY rewarding to you. If you even like the IDEA of giving to charity, then any giving you participate in cannot be wholly altruistic. Further, since most of us can think of things to do with our time that are rewarding, any altruistic action we engage in come with a cost of not being able to do rewarding things instead with the same time.
So altruistic actions would have to be things we did that we didn't like or agree with, using time or resources we might better use, and which also somehow result in a benefit for someone else.
I can only think of two situations where the above conditions might be satisfied, and neither sounds the way altruism is traditionally described. In either case the person performing the action must be truly despicable: he must hate everything that is good and helpful to other people. This is necessary to avoid a payoff from liking the results of your actions.
In the first, altruism is the result of some kind of horrible accident or strange whim on the part of the actor. He does something he finds utterly repulsive which ends up helping someone else out. And then he wishes he had never done so, and probably tries to reverse it but can't.
In the second, it's not that the action is altruistic, just the result. It seems quite plausible that if such a horrible person managed to injure himself, it would be to the benefit of others, and therefore, perhaps, altruistic.
If you don't see self-injury and accidents as forms of altruism (I don't), then I'm hard-pressed to see how something completely altruistic could possibly occur.
Of course, PARTLY altruistic things are still perfectly plausible. And likewise completely selfish acts that are beneficial to the greater good. Just don't hang any philosophies on complete and utter altruism.
2007-02-19 11:14:14
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answer #1
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answered by Doctor Why 7
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Is it quite plausible to finish AND altruistic act? There, I fastened a issue you desperately needed fastened. i trust solid about helping you. i trust solid about pissing you off. i'm getting 2 factors. You get mad that I were given 2 factors. I discuss that all acts have solid and undesirable consequences, meant and unintentional, and that if someone out of in trouble-free terms altruistic causes performs and act the act itself continues to be blended. this does no longer negate the existence of altruism. regardless of if i don't understand my evil causes, it may nonetheless be an altruistic act. regardless of if someone has an glaring egocentric reason that they are conscious of, besides the undeniable fact that the act is ninety% selfless, it continues to be an altruistic act. there is not any longer some thing in the dictionary about altruistic having quite no egocentric perspective. It says animals commit altruistic acts that earnings the p.c.. at their personal fee. This argument receives more beneficial boring each and every time it is delivered up.
2016-12-04 09:34:49
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answer #2
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answered by miracle 4
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Yes. A lot of people seem to think that it is impossible to be altruistic - that whenever a person gives to charity or helps another with no hope of recompensation they are really doing it from the sellfish motive of feeling good about themselves or avoiding guilt. But if you only give in order to not feel guilt, then why do you feel guilt? People's feelings of guilt in such a situation would only be possible if they did, in fact, care about theother person. A person who does not believe that "true" altruism is possible really has to explain why it is that we feel sympathy for other people and guilt at not helping them. Those feelings require that the person feeling them does actually care about others. If you were totally selfish, your feelings of guilt at not helping another and sympathy could not be real. If you have ever experienced those feelings, then you know that you can be truly altruistic.
2007-02-19 09:26:41
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answer #3
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answered by student_of_life 6
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There's one way to be truly altruistic and that you'll have to find by yourself, but not purely altruistic, simply because we can't, because of what the Sophist just said.
2007-02-19 10:59:44
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answer #4
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answered by Alex 5
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No. Whatever people do, they find some form of reward or they would not do it.
2007-02-19 09:43:39
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answer #5
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answered by Sophist 7
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