Atheists, is there any reason to be altruistic?

Question

In christianity we are told to be altruistic because every human being is made in the image and likeness of God:

"For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink: I was a stranger, and you took me in: Naked, and you covered me: sick, and you visited me: I was in prison, and you came to me.Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry and fed thee: thirsty and gave thee drink? Or when did we see thee a stranger and took thee in? Or naked and covered thee? Or when did we see thee sick or in prison and came to thee? And the king answering shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me." - Matthew 25: 35-40.

Is true altruism possible if you have no religious belief at all? What would be the motive in that case? Wouldn't survival of the fittest or personal gain over-rule altruistic tendencies? Why not live completely selfishly?

Just an honest "?"

^.^

I don't conceive as being a a good person as getting a "thumbs up" from God, rather it is fulfilling one's created purpose as a being with morality. God gave us empathy and compassion in order to facilitate good action. I think christians also are good because they can be compassionate and empathetic, but those are emotional reasons and are easy to do when one is having a great day and "feels" good. What happens when when you don't feel swell?

The thrust of my question I think is why be good or do good at all? Isn't helping another person just enabling them to compete for your natural resources? Why live altruistically-as in self-sacrificingly? I think TRUE altruism goes beyond being "nice" or feeling good. It is true self-sacrifice, even to those whom are cruel and undeserving. Loving those whom despise you and doing good to them. Why would one do that if they did not believe there was some intrinsic, infinite, value in a human person?

"You should be selfless toward your fellow man because he is a fellow human. It should not depend on your belief in God."

But I think that is what the true nature of chrisianity is indeed saying. God is just because there is so much wrondgoing and injustice in this world. His goodness would demand rectifying justice. However is it the intrinsic value of each person as a reflection of God that provides them with their dignity. Christians are not altruistic because "God said so" but for the same motives as atheists site empathy and compassion, but they take it a step futher and say also: this person has an infinite soul and is a reflection of God and deserving of the upmost dignity and respect and love, just as I am. We see this in the exortation: Do good to those whom despise you and revile you. That kind of altruism goes beyond mere whimsey and good feelings. That kind of altruism embraces the value of another person as a child of God.

"Who wants to live in a community where everyone just selfishly does their thing, no one helps anyone else, etc? I sure wouldn't. I also wouldn't want someone to leave me up a creek when I needed help, or to steal from me, hurt me, etc...so why would I want to do that to someone else? I would hope that my fellow man would help me if I was down, and I do my damndest to help others when they're down.

I don't need a religion to tell me that kindness and altruism are worth my while."

The camp seems devided here. Are you good because of the herd-instinct or merely because you choose to be good for its own sake?

I find it laughable that some try and reverse the question on christians while others admittedly attribute altruism to the herd instinct (which inevitably has its root cause in personal gain) still others, claim they are good just to be good for no reason!

WHICH IS IT?! You all seem to be contradicting yourselves here...

Its utterly laughable to say that christians are good out of personal self-gain and atheists are just "good." Those of you whom believe that morality evolved from the herd instinct intrinsically affirm that it is all about personal gain. That was the main reason it evolved! Survival! PERSONAL GAIN! That is some blatantly fallacious reasoning to make christians out as vile and selfish whilst atheists come out as "good" and "virtuous" when your entire system of ethical theory is based upon self-interest! At least be prudent enough to admit that.

Answer 1

I think that the question could be reversed: Are Christians altruistic only because they have been told to be based on some external (but counter-intuitive) principle?

The Matthew 25 passages are powerful precisely because they express a vision of our individual relationship to others that is in fact intuitive. And the source of that intuition is 1000s of years of experiencing the personal benefits of altruism.

An individual who displays little or no tendencies to altruism will not survive to maximize reproduction. It is differential rates of reproduction that define survival of the fittest.

Human populations are complex, and they exist in many varied environments (natural, cultural). Differing levels of altruism will achieve reproductive advantage. Some environments will reward altruism, and others will punish it.


Addition: What you see as contradiction, I see as complexity.
Reproductive advantage and differential survival are not equivalent to mere personal gain. And we are talking about averages across large populations. There are individual exceptional cases at both ends of the spectrum: Altruistic individuals who loose all chance of reproduction (but may make possible species wide reproductive success) and selfish individuals that have 1000s of descendants.

One thing I am saying is that we do not need Matthew 25 to draw the same conclusion: That treating others well is a good thing to do. I am not too worried about motiveless or motive driven altruism.

I guess another thing I am saying is that Christians are a little hard on themselves to think that they need God telling them to do it to treat others well. We secularists do not really care why Christians treat others well. I, at least, presume that one reason Christians treat others well is that they find it a good thing to do. Christians and non-Christians share basic human intuition.

Answer 2

Empathy is almost intrinsic to being a human. It is one of the sixteen basic emotions classified by psychologists, although it is a secondary emotion, which means it is not shared by all humans. Sociopaths, for example, lack the capacity for empathy.

Altruism is well studied both among humans and non-humans. It isn't even unique to the human species. It is a well studied survival trait. There is substantial game theoretic literature on it. Social creatures must have empathy and altruism to survive as social creatures.

Religions do not promote altruism any more than atheism does.

Just to think about it. Imagine you were the most selfish human on Earth, how hard would it be to get a good date? Altruism, or a facimile thereof is not only useful for survival, it is necessary for mating, securing resources and gaining optimal outcomes in many transactions.

There is a large body of sociological, economic, psychological, mathematical and evolutionary research on this topic. I suggest you go to an academic library and research it. I even used some of it recently on altruism in certain bird species and how it differs mother to child from sibling to sibling.

Answer 3

There are various results from the field of Game Theory that assert that altruism in many situations is actually the action with the greatest expected value. There's a mathematical reason for altruism, and an evolutionary one.

About halfway through section 6, this article discusses altruism and game theory.

Answer 4

As a christian you have just admitted that you are not behaving in an altruistic manner, as 'god told you to do it'. True altrusim is for no gain at all.

I, on the other hand, have no-one telling me to be altruistic, yet I have the choice to be or not to be. Sometimes I choose to be nice, sometimes I choose not to.

It's difficult to see true altruism in action, as, even if there is no outward reward for a particular action, surely we must feel good inside for doing whatever it is we have done. This is a reward in itself, therefore is not true altruism.

Answer 5

Who wants to live in a community where everyone just selfishly does their thing, no one helps anyone else, etc? I sure wouldn't. I also wouldn't want someone to leave me up a creek when I needed help, or to steal from me, hurt me, etc...so why would I want to do that to someone else? I would hope that my fellow man would help me if I was down, and I do my damndest to help others when they're down.

I don't need a religion to tell me that kindness and altruism are worth my while.

Answer 6

This is an interesting question, but maybe a little too difficult to investigate fully in this kind of Q&A context. I will give some comments from a Buddhist point of view, and hope they can at least give some slight food for thought.

Christianity and Buddhism (and vitually all of the major religions of the world) agree on most ethical questions, as far as which actions are considered positive and which negative.

One major difference is that Christians often state that belief in God is some kind of prerequisite for moral behaviour, and that without this belief there would be no reason to behave ethically, be non-egoistical, compassionate towards non-friends or enemies, love all human beings, and so on. Some Christians don't agree with this, but many do.

For a Buddhist, that sounds a little strange. In Buddhism there is no belief in God or any higher divine beings, and still Buddhism is the religion with the most clear emphasis on compassion, altruism and non-egoism (with Christianity as a clear number two, taking the lead only when you focus on love). Don't get struck on these "ratings", the point is not which religion is better on this or that, just that Buddhism has love, compassion and altruism as its foundation and backbone even without the belief in God.

If you for a moment see this question just functionally, without regard of right & wrong or higher goals, I would say it seems more skillful to teach a moral code that's explicitly said to be general, regardless of religious beliefs or ideological choices, being merely based on experience and common sense, rather than explicitly saying it's only a moral code for those who agree with certain religious views (e.g. that "human beings are made in the image and likeness of God").

One major practical difference between Christianity and Buddhism, is that Christians tend to have the view that your personality is given by nature (by God's creation), and not possible to change (i.e. to do major changes - of course there is a striving for personal betterment also in Christianity!), meaning you try to find a balance within the frame of your personal traits and originally sinful nature on the one side, and your striving to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ and behaving like a good person on the other side. This means, Christians often state that they have to behave morally regardsless of your spontaneous feelings and emotions, knowing that your nature is sinful and can never be made good however much you try.

The Buddhist way is very different. Recognizing the roots of bad and immoral behaviour, i.e. analyzing which feelings, emotions, desires and so on actually cause this behaviour, they proceed on the path of hard work with your actual emotions in order to uproot or transform the causes of bad behaviour (instead of just trying to stop the behaviour itself). At the root of the causes of all kinds of wrong behaviour (and suffering) lies, according to Buddhism, attachment, aversion and ignorance. The Buddhist way then consists almost entirely of working with these emotions, transforming them into more fruitful emotions (love, compassion and wisdom).

One detail in Christian moral thought that also is at odds with Buddhist thought, is the common thought that real, altruistic morals are somehow related to the notion of self-sacrifice. In Buddhist analyze, you soon understand that self-sacrifice, and also self-hatred and all kinds of feelings of worthlessness, is in fact an egocentrical concept, not an altruistic. Why so? True altruism, according to Buddhism, has nothing at all to do with the outcome for yourself. It's simply not relevant which the outcome is for yourself when doing an altruistic deed. It is totally focused on the other person. If you think you must sacrifice yourself somehow in the deeds, that means you see the outcome for yourself a major factor in your deed. That makes it a non-altruistic deed, because you don't give the whole focus to the other person, whatever the outcome you strive for for yourself (self-sacrifice, gratefulness, good conscience, fulfilling God's wishes, or whatever).

The view that you need to sacrifice something in order to give the full, positive effect for the other person, is probably connected with the erroneous notion of a zero-sum game. This is an utterly foreign concept to Buddhist thought. On the contrary, ultimately speeking, what is good for others is also good for you.

Finally (I don't know if I explained clearly enough, but let's stop here) i want to give one good quotation from one of the most influential of the Indian Buddhist masters:

"All whosoever who are happy in the world
Are so through the wish for the happiness of others;
While all whosoever who are miserable in the world
Are so through the wish for the happiness of themselves."

from Bodhisattvacharyavatara, Ch 8, Verse 129
by the Indian Buddhist master Shantideva, 8th century

Answer 7

I fully realize that your religious ilk in your monumental ignorance have again slandered and debased those areligious people and my reply will MATCH your offensive post.


Where the hell did you get the notion that only religious people manifest the morality and ethics of altruism??

More important where the hell did you get the bilge that morality and ethics is solely a function ,a derivative of religion .IT IS NOT !!!!

Morality and ethics evolved merely from human interactions over millennia long before religion perse even existed and developed on the bases of "what worked and what did not work" . .

YOU need to be forced to spend at least three months doing nothing but learning the vile repulsive history of the MORAL AND ETHICAL ATROCITIES/ABOMINATIONS GENOCIDES/CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY,TORTURES,KILLINGS,SLAUGHTERS,LYNCHINGS/BURNINGS that RELIGIONS have been responsible for in only the last two millennia especially CHRISTIANITY.

Atheists and all educated knowledgable others reading your garbage about morality/ethics being a "religious thing",will simply and justifiably "laugh their heads off" at your repulsive religious HOLIER-THAN-THOU attitude.


Most atheists I know are in fact HUMANISTS and I would trust the morality and ethics of a humanist long before any religious operson .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanism


As a Christian YOU now need to PRACTISE WHAT CHRIST TAUGHT YOU and APOLOGIZE to all non-religious people for your insensitive ignorant post.

Answer 8

Altruism cannot exist by prescription. If you're told to do it by a being you fear, it is not altruism.

So, altruism is only possible within a belief system where you develop internal motivations and principles, not through theistic religion at all.

Answer 9

i am an atheist, though i prefer to be called secular humanist. i have no faith in a god or (G)od, i have faith in my fellow human beings. we have to work together to survive, and our inherent nature as social creatures is part of this. we love, care, nurture and do good deeds inherently to ensure the survival of the species. in a way, all good deeds and behavior are selfish acts, we do positive things to avoid the pain of hurt or guilt.... or to make ourselves feel GOOD to some extent. i genuinely feel amazing when i deliver meals to the elderly. i have helped someone in need when others have failed to provide for them. of course, part of the reason i'm doing it is to feel good about myself, but the other part is how i've made another person feel. and why do i avoid negative actions? because of the way they would make OTHERS feel negative, as well as how doing those things would make me feel. i know the world is a much better place when people are happy. and if i'm a happy person as a result of that, great! my morals and ethics do not come from the bible. they don't come from god. they come from within. i have empathy. i have sympathy. these things prevent me from making others feel bad, because i don't want to feel bad. i'm not concerned about burning in hell for eternity if i do something bad. i'm concerned about what my actions would do to others, AND to myself, here, on this earth.

Answer 10

how would you define the fittest? is a man who can lift 500 lbs using his own strength any more fit for survival than a man who can demolish mountains with his intelligence? every member of a species serves a purpose that is beneficial to the survival of that species. the fact that humans have higher brain functions than all other animals is even more reason to be altruistic.